From Soviet Union's Aggressions Against the World, Gen. Oleg Sarin & Col. Lev Dvoretsky, 1996

The State Security Committee of the USSR (KGB) supported Ho Chi Minh’s appeal for help from the Soviet Union. The chairman of the KBG, Victor Shelepin, prepared a detailed report for Brezhnev in which he explained the necessity for immediate aid in Vietnam:

. . . Some trustworthy sources report further escalation of the Vietnam War is expected because of direct American participation in this military conflict. It is necessary to provide urgent help to the DRV and to meet Ho Chi Minh’s request for military and material support. . . .³

Similar reports were prepared by the Foreign Ministry of the USSR headed by Andrei Gromyko and sent to Brezhnev. They coincided in their opinions with those of the KBG. After reading them, Brezhnev called for their discussion at a meeting of the Presidium. The general secretary of the CPSU Central Committee who replaced the deposed Nikita Khruschev was faced with a serious problem.

What should our reaction to developments in Vietnam be? What steps should be taken to demonstrate toughness, resolve, strength, and international solidarity and at the same time prevent the transformation of a local guerilla-type conflict into a global military confrontation between the two great powers? The recent crisis in the Caribbean when the world was on the brink of nuclear war was in the minds of the masters in the Kremlin. This is why Brezhnev dare to act in as blatant a manner as had Stalin in Korea in 1950.

    3. [Russian Foreign Affairs Ministry Archive, 526/5067, Vol. 76], p. 24.

( pages 90-91, note on p. 227 )

 

Today we can speak with certainty about the responsibility of the USSR for its invasion of its southern neighbor. It is clear that the orders for military intervention were issued without considering moral norms and international law. Further, Soviet leadership took this dangerous course of action while underestimating the potential of the Afghan rebels, the Mujahidin (holy warriors). We are still paying for this gross miscalculation on the part of our then leadership. Brezhnev and his cronies erroneously assumed that Soviet soldiers would quickly suppress the rebels and at the same time strengthen the Afghan Army, permitting the Soviet troops to return to Mother Russia.

What actually occurred was that the invasion stirred up the country, letting divergent Afghan groups unite in a common endeavor against both the Soviets and the Afghan government . . .

( page 197 )

Alien wars : the Soviet Union's aggressions
against the world, 1919 to 1989 / Oleg Sarin, Lev Dvoretsky
Novato, CA : Presidio, 1996.