Who are the Mujahidin? It is possible to distinguish between three categories of fighters. The armed resistance, men who have enrolled permanently (maslaki: “professionals”, nizami: “soldiers”, mutaharek or sayyar. “mobile troops”), number some 150,000 for the whole of Afghanistan, that is to say as many as the Russians had in 1983. Next come the part-time soldiers (mahalli: “locals”, molki: “civilian forces”), generally belonging to one of the parties and organised by a local base, but who are only mobilised in a crisis and who meanwhile cultivate the land. Finally, every Afghan who has a weapon and lives in the liberated zones is potentially a mujahid. It is the first category which we shall concentrate on here.

The active members of the resistance are always organised at a local level by bases which are much alike in all parts of the country, whether they are functioning in tribal zones or not and whichever party they represent. Nevertheless, whenever it is a question of engaging in a higher level of combat, divergences begin to appear in the way of thinking, the outlook and in organisational structure.

The general characteristics of the military organization

Bases, networks and areas

To plan a military strategy, it is necessary to go beyond the purely local level and to be able to operate on a regional, or even on a national, scale, and this means facing up to the problem of the qawm with all its potential for creating division.