The last Soviet soldier to leave Afghanistan, the face of the Soviet withdrawal
On 15 February 1989, standing on the Friendship Bridge, he told a Soviet TV reporter: "There is not a single Soviet soldier left behind me."
A Soviet general who served three tours in the Soviet–Afghan War and, as the last commander of the 40th Army (1987–1989), directed the Soviet withdrawal. He was made a Hero of the Soviet Union in 1988 for Operation Magistral, which lifted the siege of Khost. On 15 February 1989 he crossed the Friendship Bridge on foot, the last Soviet soldier to leave Afghanistan, the symbolic end of the nine-year war. He went on to command the Kyiv Military District, served as First Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of the USSR, and as Deputy Minister of Defence of Russia. In 1991 he ran for vice-president alongside Nikolai Ryzhkov. In the post-Soviet era he served twelve years as governor of Moscow Oblast, embodying the political transition of the Soviet military elite.
Activities and affiliations
- 1965–1969 Military command · Soviet Union · Military and defence
Career Timeline
- 1965–1969Motorized rifle platoon and company commander, Baltic Military District
- 1972–1978Battalion commander → regiment commander → chief of staff, 9th Motorized Rifle Division, North Caucasus MD
- 1980–1982Commander, 5th Guards Motorized Rifle Division, 40th Army, Afghanistan (first tour)
- 1984First Deputy Commander, 38th Army, Carpathian Military District
- 1985–1986General Staff representative, Afghanistan (second tour)
- 1986–1987Commander, 28th Army, Belorussian Military District
- 1987–1989Commander, 40th Army, Afghanistan (third tour) — directed the Soviet withdrawal
- 1989Commander, Kyiv Military District
- 1990–1991First Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs, USSR
- 1991Vice-presidential candidate, Russian presidential election (running with Nikolai Ryzhkov)
- 1991–1992First Deputy Commander-in-Chief, Soviet Ground Forces
- 1992–1995Deputy Minister of Defence, Russian Federation
- 2000–2012Governor of Moscow Oblast (three terms)
Related historical events
- 1979–1989The Soviet-Afghan War40th Army commander, executed the Soviet withdrawalAs the last commander of the 40th Army, he directed the Soviet withdrawal and on 15 February 1989 crossed the Friendship Bridge on foot, becoming the last Soviet soldier to leave Afghanistan. He was awarded Hero of the Soviet Union for Operation Magistral.
- 1985–1989The New Thinking and the End of the Cold WarCommander of the 40th ArmyCommanded the withdrawal and was the last soldier across the Friendship Bridge on 15 February 1989; swore profusely at Soviet TV crews when they approached, later explaining the words were for the leadership who start wars while others clean up.
Operation Magistral and the Relief of Khost (1988)
The operation that earned Gromov the Hero of the Soviet Union in 1988 was Magistral, the relief of the besieged city of Khost in eastern Afghanistan. As commander of the 40th Army in late 1987, he had to reopen the severed Gardez–Khost road and break a blockade the mujahideen had tightened around the city.
The operation opened with deception. Gromov ordered dummy paratroopers dropped near the Salang pass; when the mujahideen opened fire and revealed their positions, reconnaissance aircraft and airstrikes hit them, followed by a four-hour artillery barrage. On 29 November a motorized rifle regiment made the first ground attack, but it bogged down under heavy fire and counter-attacks and withdrew with severe casualties. A renewed assault on 1 December, this time with an airborne battalion and a battalion of Afghan Commando Forces, captured the high ground above the pass; the mujahideen, threatened with encirclement, abandoned most of their heavy weapons and retreated.
Soviet forces then flew an airborne brigade by helicopter in a night attack to seize Mirujan, and airlifted another brigade into Khost itself to stage a breakout. The mujahideen mined the road and kept up long-range rocket fire and ambushes; in one ambush twenty-four Soviet paratroopers were killed, and Stinger missiles limited Soviet air operations. Even so, the armoured columns entered Khost on 30 December. Outposts holding the Gardez–Khost road open were withdrawn at the end of January.
Militarily Magistral succeeded, but it came too late in the war to have any lasting effect: once the main Soviet force pulled back, mujahideen groups cut Khost off again, as they had since 1981. Gromov received the highest Soviet military award on 3 March 1988 for designing and conducting it, yet the fact that his largest operation bought only a few weeks of open road is a measure of the war's conditions.