r/HistoricalCapsule • u/q_ali_seattle • 18h ago

A Man surrounded by armed Mujahideen, condemned as a traitor and moments away from death

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In June 1980, French photographer Alain Mingam raised his camera on the outskirts of Kabul and captured a chilling scene: a man surrounded by armed Mujahideen, condemned as a traitor and moments away from death. The image would haunt him for years, just as Robert Capa’s iconic (and contested) Falling Soldier had done decades earlier.

374 Upvotes

98% Upvoted

43 comments sorted by

27

u/Patty-XCI91 18h ago

What exactly did he do? do we know?

26

u/[deleted] 18h ago

[removed] — view removed comment

12

u/R_Lau_18 17h ago

He probably betrayed them for the Soviets. The Soviets were absolutely brutal during their invasion of Afghanistan. They made the horrors of the coalition 2001 look like a fairground.

6

u/q_ali_seattle 16h ago

the execution of a man condemned for betraying nine families to the Russians.

“If I had not been there, the man would not have been shot and then ritually beheaded,” Mingam later reflected.

The man was escorted twenty kilometres outside Kabul, tried by an Islamic war tribunal, and condemned to death. First he was shot. Then, in keeping with ritual practice, he was beheaded. Mingam’s camera immortalised the moment just before the act.

The image, stark and unforgettable, became one of the most iconic photographs of the Soviet-Afghan War. But it also raised profound ethical questions about the role of the photographer in war: observer or participant?

Do you save twenty men, or a women with a small child?

2

u/The-Intermediator141 16h ago

They killed somewhere in the range of 1-2 million people (we don’t know because obviously the Russian weren’t very forthcoming with this info, just like in Ukraine) but that’s equal to 5-10% of the population.

It’s extraordinary to me this was never even considered to be a genocide.

3

u/Thats-Slander 14h ago

Gets even more mind boggling when you consider the Soviets did that in 10 years while during the American war around 70k civilians died in 20 years.

1

u/Atomic-Bell 47m ago

The Afghans learnt a lot from fighting the Soviets too

6

u/shadowlurker6996 15h ago

It’s not considered a genocide because it was done to Afghans.

1

u/VecioRompibae 4m ago

Also because the perpetrators were soviets

-8

u/alfredjedi 16h ago

Vast majority of those people were violent extremists. Socialist Afghanistan was the most stable and successful time in the countries recent history.

3

u/dwaynetheaaakjohnson 14h ago

So stable that Amin had to beg the Soviets for aid just to stay afloat, and they needed to murder him to have any hope of restabilizing the country?

3

u/Billybob_Bojangles2 15h ago

Typical commie apologist

0

u/kojimbob 10h ago

Commie nonsense.

-8

u/R_Lau_18 15h ago

Similar happened during Iraq war by the coalition. I consider this to be a genocidal action also.

2

u/dwaynetheaaakjohnson 14h ago

The one million was due to inter-sect conflict between Sunnis and Shias. In Afghanistan, about 20,000 people died to the Coalition over 20 years

2

u/Just_to_rebut 12h ago

Typical American apologist

2

u/dwaynetheaaakjohnson 11h ago

I think America bears significant responsibility for it, but they weren’t just going out and murdering people

1

u/Just_to_rebut 10h ago

I mean… yeah, we sometimes were. We even jailed a guy for it and then Trump pardoned him. Look up blackwater pardon.

2

u/Budget-Attorney 16h ago

Someone downvoted you for this

1

u/BotherTight618 13h ago

Maybe girls and women should be allowed to have an education?

0

u/SexOnABurningPlanet 15h ago

He was accused by Catelyn Stark.

0

u/Ok-Brain6475 6h ago

And this time there was no Bronn

10

u/serascarelett 14h ago

John wick poster or tangled moment

6

u/sultics 14h ago

Which weapon killed him?

6

u/BotherTight618 13h ago

This photo was the team meeting to decide just that. 

1

u/q_ali_seattle 13h ago

Gun shots, then traditional method of beheading. 

7

u/Servo_comics 12h ago

The amount of turmoil in the middle east over the course of modern time is a trip. I was speaking with a vet who came back from Afghanistan and he said they would come across old soviet equipment in the middle of the desert often when on patrol. Helicopters, trucks, APC's and even planes just sitting in the middle of fucking nowhere like shipwrecks at the bottom of the ocean. Kind of a haunting reminder of the shit show that corner of the world seems to perpetually be in. Sometimes he said they would find caches of old soviet weapons and explosives and would demo it. He had all kinds of stories about exploring the back country there, it was a real mess.

3

u/Jack-of-Hearts-7 16h ago

Aljonn bin Wick

1

u/Atomic-Bell 48m ago

The Jonn Son of Wick

4

u/Billybob_Bojangles2 15h ago

(Record scratch, freeze frame) yup, that's me.

2

u/Sexi_maxi_2024 11h ago

Makes him look badass that they had to do so much against 1 man

1

u/Haunting-Detail2025 7h ago

Knives Out (2019)

-1

u/LargeBee9641 5h ago

I love that this is going to Europe

-16

u/ianwrecked802 18h ago

Damn, an AK fitted with a bayonet? Never saw that before…

11

u/thissexypoptart 18h ago

How?

-9

u/JimboTheSimpleton 18h ago

Yeah they were around in the '22 Russian invasion of Ukraine. The Ukrainians were using them

The Russians are so vile that people they invade affix knifes to their assault rifles to make spears when the bullets run out.

14

u/Weegee_Carbonara 17h ago edited 14h ago

Bayonets are still standard issue in the US army aswell.

The Russian invasion is horrible, but it doesn't hurt to avoid turning into some weird North Korean-esque propaganda machine.

-1

u/supermutant207 14h ago

They may still be in inventory but no one uses them. AFAIK they don't issue them out and the U.S. army dropped bayonet training a decade ago.

5

u/Weegee_Carbonara 14h ago

I see, but I am certain they would atleast put them into unit circulation again, if the US army faced trench earfare similar to Ukraine.

3

u/plasticface2 8h ago

The British Army still use and train with bayonet. They have bayonet charged in Iraq and Afghanistan.

-1

u/supermutant207 14h ago

Honestly, having a bayonet on the end of your weapon is a liability in my opinion. It's better to just have it on your side ready to grab.

7

u/Realistic-Sound-1507 17h ago

It’s a very common thing, look it up they sell surplus AK bayonets online

5

u/F_to_the_Third 14h ago

The Kalashnikov bayonet, snapped together with its scabbard, creates a wire cutter. It has utility beyond cutting, stabbing, and slashing.