World: It will be like Viet Nam

For all its efforts to lessen the impact of the Afghanistan invasion on Soviet citizens, the Kremlin leadership is beginning to discover that the war has caused considerable disquiet and difficulties on the home front. Although there are no credible casualty figures, Dissident Andrei Sakharov has spoken of "thousands" of Soviet deaths; relatives and friends of soldiers have become uncomfortably aware that the number of casualties is high. According to Moscow-based European diplomats, Soviet authorities have stopped burying soldiers with full military honors in an apparent attempt to divert attention from the deaths....

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