Analysis of information sources in references of the Wikipedia article "جنگ داخلی افغانستان (۱۹۲۹-۱۹۲۸)" in Persian language version.
In 1929 Stalin sent 1,000 Red Army soldiers into Afghanistan disguised as Afghan soldiers to operate jointly with some of Khan's loyalists, according to Lyakhovsky's book and a 1999 article in Rodina by Pavel Aptekar. The joint Soviet-Afghan unit took Mazar-i-Sharif in April 1929, but Stalin then had to recall his troops after learning that Khan had fled to India.