Kremlin Warns Afghan Rebels: Retaliation Will Be ‘Resolute’

MOSCOW — Reporting the deaths of 10 Soviet soldiers in a rocket barrage on Kabul airport over the weekend, the Soviet Union warned Tuesday that “the retaliation will be most resolute” for any further attacks on its forces by Muslim rebels fighting the Soviet-backed government in Afghanistan.

The blunt, angry warning, the most severe of Moscow’s recent statements on the escalating fighting in Afghanistan, could foreshadow major Soviet military actions despite the Kremlin’s pledge, now apparently suspended, to disengage its forces by Feb. 15 from the Afghan conflict and withdraw the 50,000 who now remain.

“Our troops are leaving the country, but they cannot remain indifferent to such sorties,” Gennady I. Gerasimov, the chief Foreign Ministry spokesman, said in a formal statement. “Even more, we cannot allow Soviet people to be killed as a result of such actions. The retaliation will be most resolute.”

The Soviet Union called upon Pakistan and the United States--which armed, trained and financed the Afghan guerrillas and which Moscow accused of “actual connivance” in the current rebel offensive--to “consider the extremely grave aftermaths that may be brought about by such actions.” It called upon the two nations to “exert their influence to prevent the opposition from such further bandit actions.”

Reagan Meeting With Rebel

“There is no doubt that the Afghan opposition would never have dared to take such provocatively criminal actions if not for outside backing,” Gerasimov said, noting later that President Reagan had received a prominent guerrilla leader at the White House last week.

Soviet forces had already delivered “a retaliatory blow” at the rebels, known as moujahedeen, after they rocketed and shelled Kabul airport Sunday, apparently in the hope of hitting a civilian airliner during takeoff.

In addition to the 10 Soviet soldiers killed, one of the highest casualty figure reported in months, 11 others were seriously wounded, the statement said.

Moscow dramatically increased the firepower of the Afghan government’s army with the deployment of Scud-B surface-to-surface missiles, which have already been used against moujahedeen camps and storage areas.

It has also strengthened its own forces in Afghanistan and in adjacent areas of the Soviet Union by rotating units with more modern weapons into the war zone to replace those finishing their tours.

And earlier this month, the Soviet Foreign Ministry announced that the troop withdrawal, begun in May under an agreement signed last April by Afghanistan and Pakistan and guaranteed by the Soviet Union and the United States, had been suspended because of the deteriorating military situation.

At the same time, however, Moscow assigned one of its top diplomats, Yuli M. Vorontsov, a first deputy foreign minister, as ambassador to Kabul to bring together those politically influential opposition figures ready to form a government of national unity.

Moscow also allocated $600 million for the resettlement of Afghan refugees as part of the broader effort to achieve a political resolution of the conflict.

Rocket bombardments of Kabul have become increasingly frequent in recent months as the rebels move progressively closer to the Afghan capital and gradually build base areas there that are secure from the government army.