Defense of the Revolution

Defense of the Revolution was a term used for paramilitary units created by the Communist Afghanistan government following the 1978 Saur Revolution, with the intent of mobilizing the population to find counter-revolutionaries and other enemies of the communist state. These units were officially volunteer, and based on the "Cuban model"; they were armed by the government and employed to guard sensitive infrastructure and maintain public order. Some reports indicate volunteers received incentives such as coupons for government stores. Editorials in the Soviet journal Pravda praised these defensive formations as early as mid-1979.

Bruce Amstutz documents DotR units composed of teenage urban males, numering 20,000 on paper in the mid-1980s, who received US$162 per month for supporting the security forces. Other academics have commented on female members of DotR units.

Early organization
Hafizullah Amin, General Secretary of the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan, had established the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution, later reorganized into the National Organization for the Defense of the Revolution. Despite extensive coverage in Afghan media, following the December 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, all mention of the NODR disappeared. Amin was assassinated in the takeover, and the core staff who had developed the NODR were executed or disappeared. Anthony Arnold suggests that the Soviets considered a loosely accountable body of armed groups to be undesirable during their occupation.