allies. He, like Soviet leaders before him, considered only a dignified withdrawal to be acceptable. This necessitated the creation of stability within Afghanistan, which the Soviet Union would attempt to accomplish until its eventual withdrawal in 1988-9. Three objectives were viewed by Gorbachev as conditions needed for withdrawal: internal stability, limited foreign intervention, and international recognition of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan's Communist government. Policy of national reconciliation After the death of Leonid Brezhnev, the political will for Soviet involvement in Afghanistan dwindled. The level of Soviet forces in the country was not adequate to achieve exhaustive military victory, and could only prevent the allied DRA from losing ground. The Soviet Union began the gradual process of withdrawal from Afghanistan by instating Muhammed Najibullah Ahmadzai as the General Secretary of the Afghan Communist Party, seeing him to be capable of ruling without serious involvement from the Soviet Union. Babrak Karmal, Najibullah's predecessor, was deemed by the Soviet leadership to be an obstacle to both military withdrawal and the diplomatic process. Although Soviet military, diplomatic and intelligence agencies were not singleminded about his appointment, Najibullah was seen as a leader that could work with the Soviet Union in order to find a negotiated settlement. Mirroring shifts within the USSR itself, the Soviet effort in Afghanistan placed "a much greater emphasis on pacification through winning over rebel commanders" rather than transforming "Afghanistan along Marxist lines [,] winning over the population through economic incentives and establishing a party and government influence in the cities and countryside". As a whole, the policies the Soviet Union and their allies powers in Afghanistan pursued after the transition of power from Babrak to Najibullah were referred to as the Policy of National Reconciliation To achieve reconciliation, the Soviet Union dedicated a serious effort to helping the Najibullah government establish relations with rebel factions, sent record packages of aid, and promised that "absolutely all of the military infrastructure would be handed over to the DRA armed forces" upon Soviet withdrawal. Najibullah achieved considerable success in reinvigorating the government security apparatus, and consolidating his power within the state. This, however, may have encouraged the Soviets to place excessive trust in Najibullah, and did not achieve the primary objective: meaningfully incorporating the opposition into Najibullah's support base. Kalinovsky writes: Vadim Kirpichenko, deputy chief of the KGB First Directorate, later wrote that Najibullah's success in establishing more control within Kabul and