The Brutal History of Russia's Alpha Group Special Forces

Here's What You Need to Remember: Alpha Group survived the collapse of the Soviet Union and currently operates under the auspices of the FSB, the successor to the KGB. Yet its confrontation with Hezbollah during the hostage crisis in Lebanon remains one of its most widely discussed, and strikingly brutal, operations.

Russia and the Lebanese Islamic militia Hezbollah have become close allies in the civil war in Syria, with both of them supporting the regime of Syrian President Bashar Al Assad in the conflict.

Their relationship has not always been so friendly.

When members of Hezbollah kidnapped four Russian diplomats in 1985, killing one of them, Russia dispatched the KGB's Alpha Group to deal with the situation.

Alpha Group is part spy network, part counterterrorism team, part general-purpose commando squad — and entirely terrifying.

It first gained notoriety for leading the assault on the presidential palace in Kabul during the initial phases of Russia's invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. Throughout the 1980s and '90s, its members participated in several high-publicity take-downs of terrorists, insurgents and kidnappers.

When the KGB and parts of the Soviet military attempted a coup in 1990, members of Alpha Group were given the job of securing the parliament in Moscow and neutralizing then-president Boris Yeltsin.

Alpha Group survived the collapse of the Soviet Union and currently operates under the auspices of the FSB, the successor to the KGB. Yet its confrontation with Hezbollah during the hostage crisis in Lebanon remains one of its most widely discussed, and strikingly brutal, operations.

The KGB created Alpha Group — or Spetsgruppa A —in 1974 in response to the Black September attacks at the Munich Olympics two years earlier.

Eight terrorists linked to the Palestinian Liberation Front had infiltrated the Olympic Village, killed two Israeli athletes and took several others hostage. West German police botched a rescue attempt at a NATO airport hours later. Nine more Israelis died there, along with five of the terrorists and a West German police officer.

Alpha Group formed in the fiasco's aftermath. But the group quickly took on a broader role than mere counterterrorism.

When the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979, Alpha Group and the KGB's Zenith Group, another special forces unit, led a contingent of 700 troops in the assault on the Tajbeg Palace in Kabul, according to David Cox in his book Close Protection: The Politics of Guarding Russia's Rulers.

The commandos entered the country under the auspices of protecting the Russian embassy. The assault on Tajbeg Palace on Dec. 27, 1979 was the first phase of the Soviet invasion. Afghan president Hafizullah Amin was hosting a party at the palace that evening. Numerous civilian guests and palace residents, including women and children, were present when the assault began.

A special forces officer who participated in the raid told the BBC in 2009 that the officers in charge ordered soldiers to kill everyone in the building.

"I was a Soviet soldier," Rustam Tursunkulov recalled. "We were trained to accept orders without question. I was in the special forces — it's the worst job."

An Afghan named Najiba was inside the palace when the Soviets arrived. She was only 11 years old at the time. "The things I saw," Najiba told the BBC. "My God — people on the floor. I saw a person … like a scene from a nightmare movie. Dead bodies. Lots."

"Please try to understand that when there's a battle going on, it's hard to know there are children there," Tursunkulov explained. "In any army there has to be someone who'll do the harshest, most horrible tasks. Unfortunately, it's not soldiers, but politicians who make wars."

Amin's 11-year-old son was killed in the attack on the palace, and Amin himself either died during the action or soon afterward — perhaps executed. According to Tursunkulov, the bodies of everyone killed in the palace were wrapped in carpets and buried nearby without ceremony.

Alpha Group continued to lead KGB efforts in domestic counterterrorism and counterintelligence through the 1980s. The unit targeted CIA agents and operatives and led the raid against the hijackers of Aeroflot Flight 6833 in Tbilisi, Georgia in 1983. They killed three of the hijackers and captured the rest, but lost five hostages.

It was the group's involvement in a 1985 hostage crisis in Lebanon that earned the Alpha Group an international reputation as a vicious — but effective — counterterror unit.

On Sept. 20, 1985, the Islamic Liberation Organization, a part of H

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