Mohammed Daoud Khan in the context of "Republic of Afghanistan (1973–1978)"

Abdul Karim Mustaghni (Dari: عبدالکریم مستغنی, July 11, 1911 – January 13, 2004) was an Afghan scientist, military officer and politician. Mustaghni was Defense Minister of Afghanistan from 1973 to 1977. Mustaghni assisted Mohammed Daoud Khan in the 1973 bloodless coup against the monarchy of Mohammed Zahir Shah. Zahir and his ministers were aware of a possible coup plot, but Mustaghni, fully aware of the plans, misled them into believing that the coup would occur months later, allowing the coup to occur while Zahir and several of his key ministers were out of country.

Mustaghni was the son of Afghan poet Abdul Ali Mustaghni.

Ahmad Shah Massoud (2 September 1953 – 9 September 2001) was an Afghan military leader and politician. Known as the "Lion of Panjshir", he was the foremost commander of Afghan mujahideen against the Soviet occupation during the Soviet–Afghan War from 1979 to 1989. In the 1990s, he led the government's military wing against rival militias, and actively fought against the Taliban and their Al-Qaeda allies, from the time the regime rose to power in 1996, and until his assassination in 2001.

Massoud came from a Tajik Sunni Muslim background in the Panjshir Valley in northern Afghanistan. He began studying engineering at Polytechnical University of Kabul in the 1970s, where he became involved with religious anti-communist movements around Burhanuddin Rabbani, a leading Islamist. He participated in a failed uprising against Mohammed Daoud Khan's government. He later joined Rabbani's Jamiat-e Islami party. During the Soviet–Afghan War, he successfully resisted the Soviets from taking the Panjshir Valley. In 1992, he signed the Peshawar Accord, a peace and power-sharing agreement, in the post-communist Islamic State of Afghanistan. He was appointed the Minister of Defense as well as the government's main military commander. The accord was opposed by Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and other warlords, initiating the Second Afghan Civil War.

Abdul Ali Mustaghni (1875–1933) was an Afghan poet. He is one of the most influential poets in modern Persian literature. He was named as the "founder of Pashto modern literature of the country" by President Hamid Karzai.

Abdul Karim Mustaghni, who assisted Mohammed Daoud Khan in the 1973 coup against Mohammed Zahir Shah, was Abdul Ali Mustaghni's son.