Gen. Daud studied engineering in college. After graduating college in the 1980s he joined the forces of Ahmad Shah Massoud against the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. After the retreat of Soviet troops and the defeat of the Afghan communist regime, Gen. Daud remained in Takhar province of Afghanistan. Ahmad Shah Massoud had ordered him to guard northern areas and to keep his forces out of the capital Kabul. When the Taliban took power in Kabul, General Daud served as a leading military commander of the anti-Taliban United Front under the command of Ahmad Shah Massoud, which later spearheaded the defeat of the Taliban. In October 2001, Gen. Daud was directly responsible for retaking the city of Kunduz from an Al Qaeda-Taliban alliance.
After the fall of the Taliban regime, he was appointed a Deputy Interior Minister for Counter Narcotics in Afghanistan. His campaign against poppy cultivation was successful in several provinces such as Logar, Ghazni, Wardak, Paktia, Paktika and Panjshir.
In 2010, he was appointed police chief of 8 northern provinces. Daud commanded all Interior Ministry forces in the north, including his own elite force of police commandos, Pamir 303. Considered one of the most effective opponents of the Taliban he was a high profile target. Gen. Daud was assassinated by a Taliban suicide bomber on May 28, 2011 in an attack in Taloqan, Afghanistan, in which six other people also lost their lives. Before his assassination, Gen. Daud was quoted as saying:
"After Mawlana Saidkhaili [Abdul Rahman Saidkhaili], I accepted to be killed while serving my people. I say this every morning when I leave my home and I am ready to be killed."
—Gen. Mohammad Daud Daud, 2011
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