[Meenepek]

Saltoro, not Siachen

Having occupied the commanding heights of Siachen glacier, the Indian Army has no reason to vacate them to make life easier for the Pakistani Army.


On April 13, 1984, India began its most audacious military campaign when troops of the Kumaon Regiment were pushed up the heights of Siachen glacier. It is now 28 years to the day India launched ‘Operation Meghdoot’, the official name given to the military campaign on the world’s highest battleground. By sending troops in April, prematurely in mountaineering parlance, India wrested the initiative from Pakistan which had planned to send its soldiers sometime later in May 1984. By the time they began their climb the Indian Army was already ensconced on the heights, with the Indian Air Force undertaking air supply sorties. In the 28 years since that day, the Army has only increased its presence on the heights, gaining territory in the process. And the Air Force has only increased its expertise and experience in maintaining troops at those heights. Army aviation has also been an invaluable contributor to the war effort in Siachen.

The Siachen conflict began because of incomplete cartographic commitments between India and Pakistan. In delineating and describing the Line of Control, military and diplomatic officials of both countries erred in ending the narrative at NJ 9842, followed by ‘thence north to the glaciers’, the most oft-quoted cartographic blunder. Even the Simla Agreement repeated the same error, and this despite the first battles already fought over the heights north of the Srinagar-Leh highway. International mountaineering expeditions then began to seek permission from Islamabad to climb in this area, all on the basis of American maps that depicted Siachen as under Pakistan’s control. Protests and counter-protests at the diplomatic level remained unanswered. Thus began the military stakes in the conflict. It took a late August 1983 coming together of the Ladakh Scouts and the Pakistani Army’s Special Services Group that finally clinched it for both countries.


Preparations began immediately for the eventual escalation during the next climbing season. Except that the Indian Army moved in before the Pakistani Army could. Bullets now came to be traded where once words were used to carry the message. In the process, as in all conflicts with Pakistan, India has only gained ground — most notably in 1987 when the 8 Jammu & Kashmir Light Infantry bested the Pakistani Army’s SSG at insurmountable heights, using extraordinary mountaineering skills. That action so bruised the ego of then Brigadier Pervez Musharraf that in 1999 he launched the Pakistani Army into ‘Operation Badr’ to take the heights of Kargil. The motivation was to occupy the heights, deny India road supply movement to Leh, and in the process squeeze the Army out of its heights in Siachen. None of it worked, of course. And India continues to dominate the heights, in Kargil and across Siachen.


The Indian Army is not on Siachen but to its west, on the Saltoro ridgeline. This is where the bull in the china shop comes into play. The occupation of heights by the Army has followed the principle laid out in the agreement delineating the Line of Control — ‘thence north to the glaciers’. For the Indian positions from NJ9842 are pretty much along the line north. This is now called Actual Ground Position Line; the bugbear in Pakistan’s claims, for it leaves Siachen well to the east. Pakistan’s interpretation of ‘thence north to the glaciers’ is actually in an east-north-east direction, ending on the Karakoram Pass. It barely touches the southern end of the Siachen glacier. The dispute, then, is really about what constitutes ‘north to the glaciers’. And in that disagreement over the direction of the LoC rests the solution to the Siachen conflict. Since Pakistan does not want to accept the AGPL principle, and India does not want to vacate without a formal written agreement, the dispute lingers. The Kargil conflict was thrust on India despite an agreement on what constituted the LoC in that sector. Here, however, there is yet to be an agreement.