The Siachen Glacier lies deep in the Himalayas,near where the borders of India, Pakistan, and China meet. As journalist Myra MacDonald writes in Foreign Policy, this uninhabitable region is also the world's most senseless battleground, another flashpoint in the perennial war of hubris between India and Pakistan.
After their first war following partition in 1947, India and Pakistan agreed to a ceasefire line dividing the disputed territorities of Jammu and Kashmir, and demarcated their positions as far as map grid reference NJ9842, from where it was to be extended "thence north to the glaciers." It seemed almost a moot point; nobody ever expected to fight over Siachen.
An Indian army camp in July 1991, at 16,000 feet.
Actual skirmishes began in 1984. Indian soldiers had been told they were being sent on a short-term mission and now had no idea when they would be going home, while generals flew in on helicopters, had themselves photographed, and left. Some of the men, dragged down by the featureless white of the terrain, began to slip into depression."It's a very small world out there. Imagine living in a white land. All white and no trees," said Dr. Rajesh Bharadwaj, a former army doctor posted to Siachen in 1984. "I remember coming back, the riot of colors that hit me. The green, yes, green is the color you miss most."
An Indian soldier keeps vigil at the Indo-Pakistan border at Siachen on Dec. 25, 2001, at almost 23,000 feet, a point higher than any mountain outside of Asia.
Despite a 2003 ceasefire, India and Pakistan still keep soldiers in the mountains. Indian troops specially trained to guard the Siachen Glacier rehearse for the Republic Day parade in Kolkata on Jan. 22, 2012.
On Apr. 7 2012 an avalanche of thousands of tons of rock, ice, and snow killed 140 people at the Gayari camp on the Pakistani side of the mountain.
A Pakistan Army helicopter carrying President Asif Ali Zardari, Army Chief General Ashfaq Kayani, and other officials flies over the site of the avalanche.
More than 450 rescuers worked at the site near the de facto border with India, though experts have said there is virtually no chance of finding any survivors underneath the 200 feet of debris.
Even with Pakistan's army base at Siachen destroyed, neither side has shown any willingness to compromise. Before talks this week, India's defense minister warned against expecting any breakthrough; India, he said, would explain its "clear-cut position" on Siachen to the Pakistanis.
A Pakistani soldier looks on at the avalanche site during an ongoing search operation at Gayari camp on April 18, 2012.
