The Coldest War (Cont.) | Outside Online

You Are Here:

Home >> The Coldest War (Cont.)

Today's Question
How do you make primitive snowshoes? answer

What should you do if you get lost driving in a snow storm? answer

Today's Question
What is the greenest ski and snowboard on the market? answer

Can I really damage a coral reef with sunscreen while snorkeling? answer

What kind of dog will make me look manlier? answer
Is there a sport that safely combines my twin passions for guns and kayaks? answer
How come most of the world's cultures enjoy eating goat, but Americans don't? answer

Online Favorites

Special Issues

Photo Galleries

Outside Magazine February 2003

Page:

The Coldest War (Cont.)


	Shelter from the storm: a Pakistani igloo on the way to Sher Post (Teru Kuwayama)

THE ARTILLERY FIRE HAD BEEN so fierce during the summer of 2002 that the Pakistani top brass delayed our trek to the front. But on our third day at Ghyari, they gave the go-ahead: We would be escorted by a squad of eight soldiers who had been ordered to relieve Captain Yasin Rafiq, the commander of a post called Sher.

Sher is perched at 19,600 feet on a ridge at the head of the Chumik Glacier, a short, steep tributary that comes crashing down into the Bilafond Glacier from the northeast and is one of the few Pakistani positions on the Saltoro that commands the high ground. It took us three days to hike there. On the third day, we reached a field of metal shards from exploded Indian artillery shells. Soaring above us was a huge crescent-shaped saddle. To get to its crest—where we could see the tiny black spot that was Sher—we had to ascend a thousand-foot snow-and-ice wall, pulling ourselves up on fixed ropes.

At the top, we caught our breath beside an 81mm mortar tube, then stepped into the post itself. Sher is only about 12 feet wide and 40 feet long. On one side are two fiberglass igloos where the men eat, cook, and sleep. On the other are a hulking 14.5mm Chinese-made anti-aircraft gun, a machine-gun bunker, and, higher up the ridge, a tiny observation post. We hobbled across 12 feet of frozen mud, stepped up to a stretch of rope serving as a guardrail, and stared down a 3,500-foot drop to the Indian front lines.

We were greeted by Captain Yasin, 29, who had been at his post for 82 days. Yasin pointed out an Indian supply base less than three miles away on the glacier below (from this distance, it was a brown spot on the ice), an Indian seasonal observation post (which we couldn't see), and an Indian helicopter route. He announced grandly that this was the first time foreigners had been permitted to visit Sher.



	An Indian supply drop at Camp II on the Siachen (Teru Kuwayama)

Above the post, the ridge rose to a massive double peak called Naveed Top. In April 1989, the Indian army launched a mission known as Operation Ibex; its aim was to capture this peak and force the Pakistanis to vacate the entire upper portion of the Chumik Glacier. Three teams of Pakistani soldiers attempted to reach the summit to thwart the Indian operation and failed; one team was wiped out by an avalanche, the others halted by overhanging seracs. A last-ditch decision was made to airlift troops to a point just below the top of the 22,185-foot mountain using French Lama helicopters designed to fly no higher than 21,000 feet.

The air was so thin, the pilots feared they would crash if they attempted to hover. So after stripping as much excess weight as they could, they used a maneuver called a "running drop," which required an individual soldier dangling from the bottom to be dropped onto the peak as they passed over. The first to make it was a 29-year-old lieutenant named Naveed-ur-Rehman. He was soon joined by a sergeant named Mohammed Yakub. But then a storm blew in and both men were forced to huddle on the mountain without supplies for two nights.

"The wind was so strong," Naveed, who is now a major, later told me, "that we had to dig in our heels to avoid being carried away." Over the next 40 days, six choppers relayed 86 soldiers and 38 tons of supplies onto the peak. Two Pakistani soldiers died and 30 were wounded during the defense of Naveed Top. That May—after the Indian advance was halted by a massive avalanche that killed a large number of their troops—both sides agreed to demilitarize the summit.

Or so say the Pakistanis. To this day, the Indian army denies that any of this ever happened.

That evening, after the sun went down, the men at Sher all crammed into the largest igloo for what Captain Yasin called "after-dinner discussion." It began with the sergeant, or havildar, thumping out a beat on an empty jerry can using a carabiner. The men began singing in Pashto, while Yasin—who is a hafiz, which means he has memorized the entire Koran—translated for me. It was a song about the cruelty of beautiful women, he said, about the rigidity of their hearts and the shallowness of their sincerity. Then the men shifted to Urdu, the language of the Mogul poets and Sufi mystics. They sang of how the affection between men and women has the power to transcend social caste. They sang about an aspect of love so complex and subtle that Yasin said it was impossible to translate and advised me to just sit back and enjoy the music.

After the singing stopped, Yasin and I stepped outside. The moon was surrounded by a rainbow-colored ring, harbinger of a storm, and the peaks were cast in a milky glow. From the shadows came a disembodied voice in Urdu.

"Beautiful night, sir."

"Mehboob, is that you?" said Yasin to a lone sentry who had volunteered to stand watch so that his companions could hobnob with the guests.

"Sir."

"Captain," I said, "could you ask Mehboob what it feels like to stand watch on a night like this?"

Yasin asked, and the reply came floating down.

"Mehboob says that a night such as this makes him feel good because he can see forever, and this helps him to perform his duty of observing the enemy. And he also says that the moonlight gives him a feeling of much refreshness."

"Refreshness?"

"Yes. Much refreshness."

Before ducking back inside, I took a long look. Somewhere out there, roughly 14 miles to the northeast, lay the Siachen—the heart of the conflict. To reach it, we would have to retrace our steps back to Islamabad; fly to Dubai, then to New Delhi, and then to Ladakh, the most remote and northern part of Kashmir; and from there drive up to the glacier—a loop of more than 3,000 miles to get to a place I could almost see from where I stood. All because of a four-inch line on a map.

Page: