How I Started a War

He

spent 77 days in Indian territory, fighting and suffering at elevations of up to 18,000 ft. He is a Pakistani soldier, and this is his account of the combat now under way in Kashmir. India and Pakistan have fought over the region since 1947, when Pakistan became a separate nation. This spring the conflict flamed again. Pakistani officials insist it was started by India, but this soldier's story suggests Pakistan was first to move. The 30-year-old soldier returned to Pakistan in mid-June for reasons he wouldn't specify. Badly sunburned from exposure, he spoke to TIME on condition of anonymity.

In February I was ordered to cross the Line of Control and climb some mountains that the Indians controlled. My commanding officers would not allow me to take my rifle. I was against going to an Indian hill without a weapon, but I saw everybody who was being sent across the Loc was going there empty-handed. We were told it was for the sake of secrecy. It took us three days of walking and climbing to reach the Indian posts. We found they were empty. Our job was to prepare makeshift bunkers.

The first five days were hell. The M-17 military helicopter did not come with our supplies. We just had Energile [a protein-enriched food pack used in high-altitude warfare] and ice. Sometimes we ate ice with sugar.

The skirmishes with the Indians started in May. [By then, weapons had been delivered to the men.] In the early days we mowed down many of them. Those Indians came like ants. First you see four, and you kill them. Then there are 10, then 50, then 100 and then 400. Our fingers got tired of shooting at them. Sometimes they came in such large numbers we were afraid of using up all our ammunition. There is no instant resupply, so you have to be careful. You could see lots of bodies strewn down below or in the gorges. We also suffered a lot of casualties, many more than what officials in Pakistan are claiming. During my stay up there, 17 of my friends died while fighting the Indians.

There is so much exchange of fire that you cannot eat the ice now or drink the water, which is laced with cordite. Soldiers are facing stomach problems because of this. We had no proper bunkers, so we dug a 16-ft. tunnel into the snow. When the Indian shells started landing on us, we would crawl into this tunnel for safety. You don't get enough space to spread your legs in the tents. You always sleep sitting up. Sometimes there is so much firing, you cannot relieve yourself even if you want to.

On the ridges now we have disposable rocket launchers, surface-to-air missiles and machine guns, including antiaircraft guns. On one occasion I was positioned on a mountain facing the Drass-Kargil highway. It's fun to target the Indian convoys.

Our officers are very strict. I saw a young soldier die in front of me because of altitude sickness. This soldier came from the plains. He fell sick soon after coming up. He offered our commanding officer 200,000 rupees [about $4,000] to let him go down, but the offer was refused. He died four days later. We didn't know his name.

If you die up in the mountains, there is no way to lift your body and take it down. The men who are fighting on those ridges know that they are in a hole from which they cannot come out alive. There are a rare few like me who somehow by fate got the chance to leave the mountains.