archive: In Enemy Territory: A Soldier's Story
In Enemy Territory: A Soldier's Story
First person
TIME Magazine, ASIA Edition
July 12, 1999
Title: In Enemy Territory: A Soldier's Story
Author: First person
Publication: TIME Magazine, ASIA Edition
Date: July 12, 1999
He spent 77 days on Indian territory, fighting and suffering at
elevations of up to 5,400m on one of the highest battlefields in the
world. He is a Pakistani soldier, and this is his own account of the
combat near Kargil. His story contradicts Islamabad's official claim
that it has never sent troops across the Line of Control that divides
Kashmir. The 30-year-old soldier returned to Pakistan in mid-June for
reasons he wouldn't specify. Thin, bearded and badly sunburned from
exposure in the mountains, he spoke to TIME on the condition of
anonymity, for fear of being court-martialed.
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 AK-47 rifle. I was against going to an Indian
hill without a weapon, but I saw that 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 near Kargil. We found they were empty, and our job was to
prepare some makeshift bunkers. All we had were tents.
The first five days were hell. The M-17 military helicopter did not
come with our food supplies. We just had Energile [a protein-enriched
food pack used in high-altitude warfare] and ice. Sometimes we ate ice
with sugar. There was jubilation when the helicopter came with real
food.
The skirmishes with the Indians started in May. In the early days we
mowed down many of them. Those Indians were crazy. They 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.
We felt sorry for 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 very careful. We were always worried that
we would use up all our ammunition on one attacking Indian party and
would have none left when a new group came. But God was always with
us. You could see lots of bodies strewn down below or in the gorges.
They were just rotting there. We also suffered a lot of casualties,
many more than 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. Even the streams down
below the mountains are contaminated. Lots of soldiers are facing
stomach problems because of this. We had no proper bunkers, so we dug
a 5-m 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 anti-aircraft 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. A young soldier from Punjab died in
front of me because of altitude sickness. The 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. I
tried to find out, but they refused to tell me. If you die up in the
mountains, there is no way to lift your body and take it down. Most of
the time we slide the bodies downward. All the men who are fighting on
those ridges know that they are in a hole from which they cannot come
out alive. You can only return dead. There are a rare few like me, who
somehow by fate got the chance to leave the mountains.
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