National Geographic - USA (2021-03)

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from the fledgling Pakistan Army, began mov-

ing toward the maharaja’s palace in Srinagar to

claim Kashmir for Pakistan. The maharaja pan-

icked and signed an Instrument of Accession

to India. India responded with a military airlift

and stopped the militias. Within weeks the new

countries were at war.

When the dust settled, the opposing armies

faced off along a hilly cease-fire line that wound

through the middle of Kashmir. After a treaty

brokered by the United Nations in 1949, teams

of military surveyors from India and Pakistan,

under UN supervision, set out to determine the

cease-fire line. Both sides agreed it would be a

placeholder until further negotiations could set

a permanent border. But years went by without

progress. Then in 1962, Chinese forces seized the

Aksai Chin, a high desert region in the eastern

corner of Kashmir, which further muddled the

border question. 

When Weathersby’s airgram arrived in 1968,

this was the complicated question Hodgson

faced: How should the United States show this

flummoxed state of affairs on its maps? If he

went by Indian officials’ claims, all of Kashmir

legally belonged to India because of the Instru-

ment of Accession the maharaja had signed.

If he followed UN Resolution 47, as Pakistan

argued, Kashmir was a separate entity, still

awaiting a public referendum to decide which

country to join. If he reflected the actual situa-

tion on the ground, Kashmir was sliced in two,

under the de facto jurisdiction of the armies of

India and Pakistan, with a small corner con-

trolled by China.

THROUGHOUT THE 1960 s, Indian diplomats

protested how U.S. maps depicted Kashmir as

being occupied territory or separate from the

rest of India. “The correct position is that the

entire State of Jammu and Kashmir is legally an

integral part of India, with Pakistan and China

in illegal occupation of areas west and north of

the ceasefire line,” read a 1966 objection. 

After Partition, the U.S. and Pakistan had

become Cold War allies, so it might seem that

the U.S. would favor Pakistan in such a dispute.

50 km

50 mi

Srinagar

Muzaffarabad

Abbottabad

Chandigarh

Islamabad

Amritsar

Shimla

Gilgit

Leh

Skardu

Jammu

Boundary claimed by

China

claimBoundary ed by

India

Boundary claimed by

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claimBoundaryed by

Pakistan

Undefined

MAP V

IEW AT

(^) LEFT
Hodgson’s line
Line of Control
Actual Ground
Position Line
Indu
s
Indus
Shy
ok Nu
bra
SiachenGlacierSiachenGlacier
H I M A L A Y A
KAR
AK
OR
AM
(^)
(^) R
AN
GE
HINDU^ KUSH KUNLUN^ MOUNTAINS
AKSAI CHIN
GILGIT-
BALTISTAN
JAMMU LADAKH
AND KASHMIR
AZA
D^ KASHMIR

K

A

S

H

M

I R

K

A

S

H

M

I R

CHINA

INDIA

PAKISTAN

AFGHANISTAN

TAJIKISTAN

Line of Control Actual Ground Position Line Hodgson’s line

India and Pakistan agreed to a
cease-fire line in Kashmir in 1949;
it was the basis for the Line of
Control set in 1972. It stops short
of the formerly uninhabited area
of the Siachen Glacier, leaving
a gap near the Chinese border.

Kashmir

India and Pakistan both claim Kashmir. India admin-

isters only the area south of the Line of Control; Pakistan

controls northwestern Kash-mir. China controls parts of

eastern Kashmfrom India in a 1962 war.ir that it took

U.S. State Department official

Robert Hodgson redrafted the

map to close the gap in 1968.

His line showed the Siachen

area as controlled by Pakistan.

India rejects this version and has

occupied the glacier since 1984.

This approximate line represents

the militarized front between

India and Pakistan north of

the Line of Control. National

Geographic maps use this de

facto line, as it best reflects

the reality on the ground.

When British India was partitioned into India and Pakistan

in 1947, the two countries’ sovereignty over Jammu and

Kashmir—a region of some 18 million people today—was not clearly

defined. Since then, both countries have claimed the mountainous,

glaciated terrain. The dispute over boundaries has created

a geopolitical tangle on the world’s highest-altitude battlefield.

BORDER LINES IN DISPUTE

ASIA

PAKISTAN INDIA

FOR THE INFLUENTIAL U.S. OFFIC

THE GEOPOLITICAL AND BOUNDARY IS

112 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC