The process of dividing British India, the former colony of Great Britain, began in August 1947. It led to a protracted confrontation and bloody clashes in which, according to official figures, at least a million people died and another 18 million were forced to seek refuge in neighboring countries. One of the main causes of contention was the claim of India and Pakistan to the region located in the northwest of the Hindustan Peninsula and called Kashmir. Its role in the tragedy was so great that all subsequent events were called the Kashmir conflict.
Clashes on religious grounds
The conflict began with clashes on religious grounds between the inhabitants of the principality of Jammu and Kashmir, founded one hundred years before the events described in the northwestern part of Hindustan. Their reason was that the majority of the population, about 80%, were Muslims, while the Hindu, a protege of the British authorities, Maharaja Hari Singh, was in power. This had previously caused widespread discontent, but the country's rigid political regime did not allow it to result in open clashes.
In the summer of 1947, in connection with the division of the British colony that began, the control of the authorities was weakened, and in several areas of the principality, local residents took advantage of this and rebelled against the hated Maharaja. Somewhat later, co-religionists came to their aid from Pakistani territory - militias from the Yusufzai, Masud, Afridian tribes, as well as Muslims living in southeast and southwest Afghanistan.
It is characteristic that the war that began in Kashmir was purely religious in nature, and not one of the warring parties put forward political demands at an early stage. Nevertheless, already at the end of October of that year, the rebels captured most of the territory of the principality and, after proclaiming the creation of an independent administrative formation Azad Kashmir (Free Kashmir), tried to annex it to Pakistan.
In the grip of bloody chaos
In response, Hari Singh turned to the Government of India with a request for military support and the inclusion of territory under his control in his state. From that moment, religious unrest escalated into an armed conflict between India and Pakistan over Kashmir. So the principality, peaceful until then, turned into a vessel, from which the evil demon of war broke out, still reaping its bloody fruits.
The Indian leadership did not take long to persuade and immediately sent a solid contingent of troops to Maharaja to help stop the advance of the rebels, supported by parts of the regular Pakistani army, near the capital of Kashmir - the city of Srinagar.
In the current situation, England made an attempt to resolve the conflict, since, having legally declared the independence of the principality, it actually tried to control all aspects of his life. At the initiative of the British government in late October 1947, negotiations began between representatives of India and Pakistan, which lasted until the end of December and did not bring real results. The armed clashes continued and in a number of places became even more fierce. At the same time, the country was swept by a wave of looting, robbery and violence, from which all sectors of society suffered.
The conflict that erupted in the Jammu and Kashmir region soon took on such a wide scale that it gave an impetus to migration processes unprecedented before that time. According to reports, in the first six months after the outbreak of hostilities, about 7 million Muslims left India and crossed into Pakistan, while an almost five-million stream of Indians moved towards them. In addition, at least 500 thousand people became victims of clashes on both sides.
UN Peacekeeping Initiatives
The fighting, which took a protracted character, continued throughout the following year and went down in history under the name of the First Indo-Pakistani War. The end was laid only thanks to the initiative of the UN, which took control of the entire territory of military operations from January 1, 1949. Six months later, through the efforts of diplomats, a demarcation line (ceasefire line) was established, which divided the rebellious Kashmir into two parts, one of which was given over to Indian control and the other to Pakistan. Each of the parties received an area of almost 77.5 thousand km 2 . To monitor the implementation of decisions made in both regions, military observer missions were created.
During the same period, UN meetings twice adopted resolutions on the immediate withdrawal of troops and the holding of a plebiscite - an act of free expression of the will of citizens on the basis of a universal secret ballot. After that, the representatives of India and Pakistan were to sit at the negotiating table and work together to work out an agreement on the Kashmir conflict.
However, a reasonable and highly humane initiative of the representatives of the world community did not receive a proper response. None of the participants in the clashes wanted to withdraw their troops on the pretext that almost half of the disputed territory was occupied by the opposite side. As a result, negotiations did not begin, which significantly worsened the situation in the region, whose population suffered immeasurably from political chaos, the decline of the economy, and rampant crime.
The outcome of the First Indo-Pakistan War
Looking back on the events of past years, historians note the influence of the Cold War on the conflict in Kashmir. It was due to the fact that the main participants in the ideological confrontation that began in 1946 - the USSR and the USA - were supported by different warring parties. So, it is known that Stalin repeatedly called Azad Kashmir the territory illegally torn away from India. The Americans, however, refrained from making concrete statements, but in fact supported Pakistan, secretly providing him with military and financial assistance, which forced the government of the Soviet Union to take retaliatory measures.
At this stage of the confrontation, the severity of the conflict in Kashmir could only be repaid in 1956, after the adoption by the Government of India of a law on the new administrative-territorial division of the country. According to this document, the part of the disputed territory within its borders received the status of Jamma and Kashmir with the summer capital in the city of Srinagar and the winter in Jammu.
The rest of the land went to Pakistan, becoming one of its administrative units with the capital in the city of Gilgit. They were controlled by a specially created Agency of the Northern Territories. The previously established demarcation line since 1956 has actually become the state border dividing India and Pakistan. As for Kashmir, which at one time played the role of the bone of contention between the two states, it was not abolished, but, according to the signed agreement, it became a state associated with Pakistan.
Such a very peculiar status provides for a confederation (political, economic and military alliance) between two unequal states, in which the bulk of power is delegated to the greater of them (in this case, Pakistan), while the lesser retains formal sovereignty and independence. It is not hard to guess that as a result, such a status turned Azad Kashmir into the humble servant of his more powerful sovereign.
For Pakistan, the possession of this small administrative entity, which had a very small territory, had undeniable benefits, since it made it possible to close India's direct access to Afghanistan and cut it off from the Central Asian region. In addition, Pakistan received a common border with its closest ally of those years - China, which was extremely important for him.
The resumption of hostilities
In this alignment of forces, the Kashmir conflict entered its next stage, called the Second Indo-Pakistani War. She also caused numerous casualties. At this next stage of the armed confrontation between the two states, the cause of the Kashmir conflict was border discord that occurred in the summer of 1965 in the remote and desert region, known as the Big Kach Runn. Who initiated it and what caused the clash has not yet been clarified, but it is known that in the very first days significant forces were pulled to the hotbed of tension, and only the intervention of British diplomats did not allow the conflict to flare up in full force.
Nevertheless, the command of the Pakistani army did not abandon plans to capture the entire territory of Jammu and Kashmir belonging to India. To this end, a secret operation, code-named "Gibraltar", was developed. It included training sabotage groups and sending them to Indian Kashmir with the aim of organizing an uprising there and creating conditions for guerrilla warfare.
However, despite all the precautions, this secret plan became known to the Indian authorities. At the end of August 1965, the units they sent unexpectedly invaded Pakistani territory and, having destroyed several camps where future saboteurs were trained, approached its capital, the city of Muzaffarabad.
Their opponents also did not remain in debt and sent a tank column in the direction of a large Indian city - Armitsar. From this moment, the local border conflict escalated into a full-scale war, in which the main role was assigned to the air force. Over the next month, aviation on both sides delivered powerful bombing strikes at enemy positions.
The war that did not bring victory to anyone
The end of the next stage of the escalation of the conflict in Kashmir was laid by vigorous action by the UN. At its meeting, held on September 22, 1965, a resolution was adopted calling on both sides to immediately stop the bloodshed, and only a day later all military operations were stopped.
In January next year, in Tashkent, at the initiative of the government of the Soviet Union, a meeting of diplomatic representatives of the two warring states was held, at which a joint declaration was adopted, drawing a line under the next stage of the Kashmir conflict. The final document of the meeting, which went down in history as the “Tashkent Declaration”, was sealed with signatures by the heads of government of India and Pakistan - Lal Bahadur Shastri (photo above) and Ayyub Khan.
This second Indo-Pakistani war ended, without bringing any tangible results to either side. Nevertheless, in each of them, state propaganda tried to create the illusion of success achieved among citizens. Suffice it to say that in Pakistan so far the day the end of that war - September 23 - is celebrated as a celebration of victory over the invaders. In approximately the same way, but in their favor they interpret the results of the Kashmir conflict of 1965 in India.
Against the background of these highly controversial allegations, the fact that this armed conflict had little to do with the Cold War is not in doubt. It was clearly established that both the Soviet Union and America were neutral, while NATO countries imposed a strict embargo on the supply of weapons to warring states. This broke out in 1965 in Kashmir, which is strikingly different from all other armed confrontations of the Cold War era.
The beginning of a new period of confrontation
Despite the agreement on the Kashmir conflict, signed in 1966 by the participants in the Tashkent meeting, the political confrontation between India and Pakistan did not weaken and five years later led to the start of a new, already the third war, which took on the widest scale and entailed numerous casualties. Unlike the 1965 conflict and earlier armed clashes, it ended with the defeat of Pakistan and its rejection of the vast eastern territories in which the creation of the independent state of Bangladesh was proclaimed.
The reason for the beginning of the next stage of the bloodshed was the civil war that swept in southern Pakistan in 1971, bordering the state of Jammu and Kashmir (India). The fact is that after the partition of British India in 1947, Pakistan began to consist of two parts, separated from each other by the vast (1,600 km) territory of India. The population of its southern part for a long time advocated granting it independence, until, finally, in 1971 it switched to open hostilities.
In this situation, India rendered military assistance to the rebels, as it was interested in their victory. In response to this, the Pakistani government tried to capture a number of border cities in India. Kashmir also found himself in a battle zone, which forced many of its residents to abandon their homes and seek salvation in the central regions of the country.
The course of hostilities of the Third Indo-Pakistani War
At the beginning of December 1971, Pakistani aviation attempted to launch a massive attack on Indian air bases and, having destroyed most of the aircraft, to repeat the success achieved by the Israelis during the Six-Day War of 1967. However, the operation they started was unsuccessful, and soon the enemy air forces were smashing their combat positions.
The Pakistani units stationed in the southern part of the country, swept by a popular uprising, were especially hard. Their position soon turned out to be so hopeless that the command of the three divisions located there preferred to declare surrender. Their solution was the only right one, since it allowed avoiding senseless bloodshed in an environment where servicemen massively left their units and sided with the rebels.
It is characteristic that the Third Indo-Pakistani War, which largely predetermined the outcome of the Kashmir conflict, was accompanied by active hostilities not only on land but also at sea. It is noted that success in them invariably accompanied the Indian side. So, as a result of the competent and decisive actions of the Navy in the first days of the war, they sank a Pakistani submarine Gazi, and a month later, the minesweeper MuhaFiz and the destroyer Khyber. In response to this, the enemy was only able to inflict minor damage to the Indian frigate "Khugri".
By mid-December 1971, the preponderance of forces on the side of India was so obvious that the government of Pakistan declared its surrender. The result of their defeat was the proclamation of the independent state of Bangladesh. Until now, every year on December 16, his people celebrate a national holiday - Victory Day.
The success of Soviet satellite intelligence
This last stage of the Kashmir conflict proceeded in the context of the exacerbation of the Cold War and the escalation of the arms race, into which the leading world powers were drawn. He found his reflection in the confrontation between the Soviet Union and the United States. It was expressed mainly in that, avoiding direct participation in ground operations, both superpowers intensified their intelligence activities and with their help tried to prevent each other from influencing the outcome of the Third Indo-Pakistani War.
A striking example of this is the events that unfolded in late November 1971 and related to another attempt to capture Kashmir by Pakistan. Then several ships of the 7th American fleet approached the coast of India with the goal of supporting their Pakistani allies with artillery fire, cruise missiles and carrier-based aircraft.
Their intervention could have a significant impact on the general alignment of forces, but it was stopped on time thanks to the actions of Soviet satellite intelligence, which revealed the plans of the American command and made them publicly known. Especially for monitoring the situation in the Indian Ocean, the Cosmos-463 satellite, which was equipped with the latest tracking system of the time, was launched into orbit.
Anticipating a negative reaction from the world community, the American leadership was forced to cancel the planned operation and further refrain from direct intervention in the conflict between India and Pakistan. Kashmir, designated by them as one of the main objectives of the artillery-missile strike, managed to repulse the offensive of the Pakistani army and was later used as a bridgehead for retaliatory actions. Training camps were also set up there. It is known that in the future the Soviet command with the help of satellite tracking has repeatedly suppressed various American military initiatives related to the conflict in Kashmir (India).
Subsequent armed clashes
The end of the 80s of the last century was also marked by another escalation of the conflict in Kashmir. Briefly, its causes can be reduced to an exacerbation of the socio-economic crisis in this region. Against the background of an extremely low standard of living of the main part of the population, various extremist organizations appeared and launched vigorous activity, acting under Islamic slogans and demanding the inclusion of this region in Pakistan.
Equipped with weapons and supported by Afghan mujahideen, in December 1989 they switched from calls for open hostilities. However, due to the timely and decisive actions of the Indian government, the rebellion was suppressed, and relative calm in the region was restored.
In the mid-80s, the confrontation between the warring parties again intensified, this time caused by mutual claims for the possession of the Alpine glacier Siachen, located on the border of Jammu and Kashmir (India). A photo of this controversial site is given in the article.
The reason for the next armed conflict was the uncertainty of its legal status, which received an extremely vague definition when signing the 1949 agreement. The negligence allowed by lawyers played the role of a time bomb, which tore apart in 1984 the already fragile peace established in the region.
According to eyewitnesses, not a day went by without artillery shelling from one side or the other, as well as numerous sorties of specially trained mountain rifle units. To stop the escalating bloodshed, the Indian authorities were forced to introduce into the state a large military contingent, which included at least 20 divisions. Only after this the intensity of hostilities began to subside, and in 1986 gave way, though not to the enduring, but still to the world.
Kargil war
And finally, the last and very long outbreak of tension in this region was noted in the spring of 1999, when at least a thousand armed militants entered India. In this case, the cause of the Kashmir conflict was the escalation of extremist sentiments among the population of the border regions of Pakistan. Crowds of religious fanatics, warmed by various kinds of agitators trained in training camps in Northern Afghanistan, crushed the Indian border garrison and, with the support of regular army units, captured a number of tactically important heights. The events of this period went down in history as the Kargil war, which lasted until the end of 2001.
Its first stage culminated in the swift victory of the Indians, who managed to promptly put forth significant military forces against Pakistani terrorists. Already a month and a half after the start of the clashes, intruders were driven out of the so-called control line - the border established by the UN decision after the events of 1971, which were discussed above. However, tensions soon resumed, this time through the fault of India.
The role of the spark that fell into the barrel of gunpowder was played by the actions of two Indian Air Force crews, which, for no apparent reason, invaded Pakistan's airspace and shot down a patrol plane there, the entire crew of which 18 people died. This incident marked the beginning of new clashes both on the control line and in the territories adjacent to it.
In November 2001, India launched a peace initiative by unilaterally declaring a moratorium on fighting against Muslims in Kashmir. In turn, Pakistan also announced the cessation of the activities of one of its most active terrorist organizations, called Hizb-ul-Mujahedin. However, general joy was premature. The confrontation resumed very soon. With varying degrees of intensity, the Kashmir conflict continues to this day.