evidence: The Siachen region is strategically important for India because it separates Pakistan from China. It also enables India to monitor the Gilgit and Baltistan regions of Pakistan. For Pakistan, the region provides direct access to China. However, until the 1970s the region was unpopulated. In the late 1970s Col. Narinder ("Bull") Kumar, a mountaineer in the Indian Army, saw a U.S.-drawn map of northern Kashmir that showed the Siachen Glacier as part of Pakistan. Pakistan had been giving permits to foreign mountaineers to climb around the glacier throughout the 1970s, creating the impression that it was Pakistani territory. Kumar received permission for a counter-expedition in 1978, and by 1981 he had mapped the entire glacier up to the Chinese border. In 1984, after receiving intelligence of a planned Pakistani troop dispatch to the region, India launched the secret Project Meghdoot ("Cloud Messenger," named for the Meghaduta, a well-known classical Sanskrit poem), positioning its troops in Siachen a week before Pakistan could deploy its forces. India thus took control of the entire glacier. Despite a few subsequent skirmishes between Indian and Pakistani forces, India retained control.