Flashpoint Kashmir: a mountain territory takes center stage as India and Pakistan, both armed with nuclear weapons, move dangerously close to war. (International).

One night last month, a 28-year-old farmer answered a knock at the door of his mud house land was gunned down. Another evening, just after sunset, six members of a family, including a 6-month-old baby, were slaughtered. A teenager was set on fire. Many houses have been burned down.

Such is the day-to-day savagery in Kashmir, the Himalayan region where control is split between Pakistan and India. The violence is committed by both Islamic militants, who want the Muslim-majority territory to be independent or part of Pakistan, and opposing Indian security forces who are determined to keep control of it.

Kashmir has been the cause of two wars between India and Pakistan, and now threatens to cause another. The past two months have seen an enormous buildup of troops, tanks, guns, and landmines all along the 1,800-mile border between the two nations. In Kashmir itself, Indian and Pakistani troops exchange fire every day across a de facto border, called the Line of Control, that runs through the disputed territory.

Especially worrisome is that both sides have become nuclear powers in the years since their last war. Now India, by one estimate, has between 45 and 95 nuclear devices; Pakistan, between 30 and 52. Because the nations lie next to each other, missiles could reach their targets in a matter of minutes. Tensions run high, and leaders from all corners of the globe are watching apprehensively.

"The stakes were high long before they had nuclear weapons," says Marshall Bouton, a South Asia expert and president of the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations. "It's just that Americans got all hot and bothered about it when the nuclear weapons became evident."

TERRORIST ATTACK PROMPTS CRISIS

The current crisis began when a heavily armed five-man terrorist team tried to blast its way into India's Parliament building in the capital, New Delhi. The Dec. 13 attack killed nine people plus the gunmen. India immediately accused two Pakistan-based militant groups opposing India's presence in Kashmir, and demanded that Pakistan halt the flow of terrorists into India--or face military consequences.

"I think the Indians are willing to go over the edge and use the military option," says one Western diplomat in New Delhi. "But precisely what form it would take or how it will achieve their aims, I don't know. They're throwing everything they have into the front lines."

Pakistan's President, General Pervez Musharraf, outlawed the two militant groups blamed by India and arrested about 2,000 suspected terrorists. But India said those gestures were not enough. By mid-January, the situation was so explosive that U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell visited both countries to try to ease tensions. In the weeks after Powell's visit, his cross-border diplomacy seemed to have a calming effect.

"I think we are on a path that could lead to the restoration of dialogue," Powell said after the trip. "But it will take action, further action, before we can really start walking down that path more aggressively."

The recent military escalation has claimed the world's attention largely because of the nuclear threat, but the tensions between India and Pakistan go back more than half a century to the birth of both nations.

The dispute over Kashmir is the main issue that has poisoned relations between the two countries since the British partitioned the Indian subcontinent into predominantly Hindu India and the Muslim nation of Pakistan in 1947. At that time, the British told the maharaja, or prince, of Kashmir to choose which country the province would join. The maharaja, who was Hindu, threw his lot in with India, though most Kashmiris were--and are--Muslim. Pakistan has never seen that decision as legitimate, and the first war over the territory began that year.

When that war ended in 1948, control over Kashmir was divided, with Pakistan in command of about a third and India controlling the rest. A United Nations resolution in 1949 called for a vote of the people to determine Kashmir's fate. That vote has never been held.

In 1989, Kashmiri discontent erupted into guerrilla warfare aimed at India's control of the province. The nature of this uprising has radically changed in the years since, as more highly trained Islamic warriors have crossed the border from Pakistan to join what they see as a movement to liberate Kashmir from Indian control. This shift has led to India's accusation that the Pakistani government is sponsoring terrorism in Kashmir--in effect, waging a proxy war by arming and training militants. Pakistan insists it provides only moral and diplomatic support for the Kashmiri struggle. Still, the 13-year-old insurgency has left 35,000 people dead, according to Indian government estimates. Others believe that the number may be twice as high.

The December attack on the Indian Parliament renewed Indian outrage over the terrorism issue. The demand from New Delhi has been tough but simple: Pakistan must find a way to stop militants from crossing the Line of Control. We don't care about promises, Indian officials are saying; we want to see results. These demands have left officials and diplomats worried that an extremist from Pakistan will commit a spectacular act of terrorism, hoping to provoke a full-scale war.

STRONG INCENTIVES TO AVOID WAR

Meanwhile, most Kashmiris reject the idea that the struggle has anything to do with terrorism. "Kashmiris have a clear right to fight for their people, says Sardar Sikander Hayad Khan, a Kashmiri leader on the Pakistani side of the territory. "The Line of Control does not divide Kashmir into two legal parts."

The only thing that will stop the fighting, the Kashmiris say, is if the United States or other powers force India to negotiate. Experts say that kind of outside pressure will be critical, because the Kashmir conflict goes to the heart of the identities of both countries. Pakistan was founded as a homeland for the subcontinent's Muslims, so the idea of a heavily Muslim state like Kashmir under Indian control is offensive. India, on the other hand, feels that losing Muslim-majority Kashmir would be a serious blow to its identity as a secular democracy that includes citizens of many ethnicities and faiths.

"There's good reason to be concerned about the potential of a nuclear exchange, given the depth of the rivalry and the hostility," says expert Bouton. "But both states have very strong incentives for avoiding a full-scale conflict."

Indeed, the relationship between India and Pakistan is far more complex than mere enmity. Each nation has millions of citizens with relatives across the border--there are some 120 million Muslims in India. And culturally, the two countries have much in common: food, language, a passion for cricket, and adoration of the same movie stars.

"We don't want a war," says one Indian official. "But this time we are determined to finish this problem, one way or another." It's that kind of thinking that has many people holding their breath.

With reporting by Somini Sengupita, Celia W. Dugger, and Erik Eckholm of the New York Times

FOCUS: Nuclear Arms Heighten Longstanding India-Pakistan Tensions Over Kashmir

TEACHING OBJECTIVES

To help students understand the roots of one of the most explosive conflicts in the world today--India and Pakistan's 55-year clash over Kashmir.

Discussion Questions:

* Which country, India or Pakistan, do you believe has the more solid claim to Kashmir?

* What evidence is there that the two countries may achieve a peaceful solution to their dispute?

* What developments could cause leaders on both sides to abandon constraint and go to war?

* Does the possession of nuclear weapons by both India and Pakistan increase or decrease the likelihood that they will go to war?

CLASSROOM STRATEGIES

Background: Complicating the original split over Kashmir was the movement of Pakistanis into Kashmir to strengthen the position of Kashmiri Muslims. Then, at the request of Kashmir's maharaja, Sir Haft Singh, India sent troops to the province.

Critical Thinking: The article reports that Kashmiris say the only thing that will stop the fighting between India and Pakistan is if the U.S. or other international powers pressure India to negotiate a new status for Kashmir. Ask students whether the U.S. should pressure India. What power does the U.S. have to force a change in India's policy? Might the U.S. threaten to impose trade restrictions? (Tell students that 22 percent of India's exports are purchased by the U.S.) Might threats backfire and make the Indians less inclined to negotiate an agreement on Kashmir?

Next, discuss India's concern that the loss of Kashmir to Pakistan would be a serious blow to its identity as a secular democracy. Tell students that India is officially a secular state. (Muslims account for 14 percent of India's more than 1 billion people, but as in many countries, relations between ethnic groups are often strained.)

Might a plebiscite in Which Kashmiris vote to become part of Pakistan suggest to the world that India is not as religiously tolerant as it claims? How could such a development affect India's relations with other countries, especially those that profess Islam as a state religion?

Web Watch: Log on to www.paknews.org for daily news from Pakistan. Log on to www.timesofindia.com for the perspective from India.