Talk:Highest unclimbed mountain

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I do not want to provoke an edit war, so I have applied the NPOV principle to the main article, but I firmly disagree with the POV that Gangkhar Puensum is wholly in Bhutan.

The local border with Tibet is a sensitive issue, but in the relevant area it can only take one logical course, the watershed divide. This clearly runs over the Gangkhar Puensum mountain. It follows that if the summit is wholly in Bhutan, then it would have to be on a spur, removed from the divide. A photograph taken of the main summit from Liangkang Kangri, a subsidiary top to the north, shows that the main summit is clean, with no such spur. It therefore follows that, in the absence of any formal agreement with China, the main summit is on the border, and NOT the exclusive possession of Bhutan.

It is worth noting that the 1986 Berry book was written at the time when the local topography was much less clear, but it is likely that the POV expressed there has been widely reproduced. Viewfinder 00:19, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

I think what you have put now summarises the situation just fine. It seems that China and Bhutan have decided that their border disputes are not worth a war so surely an edit war is not justified here either! The Gangkhar Puensum article is careful in quoting sources claiming what is on what side of the border. That article itself does not state a point of view other than by saying "the highest mountain in Bhutan" it claims that the summit is in Bhutan or on the border with Tibet (China). My personal (and unprofessional) POV is that Kula Kangri (a higher mountain) is on the border and GP is in Bhutan. However, where the border is not definitely agreed, and where some maps muddle up KK and GP, this can only be rather unclear. BTW I'd love to know the prominence of GP! Thincat 09:50, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

The prominence of GP depends on its elevation relative to Kula Kangri. The prominences shown here are based on the assumption that Kula Kangri is lower. I cannot prove this, but in the absence of any modern and accurate measurements other than the Chinese ones, I accept the Chinese claim that Gangkhar Puensum is 7570m and that Kula Kangri is lower at 7538m. The course of the watershed border is shown on a web page that I have created, and I draw specific attention to the map. A border that includes Kula Kangri but passes north of Gangkhar Puensum deviates from the watershed border and makes no topographic sense. The extra Bhutanese territory that such a border creates is completely uninhabited. The only valley that would be included would be cut off from the rest of Bhutan by impenetrable mountains and glaciers. So what legal or other basis for such a border can there be? Viewfinder 13:28, 10 January 2006 (UTC)