No friends but the mountains: dispatches from the world's violent highlands

Introduction. A towering problem

One for one : the Dinaric Alps

Our land is our land : Sierra Madre

Holding the high ground of nothing : the Andes

The dammed : Himalayas

Mountain thistles : the Caucasus

On the existential border : Kashmir

The gods of the valleys are not the gods of the hills. Part one: the Green Mountains and the Hindu Kush ; Part two: the Lyngen Alps

Cantonment (contentment) : the Pyrenees and the Swiss Alps.