Kakul (Kakol) is a village situated in the Tehsil and District Abbottabad, at an elevation of 1300 metres, 5 km northeast of center of Abbottabad city near the Thandiani Hills.

Kakul was a rural area prior to the establishment of a Boer Prisoner of War camp during the Boer War, circa 1899–1902, by the (then) Government of British India.

[1] This site was placed under the official management of the 5th Royal Gurkha Rifles.

Later on, the POW camp was converted into an army mountaineering and PT school until 1947–48, and a portion of it also remained the offices of the Royal Indian Army Service Corps (RIASC).

It was this site, which was later chosen for the new post-independence Pakistan Military Academy, which is located in the eastern side of the valley.