The global system is not driven by justice—it is dictated by interests. Ukraine is defended because of NATO’s stakes. Gaza remains in flux because of divided influence. Pakistan’s terror linkages are overlooked because of geopolitical convenience and its strategic location, not ignorance. India must therefore shed any illusions of a morality-driven world order. Alliances, economic interdependence, arms markets, and media reach all shape responses. Neutrality in such a system is not noble—it is irrelevant.
“In the 21st century, wars are not just fought on borders, but within minds, across screens, and inside the vaults of global power. Victory is no longer about occupation, but perception.”
The Changing Nature of Modern Conflict: From Battlespace to Brainspace
The 21st century has witnessed the mutation of warfare from conventional theatres to contested perceptions. While missiles, drones, and tanks still roar, it is narratives that now resonate the loudest. Military might alone no longer assures victory. Instead, who tells the story—and how—is increasingly shaping who emerges victorious. This shift calls for urgent introspection and strategic recalibration. India stands contested by adversaries—China with its salami-slicing intrusions and digital infiltration, Pakistan with its terror proxies and cognitive subversion. But more than these visible threats, it is the unseen war—of narratives, influence, and perception—that India must now learn to fight and win.
Ukraine: Power of Global Narratives Over Ground Realities
The Russia–Ukraine war is emblematic of the modern conflict template. On the ground, it is a brutal kinetic war. But in the global mind space, it is a war of framing. Ukraine, despite its disadvantages, has masterfully wielded the tools of narrative—leveraging Western media, tech platforms, and emotional symbolism to project itself as the underdog hero. The Zelenskyy government’s daily digital messaging, its skilful use of influencers, and its appeal to global conscience have earned it billions in aid and weapons.
Russia, with superior military might, failed to control the information war. Despite significant battlefield gains in early phases, Moscow lost the narrative terrain, allowing the West to script the global storyline. Sanctions, isolation, and moral condemnation followed—not purely because of facts on the ground, but due to the way those facts were presented and received.
Lesson for India: Strategic messaging and cognitive influence can tilt international alignments. India must invest in a structured, multilingual, and integrated narrative framework that spans ministries, missions, media, and think tanks. Our stories must not just reflect strength but radiate legitimacy.
The Israel–Hamas War: Asymmetry, Atrocity, and Optics
The ongoing Israel–Hamas conflict represents the moral complexity of contemporary war. Militarily, Israel wields unmatched precision capabilities and surveillance supremacy. Yet, despite targeting terror infrastructure, it often ends up ceding global opinion due to images of civilian suffering and widespread destruction. Hamas, despite being designated a terrorist organisation, exploits human shields and media virality to project victimhood. It manipulates global narratives to equate retaliatory military action with state aggression. This inversion of roles—where the aggressor appears as the victim—has gripped international discourse, university campuses, and civil society, especially in the West.
Lesson for India: We face a similar dilemma with cross-border terrorism from Pakistan and insurgencies within. The world doesn’t always see intent—it sees images. Hence, any military operation, like Balakot or Sindoor, must be accompanied by narrative management: legal justifications, moral clarity, and diplomatic briefings must move in tandem with boots on the ground.
Galwan Clash: Silence in the Face of Strategy
Galwan was a moment of valour, but also a case study in the cost of narrative hesitation. The 2020 confrontation in Ladakh saw India’s troops 3 inflict heavy casualties on the PLA, but China’s controlled media blackout and narrative suppression concealed its losses. Simultaneously, Beijing portrayed the status quo as preserved, buying time and space to fortify its position. India, despite its democratic strength, allowed the story to drift. Transparency in our losses did not translate into global empathy. Instead, it enabled China to retain strategic ambiguity and avoid diplomatic censure.
Lesson for India: In grey-zone warfare, perception is reality. We need a permanent strategic communication body under the National Security Council Secretariat—one empowered to counter disinformation, provide timely rebuttals, and keep global audiences informed of our just cause.
Operation Sindoor: Battlefield Victory, Narrative Setback
Operation Sindoor was a decisive battlefield victory that achieved the politico-military objective by surgical brilliance and the whole of nation approach. The Tri-service integrated high technology precision multi domain warfare, economic hydro strike, and diplomatic initiatives to political will, saw the dawn of a new normal. Yet, in the days that followed, Pakistan’s narrative machinery went into overdrive. Accusations of civilian deaths, diplomatic outreach portraying Indian aggression, escalated Indian losses, and strategic engagement with global institutions flipped the perception. Shockingly, the IMF, ADB and World Bank released aid packages for Pakistan, and the UN rewarded it with a vice-chair position on the Counter-Terrorism Committee—an irony as deep as it is disturbing.
Lesson for India: We won the battle, but lost the mind space. Victory in 21st-century warfare is incomplete without narrative dominance. Every kinetic strike must be accompanied by a coordinated influence operation—engaging international media, neutralising falsehoods, and showcasing India’s democratic values and defensive intent.
Spheres of Influence: Where Interests Trump Ideals
The global system is not driven by justice—it is dictated by interests. Ukraine is defended because of NATO’s stakes. Gaza remains in flux because of divided influence. Pakistan’s terror linkages are overlooked because of geopolitical convenience and its strategic location, not ignorance. India must therefore shed any illusions of a morality-driven world order. Alliances, economic interdependence, arms markets, and media reach all shape responses. Neutrality in such a system is not noble—it is irrelevant.
Strategic Recalibration: India must build its sphere of influence.
This means: • Deepening narrative alliances with the Global South • Amplifying multilateral leadership roles (G20, BRICS, SCO) • Building regional media partnerships • Creating multilingual content that reflects Indian ethos across digital platforms • A more potent Neighbourhood 2.0 policy to gain favourable space and influence.
Cognitive Warfare: The Final Frontier
The fiercest battlefield today lies within the human mind. Cognitive Warfare is an integral facet of power projection that focuses on attacking and degrading rationality, which can lead to the exploitation of vulnerabilities and systemic weakening of the adversary’s narrative. Cognitive warfare weaponises perception management, psychological domain, and emerging technologies to control human cognition and influence favourable actions making it the sixth operational domain alongside land, sea, air, space, and cyber. From China’s “Three Warfare” doctrine (public opinion, legal, and psychological warfare) to Russia’s disinformation blitz and Pakistan’s propaganda playbook, cognitive tools are now integral to conflict. 5 India’s current ecosystem is underprepared. Narrative efforts are fragmented, reactive, and often politicised. The need is for a unified, apolitical, capability-centric approach.
Strategic Recommendation:
- Establish a National Cognitive Warfare Structure with integrated teams from the military, intelligence, MEA, media experts, and technologists. Narratives are a 24×7 warfare, not just during hostilities.
- Train officers and diplomats in influence operations and information dominance
- Leverage AI for real-time monitoring, sentiment analysis, and narrative disruption
- Engage civil society, veterans, and academics to counter domestic polarisation and amplify national unity in crises
Future Capability Building: Steel Must Be Matched by Story India’s future war preparedness must balance kinetic capability with strategic storytelling. The following pillars are essential:
- Doctrinal Evolution: Shift from deterrence by punishment to deterrence by denial and domination. Integrate perception warfare into all military planning and wargaming.
- Technological Investment: Beyond jets and missiles, India needs secure indigenous communication platforms, AI-enabled content analysis tools, and deepfake countermeasures.
- Strategic Communication Infrastructure: A National Narrative Cell must be operationalised with real-time information warfare capacities—disseminating, disrupting, and defending narratives.
- Defence Diplomacy: Empower defence attachés, create regional digital media partnerships, and embed storytelling into international military exercises and outreach.
- National Security Doctrine: Draft and implement a comprehensive National Security Doctrine that includes not only force application, but force justification and perception shaping. 6
- Astute Foreign Policy: The foreign policy focus must go beyond trade and economics to understanding India and its challenges to threats more positively. The narratives must shape influence for actions that are favourable to India’s national interest.
Conclusion: Winning the War Before It Begins.
Victory or defeat in the information age is dominated by actions going viral in an instant by an adversary controlling the cognitive domain. Perception management has thus become the new centre of gravity and narratives are scripting history. In 21st-century warfare, the war does not begin when guns fire—it begins when hashtags trend, when alliances whisper and when falsehoods spread faster than truths. The post-war environment—media narratives, institutional responses, and public opinion—is where legacies are sealed. Wars of steel win battles; wars of story win futures. India can no longer afford a siloed or reactive posture. It must wage wars with integrated strategic messaging, cognitive preparedness, and influence resilience.
From Galwan to Gaza, Ukraine to Sindoor, the battlefield has moved to the screen, the studio, and the scroll. India cannot afford to fight with 21st-century weapons and 20th-century narratives. A rising power must not only build strength but also script its story—before others do it for them. We must not only strengthen our steel—but sharpen our story. Only then will India win not just the battle—but the belief of the world. We no longer fight for defeating an adversary—we fight for truth, for perception, and the conscience of the world.
Deterrence today is not just the fear of retaliation—it is the certainty of narrative dominance. “The victor of modern wars is not the one who fires the last bullet, but the one who speaks the final word—and makes the world believe it.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Lieutenant General A B Shivane, is the former Strike Corps Commander and Director General of Mechanised Forces. As a scholar warrior, he has authored over 200 publications on national security and matters defence, besides four books and is an internationally renowned keynote speaker. The General was a Consultant to the Ministry of Defence (Ordnance Factory Board) post-superannuation. He was the Distinguished Fellow and held COAS Chair of Excellence at the Centre for Land Warfare Studies 2021 2022. He is also the Senior Advisor Board Member to several organisations and Think Tanks.
