Preparing for the Future War: India and Pakistan's Changing Military Doctrines

Abstract

India and Pakistan have been changing their military doctrines at a faster pace. Indians had been since long focused on the policy of preparing them to fight a full-fledged conventional war against Pakistan. It was the nuclearization of Pakistan that forced them to bring change into Indian military doctrine and focus on a limited war than a full-fledged one. This Indian military tilt pressurized Pakistan to fill the gap at the tactical by introducing low yield nuclear weapons in its arsenal. Furthermore, Indians being restricted to initiate limited war against Pakistan opted for the options of surgical strike and, when failed to gain the desired efforts against Pakistan, opted for airstrikes in 2019, which resulted in a severe crisis. There is still a lot to come in future and bring further changes into the military doctrines of the two countries. This qualitative research gives a detailed discussion on the changing military doctrine of India and Pakistan, adding the views of expert informants.