India needs to win the war of minds before the first shot

Each nation approaches this transformation differently: the United States (US) integrates it into “information as a joint function” within its multidomain operations doctrine. China codifies it through the san zhan (“Three Warfares”) strategy, integrating the psychological, media, and legal aspects. Russia treats it as a permanent state of “information confrontation”, blending disinformation, influence operations, and strategic deception. Israel speaks of a “cognitive campaign”, where perception management is central to deterrence and legitimacy. Pakistan, facing both internal vulnerabilities and external pressures, frames its strategy through the lens of hybrid and fifth-generation warfare, where narrative control and psychological impact are as critical as kinetic capability.

India certainly recognises the importance of the information domain. Information operations (IO) now find space within our military planning and operational vocabulary. However, the supporting structures, doctrines, and institutional clarity remain largely ad hoc. Unlike cyber or kinetic domains, information warfare in India lacks a unified command, codified doctrine, or dedicated budget. This gap is increasingly untenable. As adversaries weaponise perception and narrative with precision. India must undertake a de novo review not just to catch up, but to lead in shaping the cognitive battlespace.

This convergence of doctrine signals a profound truth: the decisive battles of the 21st century are increasingly fought in the cognitive and information domains. These are not support functions but strategic domains, capable of shaping outcomes before, during, and even after conventional conflict. However, this can only bear fruit through a formal structure by way of an Information Warfare Command and a codified doctrine equivalent to cyber warfare. Without a formalised information warfare doctrine and dedicated structures, India risks losing the narrative even when it achieves battlefield success, as seen after Operation Sindoor where Pakistan’s propaganda diluted India’s military gains to some extent.

The grey zone

In the modern strategic landscape, “grey zone” dynamics refer to the contested space between stable peace and overt war, and have become the primary arena for geopolitical competition. Within this paradigm, state actors employ a spectrum of coercive tools, ranging from economic warfare to proxy conflicts.

However, a synthesis of research from two US-based think-tanks, the RAND Corporation and the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), confirmed a hierarchical shift: cyber and cognitive operations have emerged as the highest-intensity modalities due to their strategic impact and inherent deniability (see Figure 1).

While cyber warfare targets a country’s hardware such as systems and infrastructure, information warfare focuses on the “software”: the human mind. It weaponises truth and falsehood to manipulate the narratives that determine political legitimacy.

The ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict serves as a contemporary benchmark of this. Despite Russia’s traditional military weight, Ukraine has achieved narrative dominance in Western ecosystems, securing moral legitimacy and sustained global aid. This demonstrates that in modern war, narrative is not a byproduct of victory; it is a prerequisite.

India’s experience in Operation Sindoor offers a more sobering lesson. Tactically, the operation was a masterclass in tri-service synergy, successfully neutralising nine terror facilities.

Yet, in the cognitive domain, Pakistan — supported by Chinese media — orchestrated a rapid counteroffensive. Through deepfakes and coordinated social media campaigns (for instance, #GloriousInPeace), Pakistan projected a facade of resilience that muddied the international perception of India's success. While India’s eventual “multi-party delegations”and late-stage fact-checking proved effective, the initial disconnect allowed the adversary to seize the early narrative.

Losing the information war while winning the kinetic one is a strategic shortcoming. In a digital democracy, narrative ambiguity allows adversaries to rally international pressure and sow domestic confusion. If India is to secure its military gains, it must bridge the gap between battlefield dominance and cognitive influence.

Recognising information as a standalone domain is a strategic necessity, defined by unique operating principles and effects. Unlike kinetic domains, information warfare prioritises virality over veracity and emotional resonance over logic.

As General Valery Gerasimov, chief of the general staff of the Russian armed forces, noted in a paper, modern conflict is around 80 per cent non-kinetic. This shift is driven by five distinct factors.

First, the unique actors that include a diverse ecosystem of bots, influencers, and civilians. Second, the standalone effects, which constitute the ability to shape elections and delegitimise states without firing a shot. Next comes artificial intelligence (AI)-driven dynamism including generative AI and deepfakes, allowing for instantaneous and high-impact tactical pivots. Fourth, the specific lines of operation wherein information has moved from a “support function” to a primary line of effort with its own decisive points. Finally, the cross-domain impact acts as a force multiplier, justifying land invasions or amplifying cyberattacks.

The strategic framework of non-kinetic operations in ongoing and future conflicts can be classified under three heads: information (narrative dominance), cognitive (shaping minds), and cyber (infrastructure attacks) (see Figure 2). 

Games of deception

Major powers have also tailored their information architectures to their political systems. These can be categorised into three primary model approaches pursued by major countries globally (see Table 1).

China’s san zhan doctrine normalises territorial claims and projected “win-win” narratives, even as the People's Liberation Army Strategic Support Force (disbanded in 2024 and replaced by the Information Strategic Force) integrated cyber and psychological operations. Whereas Russia, under the information confrontation doctrine, uses the “Doppelgänger” strategy of cloning news sites, which is amplified by troll farms to degrade adversary cognitive defences.

On the other hand, the US’ integrated deterrence approach favours “Defend Forward” and “Naming and Shaming” through declassified intelligence to preempt adversary lies. Pakistan’s hybrid warfare strategy uses its armed forces’ Inter-Services Public Relations wing to punch above its conventional weight, leveraging low-cost digital tools as a strategic equaliser.

Analysis suggests that the authoritarian centralised models of China and Russia are incompatible with India’s democracy, whereas the decentralised US model risks being too slow for a country facing immediate existential threats in a nuclearised neighbourhood.

India can find the most viable blueprint in Israel’s hybrid system strategy, which maintains a centralised strategic “Apex” (to ensure narrative coherence) while empowering decentralised “Operational” units to execute agile, AI-enhanced campaigns. For India, this means building a command structure that is centrally guided but tactically autonomous, capable of combating the enormous AI disinformation of its neighbours.

From viewing IO as a support function, India now recognises it as a primary domain of warfare. The Joint Doctrine for Multi-Domain Operations (MDO), released in August 2025, codified the “cognitive domain” as a central pillar alongside land, sea, air, space, and cyber warfare. The Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), General Anil Chauhan, has championed this doctrinal leap, identifying the cognitive domain as the “new frontier” and necessitating a whole-of-nation approach to counter hybrid threats.

India's current IO architecture is a complex, often siloed, mix of military and civilian capabilities. Among the various apex military structures responsible for IO, the Defence Cyber Agency (DCA) is the operational hub for the cyber-information nexus. Under the Joint Doctrine for Cyberspace Operations, a key component of MDO, the DCA has matured beyond mere defence to integrated offensive-defensive capabilities.

Also, there are several service-specific IO entities maintained by the Indian Army, Navy, and Air Force, which remain functionally fragmented, lacking a single coordinating umbrella for high-intensity crises. The Army has also established the Information Warfare cells down to its lower formation headquarters. The proposed National Information Warfare Division represents a formal push toward a unified institutional structure for IO, intended to synchronise narrative efforts across the services.

Meanwhile, the civilian defensive layer firstly includes regulatory security in the form of the Information Technology (IT) Rules, 2021, which mandated that platforms remove unlawful content within 36 hours. While powerful, its enforcement is often slowed by the “freedom of speech versus security” debate. Second is the Press Information Bureau Fact Check Unit (PIB-FCU), which serves as the country’s narrative gatekeeper.  Despite legal challenges owing to the concerns of government overreach, including the Bombay High Court striking down the 2023 amendment to establish a central fact check unit, the PIB-FCU remains a primary point for countering misinformation regarding government business. Third, counter-AI initiatives such as new advisories and draft amendments to the IT Rules now mandate the labelling of synthetic media or deepfakes to target the weaponisation of generative AI in cognitive warfare.

India possesses world-class infrastructure to project influence (see Table 2), yet its organisational structure limits its potential.

Despite these massive assets, India faces three systemic weaknesses in this regard. Firstly, the lack of a unified command means that lines of authority between the military (Ministry of Defence or MoD), the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, and the Ministry of Home Affairs are blurred, leading to a reactive rather than proactive posture.

Secondly, the narrative speed differential was seen during recent border skirmishes, where India’s “truth-based” rebuttals often lagged behind the high-velocity, AI-fuelled disinformation of adversaries like China and Pakistan. Finally, legal-normative tension (interplay or conflict between what the law is and what it ought to be) means that regulatory actions often face domestic scrutiny for potential censorship, constraining the country’s ability to manage narratives without risking international legitimacy. 

India has the “hardware” (infrastructure) and the “software” (doctrine), but it lacks the “operating system” — a unified command structure — to integrate these elements into a potent strategic force. So, we need to first establish a centralised information structure at the national level dedicated to planning, executing, and countering information operations. There are several options to create an IO structure for India, such as:

Option 1: Military heavy centralisation

This approach, favoured by some “hard security and military” commentators, advocates creating a proper, single National Information Warfare Command. Supporters argue that it would unify disparate national messaging (by the MoD, the Ministry of External Affairs or MEA, and party machinery) under one strategic umbrella, ensuring coherence. A single war-room could quickly approve and deploy narratives in rapid, viral cycles, matching the speed of its adversaries' digital farms. It also provides a necessary institutional answer to integrated adversary structures like China's Information Support Force.

Critics say that a powerful, centralised command could trigger politicisation and inevitably drift into domestic partisan messaging, undermining its legitimacy. Bureaucratic bottlenecks risk creating a single point of failure, slowing down response times by demanding approval through one bureaucratic hierarchy. Also, democratic tensions could surface as this approach fundamentally clashes with India's decentralised, free media ecosystem, where independent actors are vital but cannot be “commanded”.

Option 2: Hybrid centralisation

This option, supported by think-tank experts and practitioners of Western strategic communication models, proposes a dual structure with civilian oversight. Establishing a National Strategic Communications Agency (NSCA) under the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) or the National Security Council Secretariat (NSCS) would set narrative priorities and coordinate all civilian and military entities (MEA, PIB, DCA), backed by a military execution. For instance, parallel tri-service information warfare structures in the form of an upgraded DCA and a dedicated division would handle military-specific operations. Ideally, it should be placed under the CDS.

Proponents say that it provides balanced control: it maintains a necessary political control over strategic narratives (standard in democracies) while isolating military operational capacity. It facilitates the right type of integration: easily fusing external messaging (diplomacy) with internal information security, achieving a hybrid civil-military approach. It also avoids a single point of failure, ensuring that different nodes can still function if one area faces internal or external compromise.

Arguments against it state there may be a disconnect between the proposed NSCA and the tri-service executing agency during active operations. It may also throw up alternative thought processes that would need synthesisation and smoothening, leading to a reduction of response. The speed, due to the virality of information operations, is of utmost importance.

Option 3: Networked decentralisation

Preferred by academics and tech-policy experts, this option rejects giant centralised commands in favour of flexibility and civil-military fusion. The structure would consist of joint task forces, which would mean creating permanent, jointly staffed bodies like a Cyber Mission Force comprising the DCA, the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team, the private sector, and academia. Decentralised execution would focus on common doctrine, shared tech platforms (AI for sentiment analysis, bot detection), and implementation through state-level and theatre-level cells.

Those in favour highlight the inherently decentralised nature of the information battlespace (social media and AI content); an overly centralised response is unrealistic. It mandates civil-military-private sector fusion, leveraging India's vast tech talent and data resources outside of traditional military command. The proposed structure will also fit into India’s democratic system as it preserves openness and avoids the perception of a “ministry of truth”, enhancing legitimacy at home and abroad.

Critics cite the coordination and coherence risk: despite advancements in shared technology, the inherent reliance on a web of autonomous civil, military, and private entities inevitably leads to coordination failures. The model replaces mandatory command with voluntary cooperation, making it susceptible to conflicting priorities and jurisdictional friction, which undermines unified national messaging. Secondly, it will sacrifice speed, as decentralisation prioritises consensus and democratic processes, which are inherently slower. In a space where adversaries operate at a viral cycle speed, this delay can be fatal, allowing hostile narratives to gain irreversible traction before a coordinated counterresponse can be launched. Finally, it is likely to result in suboptimal messaging:

“too many voices” frequently lead to disagreements and a diluted information response. The accommodation of diverse stakeholders often results in bland or contradictory messaging, which lacks the sharpness and coherence to contest well-synchronised adversary propaganda. 

Military imperative

So, does India needs a unified information warfare command? The short answer is yes: the facts above indicate that India needs more unification than it has today, as the current arrangements are too fragmented, too ad hoc, and too slow. Despite disagreements about the level of unification and who should lead it (the CDS or the Integrated Defence Staff vs the PMO or the NSCS vs a multi-stakeholder task force), option 2 appears to be the best course of action for India, given its political and military considerations.

Among other major recommendations to build a robust IO capability are the need to codify the Information Domain in doctrine, explicitly recognising it in the National Security Strategy. Secondly, invest in narrative infrastructure, including global media partnerships, diaspora engagement, and AI-driven sentiment analysis. Thirdly, train and deploy information warriors like veterans, influencers, and communicators, shaping discourse professionally. Fourth, integrate civil-military information fusion for unified messaging across the MEA, MoD, and intelligence agencies. Finally, counter disinformation proactively through deepfake detection, bot neutralisation, and anticipatory fact-checking.

In the wars of tomorrow, missiles may be intercepted, drones may be jammed, but narratives — once launched — are hard to recall. The information domain is where legitimacy is won, deterrence is built, and sovereignty is defended in the minds of billions. India must not remain a reluctant participant. It must become a dominant force in shaping global discourse, defending its truth, and projecting its strategic clarity. Recognising information as a separate domain is not just timely — it is imperative. India lags, but Operation Sindoor has spurred the government and the military to enhance their IO capability and capacity to win the battle of the narrative nationally and internationally. To do so, formulating a joint IO doctrine and a cogent national-level military IO organisation is a must to match up to our adversary in the north, west and now even in the east.

Creating a strategic communication agency under the PMO or the NSCS for overall policy formulation and a tri-service information command structure under the CDS for execution would be steps in the right direction. Ignoring IO is no longer a choice but an imperative.