Syed Ata Hasnain | 2025: Conflicts Unresolved Amidst Global Security Drift

The year 2025 will be remembered not for decisive victories or negotiated peace, but for a more unsettling global condition; the persistence of conflict without resolution. Across regions and theatres, wars neither ended nor escalated decisively. Instead, they lingered -- managed, contained and periodically recalibrated. It was a year defined less by outcomes of recurring issues, than by control. That demands a caution at the outset; this assessment does not catalogue operations or events. It examines strategic trends of 2025 -- and what they mean for India.

From Europe to West Asia, from the Indo-Pacific to South Asia, the dominant feature of global security in 2025 was the absence of closure. Military power was applied, but cautiously. Diplomacy functioned, but episodically. Deterrence worked --yet imperfectly. The result was a world increasingly comfortable with instability, so long as escalation could be avoided.

The global security drift: Three broad trends shaped the international security environment in 2025.

First, conflict has fully hybridised. Traditional distinctions between war and peace continued to erode. Proxy violence, narrative warfare, cyber activity, economic coercion and calibrated military force blended into a continuous spectrum. This form of conflict avoids thresholds, exploits ambiguity, and deliberately resists resolution. Its purpose is not conquest, but leverage.

Second, escalation control itself emerged as a strategy. Nuclear deterrence, economic interdependence, reputational risk and domestic political constraints ensured that even capable militaries exercised force selectively. Precision replaced mass. Timing mattered more than scale. The ability to stop -- at the right moment -- became as important as the ability to strike. In this environment, restraint was no longer a moral posture; it was a strategic necessity.

Third, the architecture of institutional global order continued to fray. International institutions struggled to enforce peace or even broker durable pauses. Coalitions formed without consensus, interventions occurred without closure, and peacekeeping increasingly became a burden without mandate. Stability, where it existed, was improvised rather than imposed.

Taken together, these trends produced a world in which power existed -- but was constrained; force was available -- but carefully rationed; and conflict was managed rather than resolved.

India’s strategic context in a world of managed disorder: For India, this global condition was not abstract. It directly shaped national security choices throughout 2025. This is also because India sits at the intersection of multiple fault lines. On its western front, the persistence of cross-border terrorism remained the most immediate threat. To the north, the unresolved situation along the Line of Actual Control with China continued to limit India’s room for strategic manoeuvre. To the east, political turbulence in the neighbourhood created new uncertainties, even as the wider Indo-Pacific demanded balance without becoming tied to any one camp. What distinguished India’s posture in 2025 was calibration. India pursued what might be described as selective firmness --responding decisively where core interests were challenged, while avoiding over-extension elsewhere.

Operation Sindoor, launched in response to a major sponsored terrorist attack, illustrated this approach. It was not significant because of its duration or scale, but because of what it conveyed doctrinally. India demonstrated that it would choose the timing, scope and location of its response -- and retain control over escalation and termination. In a global environment where adversaries often seek to manipulate thresholds and closure, this assertion of initiative carried strategic weight well beyond the immediate exchange.

Power under constraint -- Lessons from 2025: One of the clearest lessons of 2025 was that having military power is not enough. What matters is when it is used, where it is used, and when it is stopped? Initiative matters. States that react mechanically cede advantage. India’s experience reinforced the importance of choosing when and how to respond, rather than allowing adversaries to dictate the tempo.

Equally, conflict termination has become a strategic act. Ending an exchange on one’s own terms -- before escalation overtakes intent -- is now a critical component of deterrence. In this sense, restraint reflects control and not reluctance.

Another under-appreciated dimension is internal cohesion. Hybrid conflict seeks fracture as much as physical damage. Narrative manipulation, social polarisation and disinformation are force multipliers for adversaries. Managing public expectation, maintaining societal resilience, and sustaining institutional trust are now integral to national security -- not peripheral concerns.

Finally, preparedness must be comprehensive. Military readiness remains essential, but it must be complemented by cyber resilience, information management, industrial depth and crisis-time decision agility. In 2025, India strengthened these capabilities, but the more important achievement was setting the right direction for the years ahead.

The international implications: India’s conduct in 2025 also carried wider implications. At a time when many powers oscillated between overreach and hesitation, India projected a posture of controlled resolve. It neither normalised escalation nor accepted provocation as inevitable. This balance enhanced India’s credibility as a stabilising actor -- particularly in a region prone to miscalculation.

Relations with the United States continued to deepen within the Indo-Pacific framework, even as India retained strategic autonomy. The engagement with China remained cautiously optimistic. On the western front, India showed that while terrorism rules out dialogue, our response will still remain measured and responsible.

In today’s world, influence depends less on alliances and more on being reliable. Nations that act with consistency and firmness are taken seriously beyond their borders. To India’s credit its autonomous foreign policy adds great credibility.

Looking ahead to 2026: What, then, should guide India’s national security strategy in 2026?

First, clarity must be preserved. Ambiguity in doctrine invites testing. India’s red lines are now better defined. Second, capability development must continue without doctrinal rigidity. The future will not conform neatly to plans or structures. Flexibility, speed of decision-making and integration across domains will matter more than perfect organisational symmetry. Third, engagement must remain selective. Not every crisis demands intervention; not every instability can be fixed. Strategic discipline lies in knowing where restraint serves interest -- and where it does not. India must not confuse action with impact. The goal is not to solve every conflict, but to prevent disorder from shaping India’s decisions.

The central lesson of 2025 is simple: not every crisis requires a response. For India, the test ahead lies in acting only when order and stability demand it, not when pressure calls for it.

The writer, a retired lieutenant-general, is a former GOC of the Srinagar-based 15 (“Chinar”) Corps