HYBRID WARFARE: EMERGING CHALLENGES FOR PAKISTAN

Abstract

Hybrid Warfare is gaining currency and posing new challenges to military thinkers and practitioners. The changes by the technological revolution, information and psychological operations, digitisation of the battlefield, and modernization in conventional warfare have ceased to be the standalone option for applying force. These changes envisage the application of all Elements of National Power (EoNP), projected along a continuous span of activities, stretching from stability, security, reconstruction and terminating at armed conflict. The paper explains that hybrid warfare is the instrument of choice by the challengers, primarily India, to weaken Pakistan, subjugate it and either balkanise it or make it a flaccid state as the least desired objective. With hybrid warfare as an instrument of application against Pakistan, this article has attempted to dissect hybrid warfare's contours and its impact on Pakistan.