The changing nature of warfare

The nature of warfare has undergone profound changes throughout history, particularly in the last century, moving from traditional battlefield confrontations to increasingly complex, technology-driven forms that blur the lines between war, peace, and crime. Contemporary warfare now encompasses cyber operations, autonomous weapons, information campaigns, and conflicts driven by both state and non-state actors45.

Key Transformations in Warfare:

• Technological Advancements: Modern conflicts leverage technologies such as drones, artificial intelligence, and cyber capabilities, enabling remote and precision operations with less direct human involvement. Autonomous and unmanned systems are becoming critical, shifting military priorities from massed troops to high-tech assets45.

• Cyber and Information Warfare: Cyberattacks and disinformation campaigns can destabilize societies and disrupt critical infrastructure without deploying traditional armed forces. Notable examples include malware operations like Stuxnet and influence operations in electoral processes4.

• Asymmetric and Hybrid Warfare: Wars are increasingly fought between unequal actors, such as states versus insurgents or terrorists. Hybrid warfare combines conventional military force with irregular tactics, cyber operations, economic pressure, and propaganda—exemplified by Russia’s activities in Ukraine45.

• Blurring of War and Peace: The distinction between wartime and peacetime is less clear, as operations (especially cyber and information warfare) can be continuous, global, and non-lethal, aiming at influence or disruption rather than conquest5.

• Role of Non-State Actors: Groups like ISIS and private military companies challenge the traditional state monopoly on violence, sometimes waging global or localized campaigns independent of state control45.

• Space Warfare Emergence: Space is an increasingly important domain, with nations fielding anti-satellite systems and leveraging orbital assets for surveillance, communication, and potentially offensive operations45.

• Changing Military Tactics and Doctrine:

  • Special forces and small elite units now often supplant large land armies for discrete, high-impact operations5.

  • Standing conflicts are more frequently “low intensity” internal or civil wars rather than wars between states5.

Implications and Challenges:

• Ethical and Legal Issues: The deployment of autonomous weapons, cyber warfare, and clandestine information campaigns raises unresolved questions about accountability and the application of international law4.

• Civilian Vulnerability: Modern warfare can result in significant civilian casualties and societal disruption, even in the absence of direct military confrontation4.

• Economic and Strategic Costs: The expense of maintaining technologically advanced forces and defending against cyber and information threats places new financial and operational burdens on states45.

Historical Perspective:
While some foundational elements of warfare, such as the influence of social, political, and economic conditions, remain unchanged, the means and methods of conflict have transformed dramatically—from melee combat to industrial and now digital and hybrid forms of war456. Many scholars emphasize that understanding current changes is essential for formulating effective defense strategies and policy responses5.

Limitations:
There is debate regarding how fundamentally new these developments are, or whether they represent extensions of historical trends adapted to technological and social change35. The future of warfare is expected to be shaped by continued technological evolution, particularly in AI, quantum computing, and possibly biological domains, as well as by the pressures of climate change and resource competition4.

1. https://www.jstor.org/stable/44642864
2. https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/tr/pdf/AD1014542.pdf
3. https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol49/iss2/3/
4. https://dennana.in/2025/03/17/changing-nature-of-warfare-2/
5. https://capsindia.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Shekhar-Sinha.pdf
6. https://www.jstor.org/stable/222648
7. https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/citations/ADA495541
8. https://www.academia.edu/43778376/The_Changing_Nature_of_Warfare_Part_I
9. https://erinmills.ca/whatsinstore/product/the-changing-nature-of-warfare-by-peter-browning-paperback-indigo-chapters-indigobooks-c67213?model=0&variant=0