War From The Sky, Hunger On The Ground – OpEd
Can Nuclear-Armed Neighbours Afford a Drone War When Their Citizens Can’t Afford Food?
Sindoor and Smoke
On a tranquil July morning in 2025, as pilgrims trekked through the pine-cloaked trails near Pahalgam, seeking solace in ritual, a sudden burst of gunfire shattered the serenity. The massacre of Hindu pilgrims—later claimed by a little-known jihadi group allegedly operating from Pakistani soil—has reignited one of the world’s most fragile powder kegs: the India–Pakistan conflict over Kashmir.
India’s immediate response was swift and surgical. Cloaked in the symbolism of sacred vermilion, Operation Sindoor marked India’s foray into a drone-dominated theatre of retribution—targeting alleged militant strongholds along the volatile Line of Control with surgical precision and geopolitical intent.
It was calibrated to be limited, unmanned, and precise—a “new normal” in warfare, according to Indian defence officials. In response, Pakistan scrambled air defence systems and deployed Turkish-made Bayraktar drones, vowing retaliation if its sovereignty were breached.
Yet beneath this metallic ballet of unmanned precision lies a deeply human cost. Not only in the trauma of Kashmir’s civilians caught under constant surveillance, but in the broader existential dilemma confronting South Asia: can two nuclear-armed neighbours afford a prolonged drone war when millions of their citizens are already fighting a war against hunger, unemployment, and state neglect?
Strategic Innovation or Escalatory Trap?
What makes this moment different from past Indo-Pak flare-ups is not the hostility, but the tools. Both nations are experimenting with drone warfare as an escalation-control mechanism—a supposedly “clean” alternative to boots-on-ground combat. Drones offer plausible deniability, surgical reach, and reduced troop casualties. They also open Pandora’s box.
Unlike fighter jets, drones fly under radar thresholds, invite misattribution, and risk blurring the lines between reconnaissance and aggression. A misfire, or worse, a drone striking civilian infrastructure, could be all it takes for the region to spiral into a full-scale conventional war.
Further, with China backing Pakistan’s military technology ecosystem and India ramping up its own indigenous drone production under the ‘Make in India’ program, a technological arms race is already underway. This is not just a war of attrition—it’s a war of acceleration, where cheaper autonomous weapons lure fragile states into high-risk conflict at low cost.
The Cost of Conflict: Economy Vs Nationalism
While drones may be cheaper than tanks, warfare is never free. And both India and Pakistan, with their teetering economies, may find themselves bankrupted not just in finance but in vision.
India, grappling with unemployment at a five-year high, agrarian distress, and post-pandemic inflation, now finds itself rerouting billions toward defence. Investors are jittery. The stock market dipped after the launch of Operation Sindoor. Meanwhile, defence overspending threatens to derail infrastructure and education budgets—both essential for a country eyeing a global economic leap.
Pakistan, dependent on IMF bailouts, risks violating loan conditions tied to military restraint. The strain on public finances could trigger civil unrest, especially as inflation erodes purchasing power in urban centres and fuel prices soar under wartime supply constraints.
As bilateral trade collapses and regional investment stalls, the South Asian economy—already the slowest growing in the post-COVID world—is staring into an abyss.
Kashmir: The Burden Bears Downward
No place bears the burden of conflict like Kashmir. Here, the hum of drones is not just a sound—it is a haunting reminder that the skies watch more than they protect, turning daily life into a quiet theatre of psychological siege. Young Kashmiris, already scarred by decades of insurgency and military excess, now live in a panopticon where every terrace, orchard, or phone signal is a potential target.
Fear breeds radicalisation. Local governance, already weak, crumbles under the weight of securitisation. The media, meanwhile, fuels nationalism instead of fostering accountability. Television studios become virtual war rooms, where jingoism replaces journalism.
Civil liberties in both countries shrink. Dissent is labelled unpatriotic. University campuses fall silent. Artists and activists are vilified. South Asia becomes a region at war not only with its neighbour, but with its own conscience
Defence Spending vs Human Security
In 2025, India ranked as the world’s fourth-largest military spender, allocating a formidable $75 billion to defense—outstripping every other sector in the Union Budget and consuming 13.45% of total government expenditure. It was a year when missiles outpaced meals in fiscal priority.
According to reporting by Al Jazeera and independent research, Pakistan’s defense budget—hovering around $9.5 billion in 2025—consumed more than 18% of the national purse, eclipsing the country’s combined outlay on health and education. In a nation where classrooms and clinics struggle, missiles continue to command the lion’s share. And yet, over 600 million people in both countries remain below the global middle-income line, struggling to access clean water, nutrition, and stable employment.
“Missiles don’t fill stomachs. Drones don’t teach children. Wars don’t build nations.” — Former Indian diplomat, anonymous, July 2025
This isn’t just a budgetary debate. It’s a moral referendum. A war without soldiers may be waged in silence, but it reverberates in empty schools, delayed hospital funding, and rural hunger. The true toll isn’t measured in border skirmishes alone—it’s etched in fractured futures and generations caught in the crossfire.
The Bigger Question
Can nuclear-armed neighbours afford a long-drawn drone war when their citizens can’t afford food?
Drone wars may appear less bloody, more manageable, and politically useful in the short term. But control, in this theatre of drones and deterrence, is a mirage. Peace in South Asia will not descend from machines circling overhead—it must be forged through diplomacy grounded on the earth below. It will come when leaders on both sides recognise that no sovereignty is secured when a nation’s own people go hungry.
Until then, both countries risk becoming military giants with hollow stomachs and wounded souls.
