Indian Strategic Studies: 12/20/25

20 December 2025

How Kaveri Engine's 39-Year Failure Exposes Deep Institutional Voids in DRDO and HAL, Paralyzing India’s AMCA and TEDBF Programmes

RonitBisht

In a scathing The Print column published on 10 December 2025, Admiral Arun Prakash (Retd), the former Chief of Naval Staff and a distinguished strategic thinker, has delivered a stark indictment of India’s aviation establishment.

His assessment is grim: despite ambitious rhetoric surrounding the fifth-generation Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (AMCA) and the Twin-Engine Deck-Based Fighter (TEDBF), both programmes remain effectively grounded.

The cause is not a lack of funding or desire, but a 39-year-old failure that continues to haunt the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO): the inability to produce a functional indigenous jet engine.

The Kaveri Stagnation: Four Decades of Missed DeadlinesThe heart of the crisis lies with the GTX-35VS Kaveri programme. Initiated by the DRDO's Gas Turbine Research Establishment (GTRE) in 1986—and formally sanctioned in 1989—the project was intended to power India’s Light Combat Aircraft (Tejas). Instead, it has become a case study in institutional inertia.

What Trump’s New National Security Strategy Means for India

Akhilesh Pillalamarri

The National Security Strategy (NSS) of the second Trump administration, released on December 4, signals a significant shift in American foreign policy thinking and prominently reflects the distinct foreign policy views of President Donald J. Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance.

The overall tenor of the NSS reflects a geopolitical vision characterized by realism and traditional great power politics and is marked by hostility toward liberal internationalism and global institutions. The document, whose spirit will inform American grand strategy for the rest of the Trump term, highlights its belief in the primacy of nations, sovereignty, and the balance of power, stating that “the outsized influence of larger, richer, and stronger nations is a timeless truth of international relations.”

Overall, Trump’s NSS aligns with the foreign policy vision of India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and is favorable toward India and its role in the world. However, it envisions a less direct role for the U.S. in the Asian security sphere, which could be a challenge for India vis-à-vis its dynamic with China. Furthermore, the Trump administration’s single-minded pursuit of American national interests has often adversely affected Indian national interests on issues such as trade, manufacturing, and the Indian purchase of oil from Russia.

US Weapons Left Behind in Afghanistan Are Fueling Militancy in Pakistan

Umair Jamal

A recent report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), a U.S. government watchdog, has revealed that billions of dollars’ worth of weapons and military equipment that the Americans abandoned in Afghanistan in 2021 are now the main strength behind the Taliban’s security forces.

Set up in 2008, SIGAR is an independent U.S. agency that monitors how American taxpayer money was spent in Afghanistan.

The latest report was released last week. The 137-page-document reviewed the United States’ 20-year mission to rebuild Afghanistan and train its armed forces. According to SIGAR, the U.S. poured roughly $145 billion into Afghanistan’s reconstruction between 2002 and 2021. Much of this money was meant to create a stable, modern security force and support a peaceful democratic government. The report concluded that these massive efforts failed to deliver lasting peace or true democracy in Afghanistan.

Mapping China's Borderlands: Dashboard

The Mapping China’s Strategic Space: Borderlands research project investigates how China invests in, engages with, and deepens its presence within its land and maritime border neighbors in an attempt to reshape its immediate periphery. This research effort constitutes the second phase of NBR’s Mapping China’s Strategic Space project. The first phase defined strategic space as a realm vital to the pursuit of China’s national economic and security objectives and to the enduring survival of the Chinese state. Beijing aspires to freely wield its influence and assert its leadership over this realm. This dashboard was compiled in collaboration between NBR and AidData to identify thirteen indicators across 28 countries sharing maritime or land borders (or close proximity to) the People’s Republic China.

The borderland areas surrounding China’s national territory are a critical component of its strategic space. Whereas China’s geopolitical horizons stretch globally, its capacity to exercise control and effectively exert its transformative power over the full extent of its desired strategic space is still uncertain. By contrast, the country’s contiguous regions, situated in its immediate reach, present opportunities for making use of power and wealth asymmetries—testing out methods that may become trademarks of a future globally dominant China, and laying the ground for an entirely reconfigured Asia. In addition, shaping a cooperative neighborhood appears as the necessary preliminary step toward ensuring that Beijing’s global ambitions can eventually come to pass.

Why China Can’t Win the AI-Led Industrial Revolution

DI GUO and CHENGGANG XU

History has consistently shown that industrial revolutions require free institutions and robust demand to support ongoing entrepreneurship and the commercialization of new, productivity-enhancing products and services. With its system of totalitarian party-state rule, China checks none of these boxes.

STANFORD – AI is widely recognized as the core technology in an emerging industrial revolution that will probably transform every facet of the global economy. UN Trade and Development (UNCTAD) estimates – conservatively – that the global AI market will reach $5 trillion by 2033, thanks to average annual growth of about 31%. The International Monetary Fund predicts that the technology could boost global GDP by 4% over the next decade, with the United States gaining as much as 5.4%. AI’s impact on science, innovation, the military, and geopolitics is already significant, reinforcing the sense that the race for AI dominance is also a race for global dominance.

China and America Must Get Serious About AI Risk

JAKE SULLIVAN

CAMBRIDGE – In November 2024, US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping made their first substantive joint statement about the national-security risks posed by AI. Specifically, they noted that both the United States and China believe in “the need to maintain human control over the decision to use nuclear weapons.”

That may sound like diplomatic low-hanging fruit, since it would be hard to find a reasonable person willing to argue that we should hand control over nuclear weapons to AI. But with the Chinese government, there is no such thing as low-hanging fruit, especially on weighty security matters. The Chinese are inherently skeptical of US risk-reduction proposals, and Russia had opposed similar language in multilateral bodies. Because bilateral talks with the US on AI and nuclear security would open daylight between Russia and China, progress on this front was not a foregone conclusion.

China Bets on Unmanned Stealth Bombers

Olli Pekka Suorsa

This image, shared on Chinese social media platform Weibo, shows the aircraft dubbed “GJ-X” by PLA watchers.Credit: Sina Weibo

China recently unveiled two large unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), which have been unofficially designated as the “WZ-X” and “GJ-X” by China military watchers. The UAVs’ intended roles could include strategic reconnaissance and strike, offering Beijing unprecedented options in the coming decade.

China has accelerated development and testing of a growing number of advanced tailless flying wing-type UAVs, such as the Hongdu GJ-11 and its naval version, the GJ-21, as well as CASC CH-7. This trend is instructive of Chinese industry’s advances in autonomy and aeronautical design. More than that, it offers critical insights into the People’s Liberation Army Air Force’s (PLAAF) vision of its future airpower strategy.

China has worked on a next-generation manned bomber, known as the H-20, to replace the venerable H-6 fleet for a long time. Despite occasional rumors surfacing about the type’s imminent release over the years, no official or leaked (real) images of the actual design have emerged to date. Most recently, a video showing an alleged first flight of the H-20 made the rounds in social media but was quickly proven fake.

China Just Moved a Naval Task Force into the Second Island Chain

Brandon J. Weichert

Australia is understandably concerned about Chinese adventurism in the Indo-Pacific’s Second Island Chain—but there is little that it can do to stop it.

China has reached the stage of its economic and industrial development where it is pouring gobs of cash into a massive military modernization program. As a result of this push, it now has the world’s largest navy in numbers of ships, though not yet in overall tonnage. Beijing has been advancing in the naval domain at a breakneck pace.

Recently, China lashed out at their Japanese neighbors after the government of the new Japanese prime minister insinuated that her country would militarily defend Taiwan against any potential Chinese attack. This began a very nasty war of words and historical recriminations of epic proportions between the two Asian states. Threats were bandied about. Beijing circulated maps of Japan with missile targets on them.

China’s AI Use for Cyber Espionage Shifts Cyber Focus From Detection To Trust

Gil Baram

The question facing security and technology leaders is no longer whether adversaries will deploy AI agents against their environment. Now, those leaders must ask whether their trust architecture, access models and identity systems are ready for a world where breakout time—the time taken for an attacker to move from initial access to lateral movement through a digital system—has vanished, and machine-speed attackers are the default assumption.

Anthropic’s 13 November report marked a significant turning point in cybersecurity. Their investigation into the GTG-1002 campaign—assessed with high confidence as a Chinese state-sponsored operation—confirmed that AI-driven espionage is no longer hypothetical or in development. It is active and already targeting large technology firms, financial institutions, chemical manufacturers and government agencies worldwide. Anthropic describes it as the first documented case of a large-scale cyberattack carried out with minimal human involvement. The finding is important, but it should not come as a surprise.

China’s plan to quarantine Taiwan while avoiding war

Peter Olive

Concerns regarding a potential quarantine or embargo of Taiwan by the People’s Republic of China (PRC) have been growing since 2024.

While an amphibious invasion remains the most dangerous scenario, most analysts agree it poses a range of challenges for the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), despite rapid expansion and increasingly complex mission rehearsals.

These include the logistical hurdles associated with the most ambitious amphibious invasion ever attempted in history, the risk of becoming bogged down on arrival and of triggering an outside intervention and escalation.

Given these challenges, focus has shifted to how the PRC might instead seek to cut off Taiwan’s maritime supplies of energy, food, medicines and other key commodities. The purpose would not be territorial conquest but rather to pressure Taiwan’s society, potentially forcing its government to negotiate on the future of cross-Strait relations on terms favorable to Beijing.

Trump leaves complacent Europe most vulnerable since 1939

Antony Beevor

President Donald Trump’s National Security Strategy is 33 pages long. Considering the fatuous self-praise it contains, heaped upon the president himself, it was released in an unusually low-key way. Much of it is a so-called ‘Trump corollary’ to the Monroe Doctrine of 1823. It also contains an echo of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Although Roosevelt claimed that the United States would be a ‘good neighbour’ to Latin America, he rather gave the game away when he privately admitted that Anastasio Somoza, the dictator of Nicaragua, was ‘a son of a bitch, but he’s our son of a bitch’. This is a very Trumpian way of thinking, but it is also a fantasy.

Trump thinks he can get dictators in his pocket and yet he seems to have no idea when they are playing him. He has utterly misjudged Vladimir Putin, who clearly despises him. Putin kept his negotiators, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, waiting for three hours, then showed quite clearly that he had no intention of compromising on any of the 28 points that he himself appears to have dictated to the White House as a basis for discussion.

Filling America’s Shoes

AMITAV ACHARYA, ADEKEYE ADEBAJO, KATHRYN HOCHSTETLER, TANA JOHNSON, SUERIE MOON, CARLA NORRLÖF, and YU JIE

With the United States cutting aid, scrapping international agreements, and waging war on rules-based systems and arrangements that it built, questions about the future of the global order have gained new urgency. Though America may be replaceable in some areas, others may become a new Wild West.

PS Quarterly regularly features short responses from experts on topics of global concern, and this time we examine the implications of US President Donald Trump’s foreign policy. Although America’s role as the custodian of the international rules-based order was never as straightforward as its proponents believe, it at least represented an ideal against which to set expectations and measure successes and failures in global governance. But since Trump’s return, that ideal – like so many others – has been cast aside, lending new urgency to long-simmering questions.

Trump and the End of American Hegemony

JOSEPH E. STIGLITZ

In 2025, Donald Trump's erratic, unlawful policies upended the postwar era of globalization and set in motion a process that will culminate in America's loss of global primacy. Not only are the sources of US economic strength being destroyed, but all other countries are de-risking from America as fast as they can.

NEW YORK – It has become almost routine to end each year with talk of the “polycrisis,” and to acknowledge the difficulty of anticipating a future that seems pregnant with the risk of new wars, pandemics, financial crises, and climate-driven devastation. Yet 2025 added a uniquely toxic ingredient to this mix: the return to the White House of Donald Trump, whose erratic, unlawful policies have already upended the postwar era of globalization. Faced with so much chaos and uncertainty, can we say anything with confidence about where the US and global economies are heading?

Israel Unbound

VALI NASR

While the United States and its allies finally led a push to end the Gaza war in 2025, it is not clear how regional stability will be restored, or what shape a new regional order will assume. For the foreseeable future, the Middle East will be bracing for a prolonged conflict as Israel pursues military supremacy.

WASHINGTON, DC – Since Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, the Middle East has faced its most severe and consequential crisis in decades. Hamas’s egregious action demonstrated that it still posed a serious threat to Israel’s security, and the Israeli government’s reaction triggered a series of conflicts that has rattled the region.

Is Crypto an Opportunity or a Threat?

JEAN TIROLE

Innovation should enhance economic fundamentals, not erode them. With enthusiasm for crypto remaining strong, speculative unbacked tokens and lightly regulated stablecoins must be contained before they threaten financial stability and become part of the shadow banking sector.

TOULOUSE – The fascination with cryptocurrencies shows no sign of fading. With the passage of the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for US Stablecoins (GENIUS) Act in July 2025, US lawmakers added to the sense that crypto is here to stay. But look beyond the hype and an uncomfortable issue remains unresolved: Are cryptocurrencies a genuine innovation capable of serving the common good, or a speculative threat to financial and social stability?

Will Nepal’s September Uprising Transform the Ballot?

Meena Bhatta

Nepal is scheduled to hold parliamentary elections in less than three months. These polls are taking place under extraordinary circumstances. A nationwide uprising led by Gen Z toppled the sitting coalition government, led to the dissolution of the parliament, and set parts of the nation’s public infrastructure and administrative offices ablaze – literally. The uprising has demanded a new kind of political participation, a break from the way politics has long been practiced in Nepal.

The upcoming polls therefore are far more than a periodic democratic exercise. For many Nepalis these elections are a chance to renegotiate the terms of political engagement. The ambition is to redesign the existing political system, which has widely remained unresponsive, corrupt, and dominated by entrenched elites who have traded power among themselves for decades.

The interim government led by Sushila Karki has intensified preparation for the polls and is hopeful of conducting credible elections. Political parties have re-registered with the Election Commission (EC) and the EC has finalized the election calendar. Voter registration has been completed, electoral reforms are in the pipeline, and security for the elections is being coordinated across the nation. Political parties are gearing up for their general conventions before the polls.

Emerging economies and the future of global digital governance: Digital Public Infrastructure

Wakana Asano

Global debates on digital governance are often portrayed as a contest among the United States, China and the European Union. While the two great powers compete over the cloud, artificial intelligence (AI), data and telecommunications, the EU projects regulatory power through the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the 2024 EU Artificial Intelligence (AI) Act. This framing, however, overlooks a quieter transformation taking place elsewhere. Emerging economies, especially middle-income countries with large populations and consequently with increasing economic weight, are no longer passive adopters of rules, but are developing unique governance frameworks of their own with both commonalities and differences from other countries. These frameworks are cementing digital policy as part of sovereignty, inclusion and developmental priorities. Cyber geopolitics, from data localisation and critical-infrastructure projection to information warfare, now shapes how emerging economies design and secure their national interests.

Four cases, India, Brazil, Nigeria and South Africa, illustrate this shift. With large populations and economies, each country is a significant regional player, shaping trends in technology adoption and its associated norms. Their experience illustrates a broader trend in which emerging economies are increasingly influencing the future of global digital governance. This article is the first of a two-part series examining how emerging economies are shaping global digital governance.

The race for renewables in the Middle East and North Africa

Ellen Clarke

The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) is finally waking up to the imperative of renewable energy. Although the region has lagged behind the rest of the world in developing its infrastructure, surging investments in renewables will see over four times the existing capacity installed in the MENA by 2030. Nevertheless, not all countries are equally equipped to diversify and secure their energy supply to meet the soaring demand driven by rising temperatures. While Saudi Arabia has set itself the target of adding 20 gigawatts (GW) of renewable-energy capacity annually and of reaching 130 GW by 2030, other countries beset by conflict, political instability, or corruption are struggling to keep pace and adapt to climate pressures.

The economic incentives behind renewable-energy strategies

The International Energy Agency (IEA) has increased its forecast for renewable-capacity growth in the MENA by 25% over the next five years, the largest regional upgrade globally. But the year-to-year uptick in projects reflects incentives for diversification that go beyond carbon-emission concerns. The effects of climate change on MENA soil and water systems pose an acute threat to the region’s agriculture, food security, and, therefore, economies. In this context, renewables are better seen as an adaptation tool to provide the additional energy security needed to maintain agricultural production and water supplies, rather than as a system-wide energy transition away from polluting fuels.

Why Turkey Cannot Be Trusted in Gaza

Blaise Misztal, and Jonah Brody

“We want to believe that our allies will prefer to side with us, not with a terrorist organization.” That was Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan objecting to the 2017 US decision to arm Syrian Kurdish fighters, whom he considered terrorists, against the Islamic State. Today, Turkey should be held to its own standard as it demands to play a role in Gaza reconstruction: Turkey’s past support for Hamas should exclude it, permanently, from any role in securing Gaza; and, so long as Turkey sides with a terrorist organization over its allies, it can have no role there whatsoever.

For nearly two decades, Turkey has hosted Hamas leaders, pledged hundreds of millions in funding, and allowed front companies tied to the group to manage much of its $500 million in overseas assets. US sanctions have repeatedly targeted these networks, yet many still operate freely as Turkey refuses to join its US and European allies in designating Hamas a terrorist group.

Since Hamas’s brutal October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, Erdoğan has been the group’s loudest defender and Israel’s most vehement critic. Turkey has refused to condemn the October 7 massacre. Not content to declare that “Hamas is not a terrorist organization,” Erdoğan has called Hamas militants “freedom fighters.” His government coordinated with Hamas leaders, sent aid convoys, and treated Hamas operatives in Turkish hospitals. Erdoğan accused Israel of “surpassing Hitler in barbarism,” and has even threatened to “enter” Israel militarily, as Turkey did in Libya and Nagorno-Karabakh.

Drone Dominance in Contact: sUAS Challenges and Adaptations at the Brigade Level

Daniel Temme,Clayton Cooper, Matthew Levengood

In accordance with the Secretary of War’s drone dominance policy, 2nd Brigade Combat Team (2BCT), 10th Mountain Division, is aggressively pursuing Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems (sUAS) employment within both collective and pre-deployment training. To account for the loss of organic reconnaissance capabilities as a result of the recent deactivation of cavalry squadrons and Military Intelligence companies across the Army, 2BCT stood up a Multifunctional Reconnaissance Company (MFRC) to provide 2BCT with modernized organic reconnaissance capabilities. As the only subordinate unit with trained UAS operators and maintainers, the MFRC incubated the brigade’s sUAS program before training sUAS operators in light infantry units across the brigade.

Throughout this process, 2BCT identified multiple obstacles that hinder the Army’s ability to rapidly integrate sUAS at scale. The focus of this field report is to articulate the challenges that cannot be solved at the brigade level. 2BCT identified four key obstacles and proposed solutions to the challenge of achieving drone dominance:Formalizing sUAS supply chains and maintenance processes to keep non-Program of Record systems airworthy; ensuring airframes can keep pace with operational demands in both garrison and deployed environments.

Washington's Deterrence Problem

Lucas de Gamboa

When American leaders think about deterrence, they usually cite the strength of the military. “Our number one job, ” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth recently told a gathering of generals, “is to be strong so we can prevent war.” This philosophy, echoed by Republicans and Democrats alike, holds that, when the military is at its most capable, adversaries will not test us.

The logic of this view is sound, but it misses a fundamental aspect of deterrence: credibility. We may have the strongest military, but having a strong military does not mean adversaries believe it will be used. In other words, military strength alone does not prevent aggression; credible threats demonstrating America’s willingness to use force, and its resolve to see the task done, are just as important.

For a variety of reasons, America today faces a credibility problem in its deterrence strategy. Starting in the 2000s, the American public became disillusioned with intervention abroad. That reluctance, tied explicitly to misguided nation-building in regions of secondary concern, has extended to other commitments in areas more vital to American interests. This aversion to “forever wars,” though understandable, has thereby eroded Washington’s credibility and may tempt an adversary to test it abroad. To achieve peace through strength, then, Washington must urgently work to calibrate its messaging to adversaries and further encourage its allies to spend more on defense.

As Europe roars against Russia, India doubles down on Moscow

Konstantinos Bogdanos

Vladimir Putin lands in Delhi. Narendra Modi greets him with full honours. Last week, the 23rd India-Russia Annual Summit unfolded not as a relic of Cold War nostalgia, but as a blueprint for the post-Western order. And if Washington feels that it can afford to strain its relationship with India so as to apply pressure for an end to the war in Ukraine, Brussels has an opportunity here.

Sixteen agreements have just been signed: Defence pacts, trade corridors, critical minerals supply chains, pharmaceuticals, joint ventures in AI and space, a fast-tracked free trade deal with the Eurasian Economic Union. Moscow’s oil flows unchecked to Indian refineries. And beneath it all, a “special and privileged strategic partnership” has been reaffirmed – which is another way of describing India’s quiet defiance of American sanctions.

While Trump bashes the EU, other leaders want to join it

Ishaan Tharoor

It’s getting harder to overstate the strain in transatlantic ties. A week ago, the White House publicized a national security document that claimed Europe’s leadership was leading the continent toward “civilizational erasure,” scoffed at Europe’s “unrealistic” expectations to repel Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and espoused a strategy of undermining the European Union as a political entity while allying with the Euroskeptic far right. The perceived attack on the E.U. was reinforced by various statements from Trump officials and allies, furious over an E.U. fine slapped on tech billionaire Elon Musk’s X for failure to comply with E.U. digital regulations.

Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau railed against a bloc whose member states “pursue all sorts of agendas that are often utterly adverse to U.S. interests and security.” Musk himself called for the outright abolition of the European Union. President Donald Trump, in an interview with Politico last week, said Europe’s political leaders are “weak,” “politically correct” and “don’t know what to do.”

The reaction in Europe was gloomy. The latest cover in German newsweekly Der Spiegel depicted Trump standing behind a knife-wielding Russian President Vladimir Putin as the latter carved into a map of Europe. “Two rogues, one goal,” the tagline read. Kremlin officials had told reporters that Trump’s national security strategy “aligned” with their vision.

Manipulating Minds

Elina Treyger, Joseph Matveyenko, Lynsay Ayer

Reports of artificial intelligence–induced psychosis (AIP) suggest that large language models (LLMs) and future artificial general intelligence (AGI) systems might be capable of inducing or amplifying delusions or psychotic episodes in human users. To date, AIP has been discussed primarily as a public or mental health concern.

In this report, the authors examine the scope of this phenomenon and whether and how LLMs—and, eventually, AGI—could create significant national security threats. Can this capability be weaponized to induce psychosis at scale or in target groups? What kind of damage might that cause? The authors assess which targets might be most vulnerable, the potential scope of harm, and how adversaries might exploit this capability against key individuals, groups, or populations.

Updates to The 3 Core Tools For Literature Search

If you have been following me for a while, you might have heard of the "AI search loop." Given a question, this method is a thorough yet rapid way to find relevant scientific literature. Today's newsletter covers recent updates to all involved tools. Most interestingly, Google Scholar is now becoming an alternative to pricy AI tools. (See below what it means for the big picture.)

Here's how the search loop works: Based on a plain-text question, you use Consensus or the new Google Scholar Labs AI feature to find a few seed papers. These results are highly targeted, but typically yield only 2-3 relevant papers. This is why in the next step, you use Litmaps or ResearchRabbit to dig into the references of these first few papers to find additional literature based on the reference network (i.e. who cites whom). The combination of AI and reference network is what makes it so powerful. Here is a schematic:

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