Escalation hotspot

Kashmir is being ranked among the world's most critical escalation hotspots, as nuclear-armed India and Pakistan face "perilously high" tensions. The Global Peace Index, published by the highly-regarded Australian think tank Institute for Economics and Peace, noted how the four-day Indo-Pak conflict in May 2025 — the deadliest in years - exposed how quickly the Kashmir dispute could ignite a catastrophic war. The report also notes the fragility of the ceasefire - India won't even explicitly admit the circumstances around the agreement, including the role Washington played.

The May 2025 clashes saw BrahMos cruise missiles, Rafale jets, J-10Cs and hundreds of drones in the skies above the Indo-Pak border and the Line of Control. Pakistan's downing of advanced Indian aircraft, including French-built Rafales, also proved that even "limited" conflicts risk rapid escalation. The embarrassment of having to ground the pride of the Indian Air Force saw the conflict spread well beyond traditional skirmish zones in Kashmir, dragging the world toward crisis.

Meanwhile, the threat to cut off Pakistan's water — a war crime — shows that India's leaders are more than willing to act like a rogue state just to keep up their prime minister's strongman image and delusions of grandeur.

India's spokespersons can run themselves hoarse calling Kashmir a bilateral issue, but that doesn't make it so. Remember the day India asked the UN to intervene in the first conflict over the region. Modi and his regime are clearly not students of history — not even Indian history — so they are unlikely to be familiar with the events of 1914, when a regional conflict tainted by mistrust and disinformation exploded into what is now better known as the First World War. India's far-right government has been using conflict as a political tool for the past decade. Without domestic or foreign intervention soon, one day it will end up going too far.