The United Service Institution of India was founded in 1870 by a soldier scholar, Colonel (later Major General) Sir Charles MacGregor. The story of its growth is the story of the growth of the Indian Armed Forces. It was founded for ‘furtherance of interest and knowledge in the art, science and literature of the Defence Services.’
Major General Jagatbir Singh, VSM (Retd)
This Occasional Paper explores how cognitive warfare shaped the battlespace during Operation Sindoor—India’s first war in the digital era. The paper underscores the strategic importance of narrative control, information dominance, and perception management in modern conflicts. Drawing on recent experiences, it analyses how disinformation, artificial intelligence-enabled propaganda, and social media engineering were leveraged by adversaries to distort truth, undermine public trust, and influence global opinion. The study highlights institutional gaps in India’s strategic communication framework and calls for a whole-of government approach to integrate military operations with real-time narrative shaping. It makes a compelling case for creating a strategic communication authority to enhance India’s preparedness in cognitive domains. The paper concludes that military success alone is no longer sufficient; narrative superiority has become a decisive element of modern warfare.