Intelligence Collapse – Lesson from Modern Warfare
The nature of warfare is being reshaped by technology in ways and means unimaginable to many. Israel’s precision attacks, Ukraine’s deployment of drones, and Pakistan’s spectacle of multidomain operations left global defence enthusiasts in awe. Strategists and commentators centred their arguments on technological leaps that occurred in recent years to analyse the success of these countries against their adversaries. However, the common denominator among all these operations—military planning and intelligence failures of adversaries—is little discussed within the strategic community.
In the Russia–Ukraine war, the discourse revolved around drones and how they democratised the skies by providing a strategic equaliser to a weaker power against a much stronger adversary. Operation Spider Web, in this regard, highlights how Ukraine utilised drones to attack Russia’s strategic assets—but was it all about drone technology?
No, it was not. It was a classic example of immaculate human intelligence and military planning for conducting a sabotage mission, in which drones were employed effectively. At the same time, it highlights the porous counterintelligence architecture of Russia, which allowed Ukrainian agents to operate deep within Russian territory. If not for Russian intelligence failures or brilliant Ukrainian military planning, drones would not have delivered what some have described as “spy movie stuff”.
The second example is the Iran–Israel conflict, which made headlines due to Israel’s precision strikes targeting key Iranian installations and military leadership. The second most highlighted aspect of the war was Iran’s ballistic missile arsenal, which successfully penetrated Israel and shattered the myth of Israeli invincibility. During the twelve-day war, the least discussed issue was Iran’s intelligence failure and Israel’s ingenuity in using human intelligence. Even though precision strike capability was important, the intelligence network Israel maintains within Iran not only provided information but also operated drones inside Iranian territory—just like Operation Spider Web. This was the key factor behind Israel achieving initial gains during the early days of the war by neutralising Iran’s military leadership. These initial losses due to intelligence failure were a major setback for Iran’s entire security architecture, raising eyebrows among security analysts around the world, with a simple question: how was this possible?
The third case is the Pakistan–India conflict, in which the Pakistan Air Force (PAF), through Operation Zarb e Karrar, took the steam out of the Indian Air Force (IAF) by downing seven aircraft and grounding them for two days. Apart from PAF’s brilliance under the leadership of Air Marshal Zaheer Ahmed Babar Sidhu, it was India’s ignorance that led them into a tunnel vision trap. This was largely due to a significant intelligence failure, where they undermined, misperceived, and miscalculated PAF’s capability and resolve. India ignored the age-old dictum of Sun Tzu— ‘know your enemy’—and paid a heavy price by losing its honour in the South Asian skies. Later, India’s reputation was further damaged by Pakistan’s armed forces in Operation Bunyan ul Marsoos, as their key asset, the S-400, was neutralised and BrahMos missiles rendered ineffective. From Pakistan’s side, it was multidomain operations and interoperability brilliance, but for India, the true cause of embarrassment lay in its intelligence failure.
The common lesson from all these events is simple: secure intelligence architecture determines the outcome of wars. Technology and its mastery are not the only determinants. They are key enablers, but the true advantage lies in intelligence and counterintelligence to stay ahead of the enemy. In future, these lessons will remain relevant for security managers, because what happened in Iran and Russia will serve as inspiration for war planners in future.
The key takeaway for Pakistan is to apply these lessons across two critical domains. First, in countering terrorism, which is largely driven by Indian proxies and could, in future conflicts, involve attempts to sabotage Pakistan’s strategic planning. Given that drones are increasingly becoming the weapon of choice for Fitna tul Khawarij (TTP), Pakistan must develop a comprehensive strategy. A central step in this regard would be to restrict access to such drones and disrupt the supply chain through intelligence-led operations.
Second, these lessons should be applied in the conventional context of deterrence against India by maintaining a robust and credible intelligence framework capable of anticipating India’s next move. Pakistan should continue its commendable efforts, as demonstrated during the Marka e Haq, where its air defence systems successfully
neutralised incoming Indian drones through both soft and hard kills. However, future preparations must focus on preemptively dismantling any sabotage plans India may attempt to execute.
