India’s Maritime Doctrine 2025 doctrine formalises the No War, No Peace (NWNP) operational category, emphasises multi-domain operations, prioritises emerging technologies, and underscores jointness and integration across the armed forces.

The release of India’s Maritime Doctrine 2025 (IMD-25) arrives at an inflexion point in Indo-Pacific security. Grey-zone operations have blurred the boundaries between peace and war, disruptive technologies are reshaping naval warfare, and intensifying great power competition has transformed the Indian Ocean Region from a strategic backwater into a contested space. Against this backdrop, on 2 December 2025, Admiral Dinesh K. Tripathi, Chief of the Naval Staff, unveiled the IMD-25—the Indian Navy’s latest articulation of its operational philosophy and strategic outlook.

The release marks a significant milestone in the Indian Navy’s doctrinal evolution. Sixteen years have elapsed since the last comprehensive doctrine in 2009, and a decade since the unveiling of the maritime security strategy in 2015. During this period, the maritime security environment has undergone a profound transformation. Major naval powers have expanded their presence in the Indian Ocean, non-traditional threats have demanded sustained responses, and technological advances in autonomous systems, artificial intelligence and cyber capabilities have altered the character of naval operations.

IMD-25 presents a comprehensive framework for addressing these challenges. The doctrine formalises the No War, No Peace (NWNP) operational category, emphasises multi-domain operations, prioritises emerging technologies, and underscores jointness and integration across the armed forces. It lays the doctrinal foundation for realising India’s vision of harnessing the oceans for Viksit Bharat 2047. This brief examines the doctrinal contents of IMD-25, draws comparative analysis with the 2009 version, traces its evolutionary trajectory, and offers a critical assessment of its strategic significance.

Indian Maritime Doctrine 2025: Key Highlights

The opening section of the IMD-25 articulates the Raison d’être of doctrine as a framework of principles and structured concepts to guide the operational philosophy and strategic outlook of the Indian Navy.  Designated as Naval Strategic Publication 1.1 (NSP 1.1), IMD-25 occupies the apex of the Indian Navy’s doctrinal hierarchy and serves as the capstone publication, providing the guiding framework for the employment of India’s naval power in both conflict and peacetime.[1] It elucidates India’s national interests in the maritime domain. It highlights higher-level national directives for securing them against the challenges of the global maritime environment, thereby clearly articulating the Navy’s role as an instrument of national power. IMD-25 builds upon the core strategic constructs of its predecessor doctrines, advancing them along an evolutionary trajectory by incorporating innovative concepts and features that merit detailed examination.

No War No Peace (NWNP)

Among the new concepts introduced by IMD-25 is the NWNP theory. This concept refers to a security exigency arising from the emergence of a degraded security situation in relations with another state or non-state actor. A NWNP situation is typically characterised by elevated levels of distrust, cross-border tensions and internal violence, with a looming threat of escalation, creating a complex security environment that represents neither war nor peace.[2] Addressing an NWNP situation requires heightened military readiness to prepare for contingencies and, if necessary, mount a calibrated kinetic response to influence adversary behaviour. While IMD-25 recognises the ambiguity in defining the contours of an NWNP situation, it identifies certain distinguishing characteristics of such an environment, particularly in the inter-state context.[3]

In the domain of bilateral relations, NWNP may manifest as diplomatic tensions, hostile political rhetoric, and infringements on issues of sovereignty. In the military realm, an NWNP situation may unfold as sporadic skirmishes and aggressive maneuvering across the land, maritime, or aerial domains, leading to heightened readiness and buildup of the armed forces without total mobilisation. At the geopolitical level, NWNP may intensify strategic competition, undermine regional stability, and erode established international protocols and agreements. A NWNP phase may not have a defined timeframe and can range from short-term tensions to prolonged strategic stalemate.[4]

The incorporation of the NWNP concept in IMD-25 reflects the Indian Navy’s recognition of the growing salience of irregular warfare, hybrid warfare and Grey Zone Operations (GZO) in shaping the contemporary global maritime security environment.[5] These challenges have progressively blurred the line distinguishing peace and war at sea, generating security threats that fall below the conventional armed conflicts yet carry strategic impact. This trend has been reflected in several recent maritime challenges, including the Red Sea Crisis and attacks on Critical Undersea Infrastructure (CUI), such as sub-sea cables and pipelines. These incidents underscore how non-state/quasi-state actors, often operating with tacit support of state actors, are capable of disrupting good order at sea.

These emerging challenges have compelled modern navies to recalibrate and reorient their force posture, fleet composition, surveillance architecture and response mechanisms to address persistent and ambiguous threats. By emphasising the NWNP concept, IMD-25 provides a framework to guide the Indian Navy in shaping new operational philosophies to address complex and evolving maritime security challenges. Recognising the doctrinal ambiguity surrounding irregular warfare, hybrid warfare and GZO, IMD-25 seeks to impart greater conceptual clarity of these terminologies, thereby enabling naval practitioners to formulate operational strategies to address these threats effectively and coherently.[6]

Multi-Domain Operations (MDO)

In recognition of modern warfare’s increasing reliance on highly coordinated, integrated military operations across multiple domains, the IMD-25 emphasises the concept of Multi-Domain Operations (MDO). In the military context, the concept of domain is defined as a critical macro manoeuvre space whose access or control is vital to the freedom of action and the superiority required by the mission.[7] The doctrine identifies Land, Sea, Air, Space, Cyber and Cognitive domains as vital spaces in modern warfare. Given the vulnerability of these domains to compromise during military operations, the doctrine emphasises the need to establish comprehensive control over them to gain both tactical and strategic advantage over the adversary through synchronised MDO.

The IMD-25 defines MDO as the coordinated, integrated........

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