FERYAZ OCAKLI YELENA BIBERMAN

While the world’s attention is rightly focused on the war in Iran, another conflict is unfolding along Iran’s eastern border. Since 27 February 2026, Afghanistan and Pakistan have been officially at war, yet the fighting has drawn relatively little notice.

Even if the Pakistan-Afghanistan war continues under the radar, its consequences could shape the region for years to come. Beijing’s alliance with Pakistan and New Delhi’s growing influence over Afghanistan, have turned border skirmishes between two neighbours into a war with regional implications.

Pakistan and Afghanistan have had a rocky relationship since the Taliban returned to power in Kabul in 2021. The proximate cause of the war was Pakistan’s claim that its northern neighbour is harbouring the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), a terrorist group that has long plagued Islamabad and was responsible for the 2014 Peshawar school massacre that killed an estimated 144 people, mostly children. The Afghan Taliban seems determined not to give the Pakistani Taliban up to Islamabad, for fear of internal dissent and hardliner backlash in their own ranks.

In the background of the conflict stand two regional giants: India and China.

This is the first sustained encounter between an incipient Indian ally and the Western tip of China’s military spear.

Pakistan is concerned that Afghanistan is fast becoming a proxy for India. Although Afghan-Indian relations predate the return of the Taliban to power in Kabul, Pakistan sees the improving ties between the two states as a threat to its own security. Pakistan had a free hand to meddle in the domestic politics of Afghanistan for years during the American occupation, with Pakistani intelligence (the Inter-Services Intelligence, ISI) playing all sides to its own advantage. Islamabad now fears that India may use the turmoil to expand its footprint along Pakistan’s northern border.

For India, building a closer relationship with Kabul carries the double benefits of improving its hand against Pakistan as well as preventing future inflows of Islamist militants from Afghanistan into Kashmir, the disputed Himalayan region claimed by both India and Pakistan. Veterans of the Afghan jihad in the 1980s wreaked havoc in northern India in the 1990s. New Delhi is likely pleased at the prospect of cutting off a source of Islamist militancy that has long strengthened Pakistan at the expense of India’s domestic security.

Adding to the complexity is China’s expanding role. Chinese rivalry with India has a long history, most notably marked by their 1962 border war and decades of unresolved territorial disputes along their contested Himalayan frontier. But it entered a new phase when China began to replace the United States as Pakistan’s closest military partner. Once equipped by American military tech, Islamabad has gradually shifted its weapons procurement toward Beijing, while still maintaining cordial relations with Washington. Today, China is Pakistan’s primary supplier of military equipment, a central intelligence partner in the region, and a close diplomatic ally.

The Islamabad-Beijing partnership faced a test in May 2025 during “Operation Sindoor.” India carried out a limited military operation inside Pakistan in response to terrorist attacks on its own territory, similar to Pakistan’s current actions in Afghanistan. Chinese intelligence, air defence infrastructure, and reportedly Chengdu J-10C “Vigorous Dragon” fighter jets gave Pakistan a surprising edge. Not only did Chinese materiel prove its worth during the small war, Beijing may have also effectively changed the nature of India-Pakistan conflicts going forward.

This makes the present war between Afghanistan and Pakistan a first glimpse of the new security landscape of South and Central Asia. It is the first sustained encounter between an incipient Indian ally, Afghanistan, and the Western tip of China’s military spear, Pakistan.

The article appeared in the lowyinstitute