Hybrid conflict in the Afghanistan – Pakistan context: digital war mechanisms, media geopolitics, and the dynamics of online radicalization

South Asia’s evolving security landscape is increasingly characterized by hybrid conflict, where conventional tensions between Afghanistan and Pakistan intersect with cyberattacks, digital information warfare, and media-driven geopolitical narratives. This study investigates the structure, scale, and strategic implications of digital warfare mechanisms within the Afghan – Pakistan context, with particular attention to the ways media ecosystems amplify or mitigate cyber threats. It focuses on patterns of online propaganda dissemination, disinformation flows, anti-state narratives, and cyber interference operations circulating across Facebook, X (formerly Twitter), Telegram, and TikTok. A mixed-methods research design was employed. The study collected 2,400 social media posts, comments, and visual materials across four platforms (600 items per platform) through stratified sampling. R was utilized for descriptive statistical analysis, frequency mapping, and sentiment analysis to identify dominant narratives, engagement dynamics, and threat escalation patterns. In addition, a survey of 300 respondents from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan including journalists, policy analysts, university students, and digital media consumers was conducted to assess perceptions of cross-border digital conflict. Findings indicate that hybrid digital conflict between Pakistan and Afghanistan is intensifying, driven by the strategic deployment of misinformation, rapid content diffusion, and weak or inconsistent content regulation mechanisms.