Hydropolitics and the weaponization of water
As scarcity grows, rivers are turning from lifelines into instruments of power and conflict.
In a nutshell
- Water scarcity is rising, leading to a sharp increase in clashes
- Weak treaties and upstream control raise the risk of cross-border conflict
- Durable water sharing depends on transparency and clear frameworks
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Water is the only natural resource that is essential to human life. This indispensable supply is also limited. Unlike energy, where technological advancements can offer replacements for coal, oil and gasoline, there is no alternative to water. The same amount that sustained dinosaurs in the Jurassic period is now expected to meet the needs of over 8.2 billion people. Approximately 97 percent of the Earth’s water is saline (oceans), leaving only about 3 percent as fresh water – the vast majority of which is locked in glaciers, ice caps or deep underground aquifers. Consequently, less than 1 percent of the Earth’s fresh water is easily accessible for human use, in rivers, lakes, and shallow groundwater.
These realities – compounded by population growth, degradation of water quality and climate change – add dangerous pressure to the already fraught world of hydropolitics. The risk of hostilities spikes wherever nations share a water resource – particularly when there is no binding treaty to govern allocation or resolve disputes.
Earlier legal theories were entirely state-centric – either the upper riparian state claimed complete control over the water, or the lower riparian state argued it had an absolute right to the same quantity or quality of water as the upstream state. The former was the case when in 1895 the United States declared, under the Harmon Doctrine, that Mexico had no right to protest over the polluted water that the U.S. was delivering to Mexico in the Rio Grande. As water law matured, most nations, but not all, realized that this zero-sum approach would not work when so many other issues, such as trade and security between nations, were at stake.
Facts & figures
Upper and lower riparian states in international law
Upper riparian states
An upper riparian state lies upstream on a cross-border river. In international water law, it may use the water flowing through its territory, but it is expected to take downstream impacts into account.
Lower riparian states
A lower riparian state lies downstream. It depends on upstream flows for drinking water, agriculture, energy and ecosystems, and is vulnerable to upstream diversion, dams or pollution.
Modern international water law
Today’s dominant principle is equitable and reasonable use. States must share cross-border rivers in a way that is fair, avoid causing significant harm and cooperate through information-sharing and consultation.
The Harmon Doctrine
The Harmon Doctrine argues that an upstream state has absolute sovereignty over water within its territory, regardless of downstream consequences. Under this logic, upper riparian states have no legal obligations toward lower riparians. The Harmon Doctrine has been widely rejected in international law, but it still shapes political behavior.
Of the more than 800 agreements on fresh water signed since 1820 across 310 international water basins, those that have best stood the test of time share five pillars:
Institutionalization: Permanent Joint Commissions create a “technical channel” independent of political volatility. For example, Indian and Pakistani commissioners continued meeting during the 1965 and 1971 wars, shielded by the Indus Water Treaty’s robust framework.
Data transparency: Mandating the exchange of hydrological data removes suspicion. When downstream states have verified flow data, they are less likely to misinterpret natural drought as malicious upstream withholding.
Graduated dispute resolution: Effective treaties prevent political escalation by employing a tiered approach – resolving most issues at the technical level via commissions or neutral experts – rather than jumping straight to the International Court of Justice.
Benefit sharing: Rigid volumetric allocations fail during droughts. Modern treaties succeed by allocating percentages of flow or sharing the river’s benefits (for example, upstream electricity for downstream irrigation), aligning the economic incentives of both parties.
Technical specificity: Ambiguity is the enemy of implementation. Durable treaties include exhaustive annexes on engineering criteria – such as dam heights and spillway designs – to minimize room for reinterpretation by future nationalist governments.
After a brief lull during the Covid-19 pandemic, water-related violence spiked, fueled by its weaponization in Ukraine and Gaza and scarcity in developing nations. This marks a distinct shift from isolated incidents to systemic escalation, with annual conflict events growing exponentially since 2021.
The Indus Treaty, the China-Tibet Super Dam, the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) and Turkiye’s use of the Tigris and Euphrates are examples of the weaponization of water through upstream control of cross-border rivers.
The Indus Waters Treaty: A resilient, yet fragile, lifeline
The Indus is one of the greatest river systems in the world, with a water flow double that of the Nile. The World Bank mediated the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty (IWT), resolving the water-sharing dispute between India and Pakistan. The IWT gives India control over the eastern rivers and Pakistan control over the western rivers, while allowing India limited hydroelectric use of the western rivers.
The treaty is durable but faces recent strains. In April 2025, India suspended participation after a terror attack, citing unresolved issues like terrorism and climate change, despite the treaty’s general success in managing water sharing for decades. Pakistan’s reliance on the Indus system for over 90 percent of its irrigation water makes any disruption an existential threat to its agricultural economy and stability. Undermining the IWT would not only devastate the region but would also set a dangerous global precedent for not enforcing major international water agreements.
China’s Tibet Super Dam: The ‘water chokehold’ on South Asia
There were 74 water-related conflicts in Southern Asia in 2024, a significant rise from 49 in 2023, making it one of the most water-stressed regions globally, alongside the Middle East. China’s massive, planned hydropower complex on the Yarlung Tsangpo River, which becomes the Brahmaputra in India and Bangladesh, will give China total control over the headwaters of several major Asian rivers and create anxiety downstream. There is no binding water-sharing treaty in this system of rivers. The fear is that China will be able to manipulate flows by withholding water during dry seasons to cause drought or release it during monsoons to cause devastating artificial floods in India’s northeast and in Bangladesh. The Chinese authorities’ lack of transparency and real-time data sharing compounds the fears. This uncertainty gives China geopolitical leverage over India, especially amid border tensions.
Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam: Existential battle for the Nile
The largest flashpoint for water conflict in Africa centers on Ethiopia’s sovereign right to development versus Egypt’s historical water security. The GERD on the Blue Nile is a monumental national project for Ethiopia, promising to double its electricity output. However, it is also a major political shift and signifies the end of Egypt’s historical, colonial-era dominance over the Nile’s flow.
Read more by international law expert Colleen Graffy
Egypt depends on the Nile for over 90 percent of its fresh water. Cairo views the dam’s filling and operational rules as an existential threat, fearing prolonged periods of drought if the reservoir is filled too quickly or if water is held back during low-flow years. The core dispute is over unilateral control. Ethiopia views the river as its sovereign resource, while Egypt and Sudan demand a binding international agreement on flow guarantees, which Ethiopia is reluctant to fully sign. Past suggestions of military action (mostly by Egyptian political figures) underscore the intensity of the stalled conflict.
Turkiye and the Tigris-Euphrates: Hydro-coercion in the Mideast
Turkiye’s Southeastern Anatolia Project (GAP) – a colossal network of 22 dams and 19 hydroelectric plants – transformed the Tigris and Euphrates from shared rivers with Iraq and Syria into instruments of Turkish statecraft. By reducing flows by up to 40 percent on the Tigris and 90 percent on the Euphrates, Ankara’s hydro-hegemony engineered a strategic denial that halved Iraq’s winter crops, dried the Mesopotamian Marshes, and sparked violent unrest in Basra due to water scarcity and salinization. Turkiye treats water as a bargaining chip to exact security concessions and pressure Kurdish-controlled regions in Syria.
It is notable that China, Ethiopia and Turkiye all uphold the outdated Harmon Doctrine of territorial sovereignty at the expense of lower riparian states. India and Pakistan’s Indus Waters Treaty follows the principle of equitable use, giving that dispute a greater chance of successful resolution.
Scenarios
Likely: The “water chokehold” becomes the norm
This scenario represents the escalation of existing disputes, where major powers formalize their upstream control and ignore international water norms. Powerful upstream hydro-hegemons unilaterally claim complete sovereignty over river headwaters. They refuse to sign binding, equitable water-sharing treaties, preferring to use data and flow manipulation as a permanent tool of foreign policy. Their weapons are uncertainty and denial. Flows are strategically reduced during political disagreements, not necessarily to cause immediate mass death, but to cripple downstream agriculture, economy and morale. This forces downstream states into politically subservient positions to make concessions for water releases.
Somewhat likely: Water infrastructure as a primary cyber and terrorist target
The digitalization of water management creates an entirely new vulnerability: the use of cyberattacks and non-state actors to weaponize water systems. As water networks become more technologically complex and automated, they become vulnerable to cyberwarfare. A successful attack can instantly poison a city’s supply, cause dam gates to fail or reroute water flows – all without firing a shot.
State or non-state groups can remotely inject toxins or contaminants into municipal water treatment facilities. Their weapon is mass panic, disease and societal breakdown rather than kinetic force. Non-state actors can seize control of low-security dams to either flood strategic military zones or cut off water to rival populations until demands are met. Highly urbanized, water-stressed regions with aging or complex digital infrastructure become targets. This applies to internal disputes in large nations like India or external attacks on key regional infrastructure, such as desalination plants in the Middle East.
Unlikely: The era of hydro-diplomacy and durable treaties
This scenario involves a global pivot where states recognize that shared scarcity makes conflict a mutually assured destruction, forcing them into cooperation. The existential fear caused by climate change forces a renewed commitment to international law. Nations adopt a “cooperation-over-conflict” model, bolstered by advanced technology.
China, Turkiye, Ethiopia and other upstream states agree to transparent, real-time data on flow rates and dam levels, monitored by third-party international agencies (for example, the United Nations, World Bank), removing the key weapon of uncertainty. Treaties move beyond simply sharing water volume to sharing benefits (such as upstream hydropower for downstream food security).
For example, Ethiopia sells GERD electricity to Egypt and Sudan at a reduced rate in exchange for firm flow guarantees. Global investment pours into regional, non-river-dependent water solutions like desalination and efficient irrigation, lowering the reliance on disputed rivers and thus diminishing the power of the “water weapon.”
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