Hybrid, ambiguous, and non-linear? How new is Russia’s ‘new way of war’?

Abstract

Russia’s recent operations in Ukraine, especially the integrated use of militias, gangsters, information operations, intelligence, and special forces, have created a concern in the West about a ‘new way of war’, sometimes described as ‘hybrid’. However, not only are many of the tactics used familiar from Western operations, they also have their roots in Soviet and pre-Soviet Russian practice. They are distinctive in terms of the degree to which they are willing to give primacy to ‘non-kinetic’ means, the scale of integration of non-state actors, and tight linkage between political and military command structures. However, this is all largely a question of degree rather than true qualitative novelty. Instead, what is new is the contemporary political, military, technological, and social context in which new wars are being fought.

Keywords:

• Russia
• Ukraine
• Crimea, hybrid warfare
• asymmetric warfare
• Spetsnaz

Notes

1. Tolstoy, War and Peace, 1032–3.

2. Pomerantsev, ‘How Putin is Reinventing Warfare’; Bērziņš, ‘Russia’s New Generation Warfare in Ukraine’; Jane’s Defence Weekly, 31 March 2014.

3. Galeotti, ‘“Hybrid War” and “Little Green Men”’.

4. Mearsheimer, ‘Why the Ukraine Crisis’.

5. Howard and Pukhov, Brothers Armed.

6. Delovoi Peterburg, 10 July 2015.

7. McDermott, ‘Moscow Resurrects Battalion’.

8. Bigg, ‘Vostok Battalion’.

9. Evron, ‘Battling Botnets’; Giles, ‘Information Troops’.

10. Breen and Geltzer, ‘Asymmetric Strategies’.

11. Bērziņš, ‘Russian New Generation Warfare’, 43.

12. IISS, Military Balance, 5.

13. See, for example, Hoffman, ‘On not-so-new-warfare’; Rácz, Russia’s Hybrid War, 19–24.

14. Gerasimov, ‘Tsennost’, 1.

15. Johnsson and Seely, ‘Russian Full-Spectrum Conflict’.

16. Pomerantsev, ‘How Putin is Reinventing Warfare’.

17. See, for example, Galeotti and Bowen, ‘Putin’s Empire of the Mind’; Trenin, ‘Russia’s Breakout’.

18. Chekinov and Bogdanov, ‘Vliyanie nepriamykh deistvi’, 3.

19. Der Haas, ‘Russia’s Military Doctrine’.

20. For an excellent treatment of the post-2003 evolution, see Rácz, Russia’s Hybrid War, 36–40.

21. IIFFMCG, ‘Independent International’.

22. Gerasimov, ‘Tsennost’, 1.

23. Izvestiya, 27 September 2011.

24. Moskovskii Komsomolets, 16 July 2012.

25. Fontanka, 27 November 2011.

26. Galeotti, Spetsnaz.

27. Izvestiya, 27 November 2012; Trenin, ‘Russia’s New Tip’.

28. Galeotti, ‘Putin’s Secret Weapon’.

29. Daily Telegraph, 2 October 2011.

30. Walther, ‘Russia’s Failed Transformation’.

31. Pomerantsev and Weiss, The Menace of Unreality.

32. Bout’s complex career is best explored in Potter, Outlaws, Inc.

33. Mansager, ‘Interagency Lessons’.

34. Conversation, February 2014.

35. Henze, ‘Fire and Sword’, 19.

36. Broxup, ‘The Basmachi’, 68–9.

37. Kogan, ‘The Basmachi’.

38. Marshall, ‘Turkfront’, 17.

39. Broxup, ‘The Basmachi’, 68.

40. Ritter, ‘The Final Phase’, 486.

41. Ibid., 489.

42. Marshall, ‘Managing Withdrawal’, 72.

43. Chikishev, Spetsnaz v Afganistane.

44. Marshall, ‘Managing Withdrawal’, 71–2.

45. Šmíd and Mareš, ‘Kadyrovtsy’.

46. Pain, ‘The Second Chechen War’; Herd, ‘The “Counter-Terrorist Operation”’.

47. Smith, ‘Russian Cyber Capabilities’.

48. CNBC, 30 January 2015.

49. Eesti Päevaleht, 27 June 2013.

50. Maigre, ‘Nothing New’.

51. Galeotti, ‘Time to Think’.