Russia’s hybrid war in Europe has already begun. This was made clear by the President of Latvia, Edgars Rinkevics, during a press conference this week, echoing warnings about Moscow’s attempts to intimidate countries that support Ukraine.
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“It is not something that will start in the future,” Rinkevics said at the meeting near the country’s border with Belarus. “It is happening right now,” he stated.
His words referred to a series of acts perpetrated by Russia that have been occurring in Europe and have recently intensified, ranging from cut cables, disruption of air traffic due to the presence of drones, fallen missiles, arson, sabotage, among others.
Hybrid threats, according to the classic definition by academic Frank Hoffmann, “incorporate a wide range of modes of warfare, including conventional capabilities, irregular tactics and formations, terrorist acts including indiscriminate violence and coercion, and criminal disorder.”
“These are attacks designed to distract, confuse, and demoralize the adversary, but not to provoke a response. This is covert war, which causes damage and costs lives, but operates below the traditional threshold of war,” wrote the CEPA study center in an analysis on the subject.
According to a European intelligence official who spoke to Bloomberg mid-month, there are indications that Russian intelligence and security services are considering hybrid warfare operations that could include infrastructure sabotage or false flag attacks against the Baltic States and Poland.
For example, Latvia is investigating a fire that occurred last month in a warehouse of a charity organization providing aid to Ukraine. It has also experienced an increase in the number of undocumented immigrants trying to enter the country from Belarus. In response, the Riga government has deployed drones, helicopters, more sensors, and personnel at the border.
“There are also a whole series of other cases that are being actively investigated, such as sabotage, various types of provocation, and espionage,” Rinkevics said without giving further details.
Because while Ukraine experiences a wave of bombings every day, Europe has seen a rise in suspicious activities, such as what happened in Germany with the discovery of an armed drone near a Ukrainian plane, as well as accusations of assassination attempts and arson attacks.
For example, Estonia’s Prime Minister, Kristen Michal, said on Tuesday that the country’s authorities are investigating possible Russian involvement in a fire that occurred in a building used by the defense company Milrem Robotics.
The prosecutor’s office stated on Tuesday that it suspected an arson attack against the facilities of the autonomous combat vehicle manufacturer, backed by investors from the United Arab Emirates and with close ties to Ukraine.
“One of the hypotheses being considered is that it could have been an act of sabotage and that Russia was behind the arson,” Michal said in a Facebook post. “If the goal of this act was to intimidate Estonia, sow discord among our peoples, or prevent us from supporting Ukraine, they will not succeed,” she added.
Adding to all the above was what happened on Thursday, when Romania destroyed an explosive-laden naval drone near its Neptun Deep platform in the Black Sea. “A growing campaign of threats is developing that unsettles our citizens and seeks to divide our Union. This is hybrid war,” said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
“The founding mission of our Union is to preserve peace. Today, that also means having the capacity to deter provocation and aggression. Our Preparation 2030 agenda is mobilizing up to 800 billion euros. With the European Defense Initiative against Drones and the Eastern Flank Watch program, we are increasing production in Europe to provide member states with the capabilities they need. Thus, we will be able to respond to emerging threats quickly, united, and determined,” she stated.
In February this year, the European Parliament adopted a resolution on the European Union’s strategic defense and security partnerships emphasizing “the particular security concerns of EU member states on its eastern flank, which face direct threats from Russian aggression and hybrid warfare.” By July, the bloc had sanctioned 26 entities and more than 100 individuals for supporting Russia’s destabilizing activities, including cyberattacks.
Acts in the gray zone do not involve any conventional military element; technically, they are non-kinetic. As Foreign Policy magazine explained, in the recent series of such acts in Germany, the most likely culprit is Russia, which has a history of using these techniques against European states. European governments have linked the Kremlin, among other things, to the fire at a large shopping center in Warsaw, an attack on a property linked to then British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, and facilitating the arrival of migrants at the borders of Norway and Finland.
Several analysts have suggested that Russia has various motivations for carrying out hybrid warfare activities in Europe, including testing the responses of targets and imposing costs or overloading the resources of target countries.
A report on Hybrid War in Europe, delivered to the United States Congress, noted that “NATO, EU, and U.S. officials have indicated that Russia’s increased use of hybrid warfare activities is at least partly a response to Western support for Ukraine and is designed to undermine transatlantic unity, while other observers assume that Russia is adopting hybrid warfare tactics as a form of asymmetric conflict given its conventional military inferiority relative to the United States and NATO,” it stated.
According to the United States Defense Intelligence Agency, “Moscow uses indirect actions to compete with the West and overcome military superiority by exploiting asymmetry to promote Russian interests without incurring the costs of a large-scale war. Moscow also employs covert actions, information operations, cyber activities, airspace violations, and proxy agents to undermine Ukraine’s war effort, compete against the West, and test NATO’s capabilities and resolve, staying below the threshold of direct armed conflict.”
In this context, concerns have been growing. “What makes this wave of attacks notable is that it is directed at Germany, a country that promotes cooperation and understanding like no other. For German politicians, in recent decades there has been no conflict that could not be resolved through a pact, nor dispute too thorny for multilateral negotiations. Germany was a co-founder of what is now the European Union. It actively participated in negotiations of the nuclear agreement with Iran. It tried to resolve Russian attacks against Ukraine in 2014 through diplomatic talks. When the country reunified in 1990, it did so after orderly negotiations with the four victors of World War II. Overall, this constructive approach worked,” Foreign Policy stated.
“As tensions rise on NATO’s eastern flank, here are some things worth remembering. If Vladimir Putin crosses NATO’s border and the Alliance does not respond immediately, firmly, and unitedly, according to Article 5, the Alliance will be finished. No political maneuver will compensate for it,” wrote American political scientist Andrew Michta on X.
“The Alliance is struggling to unite not only because the erratic policies of the Trump administration have called into question the established premises of how it is supposed to function, but also due to the cynicism and selfishness of a large group of European leaders. Apart from the border capitals of NATO countries facing Russia, I perceived no urgency to prepare nor a true sense of danger. What I heard too often was talk of appeasing Russia or currying favor with China, despite all the bellicose rhetoric of ‘Europe.’ So this is the reality,” he questioned.
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