Hybrid warfare in and around Ukraine has confronted Europe with a paradigm shift regarding security and defense since at least 2014. It began to dawn on Europe, that in an extreme case, existing military defense- and deterrence-postures might even be bypassed through hybrid strategies in a ‘downward or horizontal escalation mode’. With Russia’s large-scale military invasion of Ukraine, the war entered a new, militarily escalating but no less hybrid phase. European countries in support of Ukraine incrementally came under hybrid attack. The spectrum ranges from disinformation, influencing, cyber-attacks and espionage, via “weaponized migration” and ideological radicalization towards various forms of sabotage. It includes the conventional military component and even threats in the nuclear domain.

Hybrid warfare is not a new phenomenon. It can be expected that the future of conflict and war to a large degree will be determined by hybrid styles of warfare.

But what is hybrid warfare? How can hybrid warfare be conceptualized properly based on its’ nature? As countering hybrid warfare requires cooperation and coordination among manifold different actors, these are not only questions of theory, but of highest practical relevance. Without a common and comprehensive understanding of hybrid warfare among various relevant actors, common and comprehensive action in defense and response would be almost impossible.

Dr Johann Schmid is the project officer for the subject of Hybrid Warfare at the Bundeswehr Centre of Military History and Social Sciences (ZMSBw), Potsdam and lecturer at the Chair of Military History and Cultural History of Violence at the University of Potsdam. Previously he was the Director COI Strategy & Defence at the European Centre of Excellence for Countering Hybrid Threats (Hybrid CoE) in Helsinki (FIN). He joined the Bundeswehr in 1989. His assignments within the mechanized infantry, latest as company commander, included deployment to Kosovo in 1999. In various positions he served within the German Federal Ministry of Defence, on the strategic command level within NATO as well as in the peace-, conflict- and security-related academia.
He gained his PhD at the University of Cologne with a study on the dialectic relationship between offence and defence in Clausewitz’ classic ‘On War’. His research interests include Hybrid Warfare, Clausewitz, Theory and the Changing Manifestation of War, Strategy and Security Policy.