Artwork © Dominik Herrmann

It could be the title of the latest blockbuster action movie, but instead it has become the rallying cry of Russia hawks across the West. What is the latest fiendishly complex, ruthlessly cunning threat we face from the Kremlin? Why, of course it’s the “Gerasimov Doctrine.”

Named for Russia’s Chief of the General Staff, General Valery Gerasimov, this is a supposed plan for combined psychological, political, subversive, and military operations to destabilize the West. Or perhaps just covert operations and disinformation, without the shooting. Or maybe the aim is to destroy the whole architecture of the global order. The very confusion about what exactly this “doctrine” entails betrays the basic point: it doesn’t exist.

A Foolish Indulgence

I really ought to know, as I was the one who incautiously and unintentionally launched the “Gerasimov Doctrine.” Back in 2013, a speech Gerasimov delivered to a Russian military conference was published in the obscure journal called the Military-Industrial Courier. It made some interesting points, and so I published a translation by Robert Coulson of RFE/RL on my blog, In Moscow’s Shadows, along with my own thoughts and annotations.

In a bid to make it eye-catching, I gave the article the tongue-in-cheek title “The ‘Gerasimov Doctrine’ and Russian Non-Linear War.” It was a mistake I will regret forevermore, because even though in the text I explicitly stated that it wasn’t a doctrine and wasn’t even necessarily Gerasimov’s thinking, it turned out that a snappy headline is much more influential that the actual detail written beneath it.

Before I knew it, the “Gerasimov Doctrine” was being hailed as the Russian blueprint for future war. For the Financial Times, Gerasimov was “the general with a doctrine for Russia,” while Politico warned that “Russia’s new chaos theory of political warfare” was “probably being used on you.” It was even cropping up in official Western military documents.

Yet the text was in no way framed as a new Russian war plan. Instead, when Gerasimov talked of a “blurring of the lines between the states of war and peace” in which “the role of non-military means of achieving political and strategic goals has grown, and, in many cases, exceeded the power of force of weapons in their effectiveness,” he was explicitly addressing what he felt was a new Western way of war. To the Russians, the risings of the Arab Spring and the post-Soviet Eurasia’s Color Revolutions were not simply popular responses to corrupt and authoritarian regimes, but the result of cunning Western—American—campaigns of covert destabilization.

A Tempting Meme

So why did an article in an obscure defense magazine shape Western perspectives on Russian military thinking and, by extension, political ambitions?

The first answer is Crimea. The seizure of the peninsula in February 2014 by the so-called “little green men” was efficient in its execution but not especially novel in its means. Deploying troops without clearly identifiable insignia? Breaking the enemy’s lines of command and communications? Lying about what you’re doing? None of these were really ground-breaking.

Nonetheless, coupled with the subsequent incursion into Ukraine’s Donbass region (a more plausible case of unusual, asymmetric tactics, with its reliance on thugs, gangsters, mercenaries, and nationalists as proxies), it crystallized the notion that somehow Moscow had imagined and adopted a brand-new style of warfare.

More than anything else, this mythical doctrine was the sum of all fears held in the West about a modern world that once had seemed so comfortable—history had ended, remember? —and now was chaotic and threatening. The transatlantic relationship was under pressure, first as Barack Obama “pivoted to Asia” and then when Trump introduced a confrontational new transactionalism. Challengers from Beijing to Tehran were questioning the international order. Even the foundations of Western democracy and the European project were coming under pressure.

Such Perfect Villains

In such a climate, how comforting to have someone to blame. From Trump to Brexit, the rise of ultra-right anti-migrant movements to ultra-left climate activists, the West could affect to spy the sinister hand of Moscow—or its trolls and tweets—at work. How convenient to be able to portray these processes as the products of foreign interference rather than of domestic shortcomings.

And the Russians made such good villains. Consider Putin’s triumphalism over his Crimean land-grab and the stone-faced and cold-hearted denials of any blame for the shooting down of the MH17 airliner over the Donbass by Russian-backed forces using a Russian-supplied missile. Consider the string of Russian-linked assassination plots. Gerasimov himself even looks like a stock figure from Hollywood, the habitually-impassive, slab-faced Russian heavy.

The irony is, that even while railing against the “Gerasimov Doctrine” meme, Moscow itself helped it spread. A second-rank power trying to present itself as a global player—and given that politics are about perceptions, this means scaring or seducing other countries to treat it as such—Putin’s Russia actively seeks to look more formidable and threatening than it is. Hence the bomber patrols willfully straying into NATO airspace, the inflammatory rhetoric, the adventures in Syria and Libya.

A Dangerous Myth

Gerasimov is a decorated tank commander and a tough and competent manager of the Russian high command. His career has shown no evidence that he is a ground-breaking military theorist—or even that interested in the scholarship of war. He probably didn’t even write that famous speech himself. Nor is what people claim to see a “doctrine” in the Russian sense, which is a foundational notion of the wars Russia expects to fight and how it plans to win, driving everything from what weapons to buy to how many soldiers to recruit.

So what, though? Given that it is hard to deny that Russia is deploying propaganda, covert influence operations, threats, and “black cash” (untraceable, corrupt money) to divide, distract, and demoralize the West, and given that it has shown a willingness to back its political ambitions with military force, what’s in a name?

The academic pedant in me replies that it matters in its own right. Yet from a wider policy perspective, this myth also has several serious dangers. First, it mistakenly makes Russian policy somehow new and distinctive, whereas actually it simply reflects how inter-state conflict is changing in a modern age characterized by deep interconnections of our economic, information, and cultural spaces—and by the increasingly prohibitive cost of military conflict.

Second, by allowing the West to blame Russia for everything from political disaffection to football hooliganism, we get distracted us from addressing their root causes. Groups and individuals who have their own motivations are disenfranchised. Labelling them Moscow’s “useful idiots” only pushes them further into opposition.

Third, it misrepresents Russia’s approach in such a way as to distort Western policy. Central to the “Gerasimov Doctrine” notion is that there is a single Russian strategy, and—as in Crimea and the Donbass—all the political and social disruption is simply a prelude to war. In fact, the Kremlin is fundamentally risk-averse, with no signs of further territorial ambition, and a keen awareness of its relative weaknesses compared with the West. A European focus on when and where the “little green men” will appear next is a distraction, at best.

More to the point, Moscow’s approach is opportunistic, fragmented, and often contradictory. There is a broad vision from the Kremlin, but most of its interference in the West is driven by the interests and imaginations of individual actors and agents. If we truly want to resist Putin’s “political war,” we need to address the weaknesses they exploit in Europe, not look for some sinister grand plan in Moscow.

The post “The Gerasimov Doctrine” appeared first on Berlin Policy Journal - Blog.

© Mikhail Klimentyev/Sputnik via REUTERS

It is not entirely surprising that Russia has made a name for itself in the cyber world. Russians are, after all, good at hacking―very good. It’s an ironic by-product of backwardness. If one goes back to the 1980s and 1990s, and even the 2000s, Russians were often unable to buy the latest technology that we in the West could access; at the same time, Russia is historically strong in mathematics. Quite a few Russians, deprived of the programs we rely on, actually learned to code. Hacking systems and programs was meant as a workaround, but these hackers eventually developed a subculture of their own.

Hackers are by definition nearly always ahead of the game. They are looking to exploit vulnerabilities that are largely unknown until they are weaponized. Because of this, hacker activity often says more about Western vulnerabilities than Russian capabilities. The Russians have not really been able to break anything that is not broken already; they have merely been able to exploit opportunities. Rather than recognize what this means about our own failings, we often use the Russians as scapegoats.

Conversations with those in the security establishment and military in Moscow inevitably reveal the extent to which they feel Russia is at war with the West―a war they believe the West started. This is a non-connected, non-military war, one where they are fighting for Russia’s place in the world and Russian sovereignty.

At the same time, under Putin, Russia is invested in a campaign to make Russia great again, to assert itself as a great power when in fact it is not. Despite Russia’s vast physical scale, its economy is smaller than that of New York state. Its soft power is almost non-existent. And its military power, while not inconsiderable, is reaching the point of being overstretched.

Not Much Impact

This helps to explain the country’s enthusiasm for cyber warfare: if you are sensible, you move the field of battle to where you feel your opponents are most vulnerable. Putin believes that the West’s vulnerability is precisely that it is a constellation of democracies, with legitimate internal and inter-state disputes and disagreements along various fault lines. He is aided by the fact that the West is going through something of a legitimacy crisis, with real suspicions about the political class, questions about the future of the EU, and pressures on the transatlantic alliance. Even if Putin had never been born, these tensions would still have arisen.

The Russians have exploited these weaknesses. In terms of the American election, the Kremlin was clearly trying to influence the outcome, though it is still unclear how great an effect its efforts had. The much-vaunted Facebook campaign has been shown to be relatively marginal, and so far research on voting patterns and intentions as a result of that, or the leak of Democratic emails, have not been able to demonstrate substantive shifts in any statistically robust way.

Donald Trump won to a large extent because of his own capacity to create a groundswell of public support, and perhaps more importantly thanks to both James Comey’s unexpectedly timed announcement about the investigation into Hillary Clinton and Clinton’s own clumsy campaign strategy. In general, when Russian hackers act abroad, their impact is often relatively small. But even when the effect is significant, this does not mean they are particular capable.

Many Russian people genuinely believe they are fighting Western attempts to muzzle or restrain their country. While there is a certain degree of exasperation in Russia over the claims of hacking, on another level it fits into a very convenient narrative: it elevates Putin to a status he frankly does not deserve, as this terrifying Bond-type villain threatening Western democracies. One would almost believe that Putin can reshape elections and topple governments with the click of a mouse. He cannot, but it suits him to maintain that appearance.

Democratic Resilience

In reality, we should not assume Russia is any more secure than we are, not least because we have witnessed a series of cyber crimes carried out against Russian targets as well. Instead, it is important to examine the country’s political intent and its willingness to take geopolitical risks. When you are fighting a war like the one the Russians believe they are, you are willing to take risks. The West, on the other hand, does not regard itself as being at war with Russia, so we have a very different set of basic operating principles.

If we question which global powers have the greatest offensive cyber capabilities, America would undoubtedly be at the top of that list. Western nations, however, are not deploying their capabilities against the Russians the way the Russians are deploying theirs against the West. The difference really is about politics and mind-set―indeed, the Russians are lucky we are not seeking to hack them in the same way as they are hacking us on a state level.

We should not underestimate the fundamental resilience of democratic systems and democratic societies. The Russians did not even seek to elect Trump, or believe he could be elected; they believed the American establishment would not allow a Trump to win, and that American democracy is much more managed than it is in reality. They simply wanted to ensure that Clinton, whom they were certain would be elected, would be as weak as possible on Day One of her presidency. It is entirely possible they played some small role in Brexit, but ironically enough, news about the scale of that support could give the British political elite the chance to renegotiate and revisit the decision to leave the European Union. The Russians supported the Front National in France, but they could not secure a victory. And in Germany, Russian meddling has in many ways forced the country and Chancellor Angela Merkel into a much more anti-Russian position. Time and again, what is seen as a tactical success by the Russians is really a strategic defeat.

Cyber Is Cheap

There is a strong case to be made for far less hysteria over Russia’s capabilities. When we overestimate Putin, we not only encourage him but also empower him; people begin to believe we need to make a deal with Russia. Instead of obsessing over Russia, however, we need to push for greater resilience in general. This is not merely a Russia problem, after all, it is a modernity problem.

There are various other protagonists that could be using these strategies, and quite possibly with much more serious intent. If one looks at Chinese military and political thinking, for example, it already embodies many of the principle of so-called “hybrid warfare,” and they have used similar tactics in the South China Sea. It is certainly not implausible that they will also be looking carefully at the lessons of Russia’s information warfare campaign for future reference. Other actors are unlikely to be operating on the same scale, but as cyber and information operations can be relatively cheap, we cannot exclude them being used in more limited ways, whether to try and tip the balance of power in the Balkans or other complex political environments. Finally, let’s not assume this is purely the province of states; in the US elections and the Brexit vote in particular, we have already seen significant legal campaigns by pressure groups and powerful individuals to manipulate the information environment for political purposes. This is only likely to become more common, and perhaps in some cases also shade into the realms of illegal operations―or at least morally questionable ones, given that laws tend to lag behind the technical capabilities.

In the case of more direct cyber attacks, unless it comes to a real conflict situation, Putin is not going to try and crash national power systems in the middle of winter, for example. That would mean war, a shooting war. But there may well be terrorists and pariah regimes that are less concerned about the implications.

So this is a useful opportunity to consider the vulnerability of our modern systems and shore up their security and resilience. European security would be served better by investing more in cyber security rather than simply assuming that hitting the 2 percent of GDP mark on defense spending in terms of tanks and guns and rockets provides guaranteed protection.

Asymmetric Response

We must also rethink our response to Russia. There has been very little cost to the Putin regime as a whole, because we have a tendency to fetishize symmetry: If you carry out a cyber attack, then our response ought to be something cyber; if you limit our media, we will limit yours.

We can and should think more imaginatively and asymmetrically. It is perfectly legitimate for us to make clear that we regard hacking our systems as unacceptable, and that rather than responding by hacking into theirs, we will expel Russian companies from our countries or find other, comparable avenues of creating real, tangible costs. There should be more personal sanctions targeting people associated with Russia’s cyber and information warfare activities, but also those who simply order or encourage or justify them. We need to show there is some kind of price without feeling the need to be equally aggressive and equally cyber militarist.

Regardless of how we respond, the sound and fury hides the fact that Russian hacking is not some kind of existential threat to the West. We need to stop treating it like one, and instead consider specific responses to a specific problem.

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