IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/fswixx/v32y2021i2p295-319.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The concept of ‘hybrid warfare’ undermines NATO’s strategic thinking: insights from interviews with NATO officials

Author

Listed:
  • Murat Caliskan
  • Michel Liégeois

Abstract

Hybrid warfare has been a popular term that refers to contemporary warfare. Despite the increasing number of critiques, NATO has used the term in its strategic documents and summit declarations. Since concepts are important in shaping our understanding and the way that our forces fight, NATO’s use of a controversial concept has raised some questions. In this context, this paper aims to explore the meaning of the hybrid warfare from the viewpoint of NATO, based on in-depth interviews with NATO officials who have sufficient expertise and experience about the concept. The authors conclude that hybrid warfare is an ambiguous concept which clouds NATO’s strategic thinking and leads NATO to forget the difference between war and peace. Further analysis has revealed that NATO uses this concept as a tool for the strategic communication rather than a military concept.

Suggested Citation

  • Murat Caliskan & Michel Liégeois, 2021. "The concept of ‘hybrid warfare’ undermines NATO’s strategic thinking: insights from interviews with NATO officials," Small Wars and Insurgencies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 32(2), pages 295-319, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:fswixx:v:32:y:2021:i:2:p:295-319
    DOI: 10.1080/09592318.2020.1860374
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/09592318.2020.1860374
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/09592318.2020.1860374?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:fswixx:v:32:y:2021:i:2:p:295-319. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/fswi .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.