The prevalence of hybrid war is increasing. From Russian drones flying into NATO airspace, to cyberattacks and political interference, to the US seizing a Venezuelan oil tanker, war is now rarely black and white, but exists in the grey. Former British Intelligence officer Andy Owen argues the same game-theoretic logic we apply to hot wars needs to be applied in hybrid warfare too. Incursions should be responded to proportionally. If we don't respond, hybrid war will only spread and expand, and could even turn hot.

As the US-backed “liberal international order” in place since the end of the Second World War is collapsing under the pressure of increasing geopolitical competition and internal fragmentation, so too is our understanding of the dichotomy of war and peace. Competition is manifesting in conventional wars, such as the Russian invasion of Ukraine, but also an increasing number of “grey-zone conflicts,” in which autocratic states use hybrid warfare to attack liberal democracies. These conflicts do not fit neatly into post-war legal and moral frameworks. As hybrid tactics fall below the traditional threshold for war, democracies are not providing responses that act as a deterrent for further attacks. Without an urgent rethinking of these frameworks, we are likely to see the expansion of these conflicts.

Our societies are more interdependent and interconnected than ever before. Our reliance on technological, social, economic, and logistical networks has increased the attack surface available to those who see themselves as in geopolitical competition with us. That competition varies in its severity and aggressiveness.

Autocratic powers engage in normal competitive engagements, such as expanding their influence abroad—something China has been particularly effective at with its long-term strategic planning—conducting espionage, or developing their own military and technological capabilities. These may impact the economic and political interests of liberal democracies, but they do not necessarily interfere with their sovereignty or directly threaten their security, and also do not differ materially from activities liberal democracies themselves are undertaking.

However, autocratic competitors are increasingly engaging in more aggressive acts, leveraging hybrid warfare that mixes conventional and non-conventional means in pursuit of their objectives. These means include misinformation and disinformation campaigns designed to sow discord and undermine state authority, cyberattacks, electoral intervention, economic coercion and espionage, diplomatic pressure, trade, provocative military exercises, sabotage, arson, attacks against critical infrastructure, assassinations, and drone activity. They remain below thresholds within current international frameworks that trigger legitimate conventional military responses or legal and political consequences. They are also often deliberately hard to attribute, with aggressors regularly using non-state actors as proxies. By adjusting the scale, concentration and nature of their activities, strategic competitors vary the intensity of competition.

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Our reliance on technological, social, economic, and logistical networks has increased the attack surface available to those who see themselves as in geopolitical competition with us.

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Russia’s activities in Europe provide examples across the full spectrum of grey-zone activities. Moscow’s campaign has a focus on targets related to support for the Ukrainian war effort, but more often it is simply aimed at causing chaos and unease.

In recent weeks, drones have forced Belgian airports to close on numerous occasions. German defense minister Boris Pistorius linked these incidents to discussions over the use of Russian frozen assets in Brussels. It follows a series of drone incursions over NATO nations that included approximately 20 Russian drones entering Polish airspace in September during a large-scale attack on Ukraine, prompting Poland and NATO allies to shoot down multiple drones, causing minor damage to residential areas.