Developments in Western military thinking related to counterinsurgency doctrine are also relevant for the debate of ‘hybrid warfare’ as an assumed new Russian approach to war. Drawing on the historical experience of Britain, France and the United States, counterinsurgency doctrine was proposed as an antidote to the US coalition’s military failures in Afghanistan and Iraq. Although there is no single template for how counterinsurgency operations should be approached, there is widespread agreement on the need to gain the support of the local population. This is essential to ensure their participation in the counterinsurgency efforts or at least to prevent them from supporting insurgent groups (Kieras 2016: 351).
Information and psychological operations, conducted by units trained specifically for this purpose or by special operations forces, are an important tool for influencing and gaining support from the local population. As Robert Egnell has put it, success in ‘winning the hearts and minds’ of the population is essential for successful counterinsurgency warfare, because ‘the number of battlefield victories… matter little if the population thinks you are not winning, or visibly improving people’s situation’ (2010: 291). At the same time, although it is generally accepted that getting the local population ‘on side’ is an absolute requirement for defeating an insurgency, there is a ‘staggering lack of empirical evidence to support’ that it is routinely delivering expected outcomes (Egnell 2010: 292). Especially when it comes to information and psychological operations, the lack of understanding and insight into the historical, social, political and economic context of the target state makes it difficult to communicate the intended message. As Egnell concluded, ‘insurgents have the inherent advantages of better cultural understanding and closer contacts with the local population. They are therefore in a strong position to present alternative narratives to events, and even turning tactical losses into victories of perception’ (2010: 291).
The examples of the RMA and of counterinsurgency warfare provide some useful context for the study of ‘hybrid warfare’ as a supposed war-winning Russian strategy. As the case of the RMA shows, drawing generalized conclusions from a single successful application of a war-fighting approach is problematic. The potency of Russian ‘hybrid warfare’ capabilities should not be taken for granted, because the Crimea operation to date is the only example of the successful application of this presumed approach. Moreover, the Crimea operation, which was very limited in scope and scale, does not provide sufficient empirical evidence to conclude that tactics successfully used in this case will deliver a similarly positive outcome in a different scenario. From this point of view, assessments of the Crimea operation as a new Russian mode of warfare, allowing the Kremlin to circumvent relative weaknesses in its conventional military power vis-à-vis the West, should be taken with a pinch of salt.
The relevance of the RMA and counterinsurgency discussion for the debate on Russian ‘hybrid warfare’ goes beyond this obvious point. As was the case for the US coalition in the 1991 Gulf War, Russia operated in Crimea under extremely favourable conditions that negated the need for overwhelming force and enabled the swift annexation of the peninsula within a matter of weeks (Norberg et al. 2014: 44–7). The fact that Russia already had a considerable military presence in Crimea eased the logistics of the operation and enabled the Kremlin to prepare for the operation without the need for conspicuous troop movements. As a result of the political turmoil in Ukraine leading up to the operation, the country’s political and military leadership was weakened and unable to stage a coordinated response. This was exacerbated, as Maxim Bugryi wrote, by the government’s ‘tenuous political control over the Crimean peninsula’ (2014). It is also likely that Russia acted in the knowledge that it could operate with relative impunity, as outside military assistance to Ukraine was improbable. There was little danger the annexation of Crimea would lead to a direct military confrontation with NATO (Adamsky 2015: 38). This possibility would certainly have to be factored into Russian risk calculations if it resorted to direct aggression, even by ‘hybrid’ means, against one of the alliance’s members.
Arguably the most important factor enabling the success of the ‘hybrid’ approach in Crimea was the strongly pro-Russian outlook of the majority ethnic Russian local population, making a protracted insurgency unlikely. This negated the need for the use of overwhelming force from the outset and meant that a combination of mostly non-military ‘hybrid’ tools was sufficient. In Crimea the usually difficult battle for ‘hearts and minds’ was won before it even had begun. Cultural misunderstandings were not an issue and there was a negligible danger of a popular uprising or significant support for potential insurgent forces. There was no need for Russian soldiers to engage in messy battles or risk civilian casualties and they were left to secure government buildings and Ukrainian military installations with next to no resistance. It is easy to see that such conditions would be difficult to replicate in any setting other than Crimea. Serious resistance leading to protracted violence and use of military force would be almost inevitable even in neighbouring states with significant Russian minorities. It is unlikely that a ‘hybrid approach’ as used in Crimea would have enabled easier victory for Russian forces in previous interventions, such as Chechnya and Georgia. Although in spite of all of its shortcomings the Russian military was vastly superior in terms of manpower and technology, Chechen fighters had sufficient forces and willpower to stage a sustained campaign of resistance and to inflict heavy losses on Russian troops. Improved capabilities to deal with lower-intensity missions would have meant that the wars in Chechnya could have been fought with less brute force and fewer casualties on both sides. However, given the Chechen side’s willingness to resist, it would never have been a ‘bloodless’ victory. Moreover, winning the ‘hearts and minds’ of the Chechen population would still have been difficult.
Unlike in Crimea, where significant portions of the population were in favour of joining Russia, the Chechen wars were fought to quell the republic’s desire for independence. Although the increasingly radical Wahhabist insurgents during the second Chechen War never enjoyed widespread popular support, historical antagonism and feelings of revenge meant that Russian troops were far from being welcomed with open arms (Kramer 2005: 215). No amount of ‘hybrid warfare’ would have changed that. It is unlikely that a ‘hybrid’ approach would have worked in the war in Georgia in 2008. This was fought as a conventional military campaign and combined arms operation. Such an approach was suitable to the war’s objective, which was to expel Georgian forces from South Ossetia and to weaken the country militarily. In this conflict, Russia fought a conventional opponent using similar equipment and tactics, but the Russian military had the upper hand through its overwhelming physical superiority. Although the war revealed some operational weaknesses, including problems with command, control and communication, the aim of expelling Georgian forces was achieved within the matter of five days (Bukkvoll 2009: 61). It is unlikely that ‘hybrid warfare’ would have made a substantive difference to the outcome of the campaign.