Ten Guidelines for Dealing with Hybrid Threats A Policy Response Framework

Summary

Rival states increasingly use hybrid tactics to exploit vulnerabilities and influence demo cratic processes. These tactics include the coordinated and synchronised use of violent and non-violent instruments of power to execute cross-domain activities, often circum venting detection and attribution, that are conducted below the threshold of conventional armed military conflict. Fast-paced technological development and deep globalisation have provided rival states with startling tools to erode the democratic processes and institutions of foreign competitors. In recent years, Western states have increased their situational awareness and noted the need to guard against potential hybrid threats. For example, the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation’s (NATO) latest Strategic Concept launched at the Summit of Madrid in June 2022 reaffirms the Alliance members’ determination to counter hybrid threats, highlighting plans to ‘invest in our ability to prepare for, deter, and defend against the coercive use of polit ical, economic, energy, information and other hybrid tactics by states and non-state actors’.2 Governments acknowledge that bolstering defences and enhancing resilience does not suffice to deter hybrid aggressors. As a result, their counter-hybrid policies have evolved and have started to encompass more proactive policies, including those specifically aimed at deterrence. However, deterring hybrid aggressors is a difficult task. Not least because hybrid adver saries deliberately circumvent detection and escape responsibility, there are no clear shared rules that regulate acceptable behaviour, defenders lack either the capability or the willingness to respond, defenders lack a proper understanding of both the incentive struc ture and weak spots of rival actors, and the design and execution of counter-hybrid policies often come with potential second- and third-order effects. Therefore, it is of paramount importance to develop a proactive counter-hybrid deterrence posture, which addresses these pitfalls. This will improve states’ ability to guard against potential hybrid threats going forward.

Keywords

hybrid threats, guidelines, deterrence, policy framework

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