Beyond Crimea: The New Russian Empire

This preference for a covert and shadow war seems to stem from the “Gerasimov Doctrine,” published in February 2013 in the Russian Military-Industrial Courier. In his article, the Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Federation, General Valery Gerasimov, proposed eight phases of modern hybrid warfare to subvert states and gain control of territories without resorting to conventional military means. General Gerasimov concluded that “The very ‘rules of war’ have changed,” and that today nonmilitary means such as the “use of political, economic, informational, humanitarian, and other non-military measures—applied in coordination with the protest potential of the population” can exceed “the power of force of weapons in their effectiveness” and “that the open use of forces—often under the guise of peacekeeping and crisis regulation—is resorted to only at a certain stage, primarily for the achievement of final success in the conflict.”¹³¹ Hybrid warfare rather than traditional military campaigns is crucial to Russia’s reimperialization efforts and effectively utilizes, among other tactics, efforts to win the hearts and minds of a civilian population, and information and cyber warfare.

In the long run, Moscow may be increasingly unable to bear the costs of territorial expansion and military campaigns to reimperialize more post-Soviet territories. Though Russia has recently modernized its military, at some point the cost of modernization may become prohibitive. Yet Moscow has demonstrated great ability and success in engaging in low-cost hybrid warfare and creating frozen-conflict zones in Transnistria, South Ossetia, Abkhazia, and potentially Luhansk and Donetsk. Frozen conflicts are defined as conditions where active armed conflict may have ended but no peace treaty or political resolution has resolved the tensions to the satisfaction of the different sides. In a frozen conflict zone internal sovereignty can be achieved on a breakaway territory but at the expense of “external sovereignty” (recognition in the international system).¹³² The term “frozen conflict” is almost completely associated with the breakaway post-Soviet territories that emerged as a result of Moscow’s efforts to protect its compatriots. While such conflicts do not amount to direct annexation, they permanently remove territories from the states in question, place them under Russia’s direct influence, and pave the way for Russia’s subsequent territorial expansion. They benefit various local and transnational interest groups (including Russian groups) involved in transportation of commercial goods, money laundering, organized crime, and arms trafficking. After years spent as unrecognized entities in the gray zone of the international community, these territories eventually seek closer ties to Russia or absorption into the Russian Federation rather than independence, as seen in the cases of South Ossetia, Abkhazia, and Transnistria. While frozen conflicts may serve as stepping-stones for annexation by Moscow, they are equally effective in destabilizing target states like Moldova, Georgia, and Ukraine. By challenging the territorial integrity of these states, Moscow is able to thwart their pushes for EU or NATO membership and thus constrain their foreign policies and keep them in its sphere of influence—a key aim of the Russian government and the reimperialization trajectory.

The proposed seven stages of Russia’s reimperialization policy trajectory help make sense of the seemingly disparate processes under way in many of the fourteen states of the former Soviet Union. They serve as a lens through which to view the Kremlin’s efforts at extending its influence and territory in the former Soviet republics, irrespective of their wishes or the wishes of the so-called compatriots. The seven-stage paradigm is not a timetable for Moscow’s imminent annexation. Instead, it outlines how the stage is set for military escalation and how hybrid warfare, annexation, separatism, and frozen conflicts can become possibilities. The more aggressive phases of reimperialization often come into play either at opportune moments or when the target countries are deliberating closer ties with EU or NATO, as in the cases of Ukraine, Georgia, Moldova, and Armenia. EU or NATO membership, as in the case of the Baltic States, does not preclude Russia’s use of softer reimperialization tactics, nor does it completely exclude the possibility of separatism and armed conflict.