Sam Mullins
Introduction
During the last decade or so, a growing international consensus has emerged that the boundaries between peace and war are becoming ever more blurred. States increasingly seek to compete with, coerce, and influence one another in ways that are widely perceived to be hostile, yet intentionally remain below the threshold of conventional war.[i] Although in some respects, this is nothing new—examples of everything from economic coercion to “fake news” can be found throughout history—such tactics have expanded and proliferated in the post-Cold War era as a result of increased globalization and advances in technology, along with the rising costs of war.[ii]
Authoritarian, revisionist states like Russia and China, which have spearheaded the rise in so-called “gray-zone warfare,” have also been driven by their fear of U.S. conventional military superiority. Moscow and Beijing have further demonstrated a growing sense of paranoia surrounding “color revolutions” in the former Soviet Union, and the “Arab Spring” uprisings against corrupt governments in the Middle East and North Africa. Over time, Russian and Chinese leaders came to view these events, not as legitimate manifestations of popular discontent, but as Western-orchestrated plots that amounted to a new way of warfare aimed at undermining and ultimately overthrowing autocratic regimes.[iii] As a result, they have invested heavily in such tactics as disinformation, subversive economics, political interference, and use of proxies.
No comments:
Post a Comment