Entering the third year of Russian aggression on Ukraine, in parallel with Russian military efforts to capture Avdiivka, marks the hesitance of the West to provide adequate economic and military assistance to Ukraine. The halt in the adoption of a new aid package in the US Congress has directly affected the situation on the front lines, where Ukrainian forces struggle with a chronic shortage of ammunition for all types of artillery. Internal issues within the US politics leading up to the presidential election and the dominant conditioning by Republicans regarding regulatory changes concerning border control have halted the urgent aid of 60 billion dollars to Ukraine. On the other hand, the disparity between the promised and allocated funds from the EU to Ukraine is noticeable. Out of the pledged 144 billion euros in military aid, Ukraine received 77 billion by January 15, 2024.
The war fatigue in Ukraine, the strengthening of populist forces in Slovakia and the Netherlands, coupled with Hungary’s continuous obstruction within the EU have lowered the degree of European cohesion about the importance of aiding Ukraine. Despite the populist tendencies within the EU, the Ukrainian crisis has shown that Western democracies are moving away from economic dependency on autocratic regimes in Moscow and Beijing. Furthermore, besides the interruption of economic flows, a two-year time span has shown that the security structure of Europe is changing. Finland and Sweden, historically military-neutral states, have joined NATO, while the eastern wing of the Alliance has been additionally reinforced with 2,000 soldiers from the United States.
While the two-year anniversary of the military aggression on Ukraine is marked by Europe’s and NATO’s desire to create a deterrence strategy, Russia bases its strategy in three main directions: strengthening military capacities, bypassing sanctions, and hybrid actions in the information sphere. In a prolonged war of attrition, Russia is creating conditions that will induce war fatigue among the Western public regarding the topic of war and aid to Ukraine in the long run, and break the morale of the Ukrainian military to fight on the frontline.
Military aspect
Western sanctions on the Russian military-industrial complex and high expenditure of military resources have forced Russia to rely on external suppliers for weapon procurement. Besides the kamikaze drones it has been procuring from Iran since 2022, Russia started to import short-range ballistic missiles for the first time.
The procurement of artillery ammunition and weaponry from North Korea was arranged by the Russian Minister of Defence, Sergey Shoigu, in July 2023. It is evident that Russia is stockpiling weaponry for a prolonged war and, through strategic partnerships with authoritarian regimes, facilitating unhindered ammunition supply. On the other hand, Ukraine relies on Western partners for the supply of weaponry, the internal political dynamics of which directly reflect on their stance towards military assistance. Thus, the coming to power of Robert Fico in Slovakia marked the halt of military aid shipments from that country to Ukraine.
Bypassing sanctions
Despite strong sanctions, primarily in the domain of fossil fuels and consumer goods, Russia uses trade agreements in the duty-free zone with Central Asian countries to evade their consequences. During the two years of aggression, Kyrgyzstan significantly increased imports from all parts of the world, while simultaneously increasing exports of certain products to Russia tenfold. Significantly increased imports of semiconductors from Western countries are indicative, as it is precisely this type of technology that enables the continuity of operation of the Russian warcraft.
By finding ways to bypass sanctions, the Russian military-industrial complex is serviced, and also implementing the import of consumer goods, while more simply controlling the social peace in the country following the aggression on Ukraine. The strategy of undermining the EU sanctions regime is evident in the example of Kazakhstan, which doubled its exports of microchips to Russia in 2022. An investigation determined that these goods were imported from Germany and the Netherlands and were used in the production of the Russian military drone Orlan-10, which unsystematically targeted residential buildings in Kyiv.
Operations in the information sphere
An important aspect of Russia’s hybrid actions is hybrid activities in the information sphere, following the doctrine of the Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Federation, Valery Gerasimov. The creation of informational conditions for war prior to the aggression on Ukraine consisted of multi-channel operations and psychological propaganda activities aimed at portraying Ukrainians as Nazis or creating narratives suggesting that the Ukrainian army had been continuously shelling Donbas since 2014, thus justifying Russian military intervention and the annexation of Crimea. However, the onset of aggression against Ukraine was marked by narratives that Ukraine was developing biological weapons in laboratories with the support of the United States. These operations in the information space served as a pretext for aggression, as well as to justify operations in Ukraine to the domestic audience in Moscow.
However, the diplomatic blockade and the expulsion of Russian diplomats from the EU member states following the aggression influenced the nature of hybrid activities in the information field. The narrative about BRICS as a crucial element of the new world political order, in which Russia and the Global South will decisively influence global political currents, is channeled through state media outlets RT and Sputnik. Furthermore, the decolonization of the African continent with Russia as an active participant in the process is a dominant narrative of the informational strategy of hybrid actions after February 2022.
The new tactic of action towards Ukraine implies psychological propaganda activities aimed at discrediting the political and military leadership in Kyiv, demoralizing Ukrainian troops, and disorienting the population in Ukraine. Just one fake post on social media, generated in line with this strategy, depicting a deceased Ukrainian soldier whose family received no attention from the state, generated over 2 million views. Furthermore, the main narrative thesis exploited by Russian state media with the aim of diminishing support for Ukraine was that the Americans are fighting against Russia to the last Ukrainian. That narrative is also present on the YouTube channel of Sputnik Serbia.
Disinformation tactics also encompassed social media platforms, where fake accounts of European officials or prominent media outlets spread fake news and narratives about the lack of Western support for Ukraine. Such was the case with the fake account of the German Minister of Foreign Affairs, Annalena Baerbock on X, which served as the initial trigger for the discovery of 50,000 fake accounts spreading pro-Russian propaganda in a coordinated manner. The primary goal of this hybrid tactic is to reach Ukrainian public opinion through Western social media platforms, given that the Ukrainian media and public space are closed for Russian channels of action.
The Western Balkans and Montenegro
Two years since the aggression on Ukraine has shown that Russia is adapting to the new circumstances and finding new channels for hybrid actions. New tactics of action, regardless of their innovation, have the same goal as before the onset of aggression – undermining Western democracies and NATO and causing division regarding support for Ukraine. In the Western Balkans, one of the open channels of action even after the aggression remains the Serbian Orthodox Church, which, through the dissemination of narratives about preserving traditional values, remains a consistent proxy of the Russian Orthodox Church and the Kremlin regime. Additionally, as the only European state that has not joined EU sanctions, Serbia remains within Russia’s sphere of interest, which still maintains a protective role in the UN Security Council regarding Kosovo. Even after the invasion of Ukraine, the authorities in Belgrade remain the pillar for channeling pro-Russian interests in the region. Despite the changed rhetoric in the context of EU accession, political proxy actors in Montenegro promote a pro-Russian narrative of sovereignty and anti-globalism as key guidelines for state policy.