How Russia and Belarus Are Weaponizing Migration
A new type of hybrid warfare is developing as Minsk and Moscow traffic refugees between the Middle East and the European Union.
In a Polish forest.
Photographer: Wojtek Radwanski/AFP via Getty Images
It appears that the dictator of Minsk and his overlord in Moscow are waging a coordinated form of hybrid warfare against western Europe. Such tactics, of course, aren’t new to Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko or his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin. What’s novel is how unfathomably callous and evil these have become.
In the past, Putin for one has been better known for hybrid warfare involving mixtures of cyberattacks, disinformation campaigns and “little green men” — that is, combatants who are Russian but wearing unmarked uniforms as they infiltrate or invade places like Crimea. This time, Lukashenko, apparently with Putin’s blessing, is using some of the world’s most vulnerable human beings as weapons.