The wars in the Middle East (Afghanistan and Iraq) in which the United States has been involved are widely debated and often seen as asymmetrically full-scale wars. What is characteristic of these conflicts are that there is no research to map these conflicts regarding the US application of hybrid warfare. The purpose of this study is to gain an understanding of US contemporary warfare by consuming the modern theory of New Generation Warfare (NGW) on the conflicts in Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003. The ambition is, therefore, to consuming the existing theoretical starting point to analyse existing research in the field to contribute to the war science research. The conclusions drawn from this study are that US contemporary warfare is moving in the same direction as Russia. It has shown that US contemporary warfare is a precursor to Russian contemporary warfare, which is characterized by military interventions with special operations forces and fewer conventional forces with great emphasis on psychological and information operations. Based on the analysis of the Middle East conflicts in which the United States has been involved.

Denna studie undersöker hur applicerbara traditionella krigföringsprinciper är på moderna okon-ventionella krig av hybrid karaktär. Krigföringsprinciperna härstammar från konventionella krig, men gör anspråk på att vara allmängiltiga i alla krig. Är de då applicerbara på moderna okonventionella krig av hybrid karaktär? Studien applicerar traditionella krigföringsprinciper på krig av hybrid karaktär i syfte att utforska principernas applicerbarhet i denna tillsynes ”nya” form av krigföring. Studien förhåller sig till Brett A. Friedmans On Tactics: A theory of victory in battle som teoretiskt analysverktyg, detta då hans teori är baserad på traditionella krigföringsprinciper. De två fallstudiernas resultat tyder på att krigföringsprinciperna genom Friedmans teori är applicerbara på okonventionella krig av hybrid karaktär men inte fullt ut. De innehar därmed ett värde som analysverktyg och pedagogiskt verktyg av genomförda eller pågående krig. Teorin skulle kunna utvecklas gällande kategoriseringen av fysiska och mentala principer, där vilseledning borde kategoriseras som en fysisk princip. Eventuellt har teorin större applicerbarhet på den mer offensiva parten i krig på grund av principernas ursprung ur en offensiv tradition.

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The characteristics of the Russian military operations during the Russo-Georgian War of 2008 and again in the Crimean Crisis 2014, were “rude awakenings” to a shift in the strategic behaviour of Russia, not refraining from military aggression as means to political aims. In the aftermath of these “strategic shocks”, the scholarly debate on how to interpret and understand these limited wars, has several ongoing discussions, among which is whether this modern Russian style of warfare, as demonstrated in Moldova, Georgia, Ukraine and elsewhere, really is a novel concept or plainly “old wine in a new bottle”. This thesis is part taking in that debate through the theoretical framework of three Soviet era warfare methods from the psychological dimension: Deception – Maskirovka, Information Warfare – Reflexive Control, and Subversion – Active Measures. Within the framework, an analytical tool for qualitative text analysis is designed and then applied for the case studies of the Russo-Georgian War, as it compares to the Crimean Crisis, collecting indicators for the apparent presence of traditional methods in these cases. The study concludes that the Soviet era warfare concepts of Maskirovka, Reflexive Control and Active Measures, are relevant as explanators for a facet of the modern day Russian warfare style, in alignment with the general argument on the Russian warfare doctrine as evolutionary, rather than revolutionary, vis-a-vis the strategic practices of the Soviet era.

Studies have shown that the Russian operations in Georgia and Crimea have been described as both examples of failed and successful operations. Both conflicts had hybrid elements to them, especially the Russian annexation of Crimea which jumpstarted the western debate into the subject.  This study aims to analyse the difference in Russian methodology and differences between the two conflicts, this is done based on a theoretical framework of ‘effective hybrid warfare’. The goal of this study is to discern to what extent these two cases can be described as effective hybrid warfare operations. This is done thru the method of comparative studies.  The results showed that the operation on Crimea to a greater extent could be considered effective hybrid warfare, more specifically, the weaker aspects of the Russian operation in Georgia seemed to have been corrected and were less present in the Crimean operation. This indicates that the Russian staff learned from its mistakes and the weak points of the Crimean operation is not likely to be present in their next campaign.