Generations of war
In a 1989 article William Lind and colleagues divided modern war into generations: massed musket lines, firepower-based attrition, and manoeuvre and infiltration such as Blitzkrieg. In the fourth generation the lines between war and peace, soldier and civilian, and front and rear blur.
Fourth-generation warfare
Thomas Hammes defined 4GW as using all available political, economic, social and military networks to convince an enemy's decision makers that their goals are unachievable or too costly. Vietnam, the Palestinian intifadas and al-Qaeda are cited examples: an actor can lose battles yet win by breaking the opponent's political will.
Hybrid warfare
In 2007 Frank Hoffman described hybrid wars as combining conventional capabilities, irregular tactics and formations, terrorism including indiscriminate violence, and criminal disorder in the same battlespace. Hezbollah's mix of state-level weapons such as anti-tank missiles with guerrilla tactics in 2006 is the classic case. After Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea the term widened to cover unmarked troops, cyber attacks, disinformation and economic and diplomatic pressure.
Critiques
Critics argue that wars have always mixed means, so little is new, and that the generational scheme oversimplifies history. The concepts nonetheless shaped national security strategies and NATO's response to gray-zone threats.
References
- Lind, W. S., Nightengale, K., Schmitt, J. F., Sutton, J. W., & Wilson, G. I. (1989). The changing face of war: Into the fourth generation. Marine Corps Gazette, 73(10), 22-26.
- Hammes, T. X. (2004). The Sling and the Stone: On War in the 21st Century. Zenith Press.
- Hoffman, F. G. (2007). Conflict in the 21st Century: The Rise of Hybrid Wars. Potomac Institute for Policy Studies.
- Galeotti, M. (2016). Hybrid War or Gibridnaya Voina? Getting Russia's Non-Linear Military Challenge Right. Mayak Intelligence.