Belarus is conducting its own information warfare campaigns in Europe, independent of any influence Russia may have in the country, according to a new paper by the European Centre of Excellence for Countering Hybrid Threats (Hybrid CoE). Hybrid CoE, headquartered in Finland, is an autonomous, network-based international expert organization, established in 2017, to address hybrid threats, particularly in Europe.

Hybrid warfare is a loosely defined cluster of aggressive actions that incorporate economic, cyber, and information attacks and can occur over long periods of time, often out of the public eye. International strategy thinktank Global Security Review describes hybrid warfare as “a strategy that systematically blurs the lines between war and peace”.

The new Hybrid CoE paper, “Belarus as a hybrid threat actor: A Russian proxy with residual agency“, was authored by analyst and European security expert Anaïs Marin and examines Belarus in the context of Russia’s war against Ukraine. The general assumption has been that Belarus has been following Russia’s lead in its hybrid strategy, with the Kremlin setting the agenda and Belarus’s president Aleksandr Lukashenko following suit, in order for him to consolidate his power in the country. But the paper asserts: “Even though Belarus’s foreign policy objectives often align with Russia’s, and their hybrid threat tactics appear coordinated, their interests do not fully coincide in the longer run.”

According to Marin’s analysis Belarus has two complementary goals: “regime consolidation (against internal enemies) and regime legitimation (in the eyes of external adversaries). Meeting these goals requires mobilizing hybrid threats in an autonomous manner.”

Disinformation and media-based warfare are a key part of the Belarusian strategy, which run in parallel to Russia’s own disinformation attacks run our of the country.

“Belarus is instrumental for disinformation purposes, as part of Russia’s wider CogOps (cognitive operations), providing propaganda outlets such as Radio Belarus that echo Kremlin narratives about the war, NATO16 (especially Poland),17 and the Baltic states, which are also targets of joint smear campaigns.”

But Belarus has an independent information warfare strategy aimed at discrediting Europe and “re-legitimizing” the Lukashenko regime.

“The mission plan is to persuade public opinion in target countries that, while Belarus is not perfect, it is not all that bad (alternatively: it is not its fault, it is being manipulated, it has no other options, etc.), and that democracies are not that good either (i.e. whataboutism).”

The Belarusian opposition, including opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, has been located in Lithuania since it was forced out of the country after the 2020 presidential election. As a result, Lithuania is a particular target of hybrid attacks from Belarus. One propaganda attack is the suggestion that the exiled opposition wants to move the capital of Belarus to (Lithuanian capital) Vilnius, which both generates suspicion toward the opposition and subtly introduces the idea of a “greater Belarus”.

Using media as a weapon also extends to the country’s surveillance and oppression of Belarusian exhiles and emigres: “The foreign intelligence branch of the Belarusian KGB is increasingly resorting to online recruitment via social networks…fuelling an “uberization” of the profession. For example, it hires amateur photographers to film anti-Lukashenko protest actions abroad.”

Download and read the full Hybrid CoE paper here.