Event 1148

{
  "category": "InfoOps",
  "confidence": "High",
  "country": "Russia",
  "description": "The Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA) published a comprehensive report titled 'War Without End: Russia’s Shadow Warfare' on November 19, 2025, analyzing Russia's ongoing covert conflict operations. The report reveals Moscow's adoption of Soviet-style shadow warfare tactics including sabotage, cyber and information operations, targeted violence, and political influence campaigns designed to destabilize adversaries without triggering direct military responses. The Kremlin's shadow warfare is framed as a continuous, strategic system governed by neo-Stalinist ideology aimed at regime survival through both internal repression and external aggression. The report stresses that Russian security agencies, particularly the FSB and GRU, have merged domestic repression with foreign sabotage efforts, increasingly blurring lines between covert and overt conflict actions. It highlights a doctrinal absence of empirical success metrics where escalation is systemic and narrative-based; failed operations still serve strategic purposes by provoking overreaction and increasing adversary costs. The analysis emphasizes the strategic risk this unrestrained shadow warfare poses to European security, warning that only a clear, disciplined deterrence by NATO and European states can potentially curb Moscow's aggression and reduce the risk of full-scale war.",
  "event_time_utc": "2025-11-19T00:00:00Z",
  "evidence": [
    "Shadow warfare comprises sub-threshold coercive activity: sabotage and infrastructure disruption; transnational repression and targeted violence; cyber and information operations; sanctions evasion and covert procurement; and political influence.",
    "Russia’s shadow warfare is not simply a covert strategy... but the reflection of a deeper ideological and institutional logic, a neo-Stalinist threat framework that sees warfare as continuous and ubiquitous.",
    "The Kremlin’s overriding concern is not Russian national security, but the survival and continuation of the current regime.",
    "Russia’s special services—chiefly the FSB and GRU—are tasked with handling both domestic repression and foreign sabotage.",
    "Shadow warfare is simply understood as one of the options put on the Kremlin’s strategic table by a range of both military and non-military forces.",
    "Russia's shadow warfare operates without empirical calibration; exposure of operations is often spun as proof of relevance and success.",
    "CEPA launched a major project 'Defend, Deny, Deter: Countering Russia’s Shadow Warfare' to develop new transatlantic deterrence approaches."
  ],
  "extra": {
    "extra": {
      "extra": {
        "evidence": [
          "Shadow warfare comprises sub-threshold coercive activity: sabotage and infrastructure disruption; transnational repression and targeted violence; cyber and information operations; sanctions evasion and covert procurement; and political influence.",
          "Russia’s shadow warfare is not simply a covert strategy... but the reflection of a deeper ideological and institutional logic, a neo-Stalinist threat framework that sees warfare as continuous and ubiquitous.",
          "The Kremlin’s overriding concern is not Russian national security, but the survival and continuation of the current regime.",
          "Russia’s special services—chiefly the FSB and GRU—are tasked with handling both domestic repression and foreign sabotage.",
          "Shadow warfare is simply understood as one of the options put on the Kremlin’s strategic table by a range of both military and non-military forces.",
          "Russia's shadow warfare operates without empirical calibration; exposure of operations is often spun as proof of relevance and success.",
          "CEPA launched a major project 'Defend, Deny, Deter: Countering Russia’s Shadow Warfare' to develop new transatlantic deterrence approaches."
        ]
      }
    }
  },
  "media_assets": [
    {
      "capture_url": null,
      "captured_at": "2025-11-29T19:27:26.487700Z",
      "description": "SingleFile archive",
      "hash": "8d4be1e34296689dd607d26087a5f899f180fb34d094a89e4d1d9d3d313425e8",
      "mime": "text/html",
      "origin": "singlefile",
      "size_bytes": 6303645,
      "source_url": "https://cepa.org/comprehensive-reports/war-without-end-russias-shadow-warfare/",
      "type": "document",
      "url": "/media/event_1148_20251129_192255_229e7a09.html"
    }
  ],
  "notes": "This CEPA report highlights how Russia’s shadow warfare is a systemic and ideologically rooted strategy rather than ad hoc covert actions, creating persistent destabilization risks in Europe. The fusion of domestic and external operations by security agencies and the lack of internal constraints on escalation mean traditional Western efforts focusing on exposure or sanctions risk provoking more aggression. Monitoring should prioritize emerging operational patterns that reflect further strategic escalation or adaptation of Russia’s covert methods, as well as developments in NATO’s deterrence responses aimed at enforcing discipline on Moscow's hybrid warfare apparatus.",
  "schema_version": "v1",
  "summary_extended": "Published on November 19, 2025, the CEPA report 'War Without End: Russia’s Shadow Warfare' provides an in-depth analysis of Russia's covert hybrid warfare strategies as part of a permanent, ideologically driven conflict system. Russia employs a blend of sabotage, cyberattacks, political manipulation, and targeted violence, driven not just by opportunistic tactics but a neo-Stalinist doctrine viewing perpetual war as necessary for regime survival. The Kremlin's intelligence agencies, notably the FSB and GRU, are deeply involved in both domestic repression and external destabilization, merging their roles in a continuum of covert aggression. This shadow warfare operates without clear success benchmarks; operations are deemed successful if they disrupt or provoke adversaries regardless of exposure or failure, creating a self-reinforcing cycle of escalation. The report warns that traditional Western responses often validate Russian aggression instead of deterring it. It argues effective deterrence must impose strategic costs on Russia’s shadow-warfare system to avoid broader conflict escalation with NATO and European countries.",
  "summary_short": "CEPA report details Russia's continuous neo-Stalinist shadow warfare using covert tactics to undermine adversaries and evade direct war.",
  "url": "https://cepa.org/comprehensive-reports/war-without-end-russias-shadow-warfare/"
}

{
  "source": "admin_quick",
  "tags": [],
  "url": "https://cepa.org/comprehensive-reports/war-without-end-russias-shadow-warfare/"
}