In his book De slag om Europa (‘The battle for Europe’), Rob de Wijk describes how we are in a state of warfare. Huib Modderkolk uses the same imagery in his book There’s a War Going On But No One Can See It. However, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022 was a wake-up call for Europe.
This is reflected in the increased defence investments: the Netherlands has adopted the 2% standard, while the Baltic States are going to more than 4% and Poland even as high as 5%. It is not enough for individual countries to make these investments though: it is vital to work together, to better align Europe’s systems (including weapon systems) and digital and other infrastructures.
Three dimensions
In this day and age, wars are fought in three dimensions: classical warfare and propaganda (both of which have been around forever), and now a new ‘digital warfare’ as well. In 2024, classical warfare is fought in trenches, but also with weapons that use digital technology, such as drones. Propaganda, or information warfare, has entered a new phase thanks to digital technology, using widespread fake news with doctored images and developing new channels to inform (or misinform) groups of people.
It is worrying how much society has come to depend on the systems of American companies
This information warfare is closely connected to the third dimension, digital warfare. On top of all this, we are seeing cyberattacks and risks to the ICT infrastructure. Generally, these are hybrid risks that affect both physical and digital infrastructure: from hardware to software, but also risks to the logistics chain – as demonstrated in Lebanon, when Israel sabotaged pagers and walkie-talkies to remotely detonate them later. As digital technology is used in other contexts besides classical war zones, the concept of ‘war’ is becoming more diffuse. An example is voter influencing and manipulation in the US by foreign powers through the use of propaganda, manipulation or hacking voting machines.
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