Conference on Russia Papers

In the evolving post-Cold War order, Russian revanchism has emerged not merely as nostalgia for Soviet or tsarist legacies but as a neo-imperial project framed in narratives of historical injustice and civilisational mission. Since Crimea’s 2014 annexation and especially after the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, it has shown overt disregard for smaller states’ sovereignty, notably in the Baltic region. Central to this agenda is the manipulation of historical memory, where anti-fascist rhetoric serves less as reckoning and more as a weapon to delegitimise states resisting Moscow’s influence. Recent monographs – History of Ukraine (2022) and History of Lithuania (2025) – illustrate this by presenting archival evidence while advancing state-aligned narratives that prioritise ideology over analysis. As Lithuania responds with heightened securitisation, the fusion of sponsored historiography, and weaponised identity politics reveals history’s role in geopolitical disruption. These trends signal a twenty-first-century recalibration of imperial influence, where the battle for meaning precedes that for territory. This article introduces Litvinism as a hybrid threat within the Kremlin’s memory wars, offering the first systematic analysis in English of how Russia weaponises medieval history to destabilise Baltic statehood.

The article’s primary goal is to assess the Russian-led disinformation operations and to examine NATO’s counterstrategies within the broader context of information warfare. By understanding motivations, mechanisms and consequences of Russian Federation’s use of propaganda and disinformation, one gains a better ability to counteract such practices, bolsters the psychological resilience of a society, and becomes able to establish a sustainable regional information security model. In the context of this work, we understand the existing model as a set of technological, organisational, political, and sustainability measures that create the prerequisites for the states of the region to achieve a high level of information space security.

Russia has repeatedly accused European states of ‘piracy’ for detaining vessels from its ‘shadow fleet’ suspected of grey zone activities in the Baltic Sea. These accusations are legally unfounded. However, the persistence of this narrative in both official statements and public discussion in Russia warrants closer scrutiny. This article argues against dismissing Moscow’s invocation of piracy as mere propaganda. These claims should be understood as lawfare – the strategic misuse of legal concepts to advance political objectives. This article examines how such lawfare complements Russia’s coercive signalling strategy and explores its broader strategic implications. Moscow’s piracy narrative reveals how hijacking the authority of international law has become integral to the Russian practice of deterrence.

Russia’s war against Ukraine has significantly impacted the security situation in Europe. While continuing to be a conventional land threat in the Baltic region, Russia has increasingly turned to the maritime domain to confront NATO. This article considers the interrelated influence of maritime geography on Russian strategy, and the evolution of Russian naval power toward power projection and non-nuclear deterrence. Together, these factors may contribute to a perpetuation of the current confrontation between Russia and NATO.

The war in Ukraine, which began in 2014 and escalated in 2022, has showcased contemporary warfare strategies that have been observed and adopted by non-state armed groups (NSAGs), including insurgents, paramilitaries, and mercenaries. The relationship between terrorism, organised crime, and non-state armed actors (NSAAs) has been analysed as a strategic means of exploiting illicit markets. This relationship is primarily evident in failed and fragile states, where it is used to profit from war, technology, and the cyber environment. This chapter analyses the impact of NSAAs on the global security agenda, particularly in light of technological advances. It argues that this impact has significantly changed since the war in Ukraine, representing a new threat capable of challenging security dynamics at regional and global levels.

This chapter identifies and analyses security challenges posed by Russian para-statal military organisations (PSMOs) to European security interests. It focuses on three challenges: 1) the challenge of Authoritarian Conflict Management (ACM) abroad; 2) the challenge of enacting ACM and related PSMO limitations; and 3) the challenge of subversion at home. The chapter emphasises international power shifts, increasing authoritarian great power activism, and the seeming limitations of the ‘liberal stance’ towards conflict management that point toward a different approach undertaken through Russian PSMOs. Assessed together, the potency of Russian PSMOs rests in offering an alternative to European engagement, the heightening of violence overseas and its repercussions, and the fear of changed PSMO effort on the European continent.