INFORMATION WAR AS A COMPONENT OF MODERN HYBRID WARS (EXAMPLE OF GEORGIA AND UKRAINE)

Abstract

The presented article analyzes Ukraine and Georgia – sovereign states that at the beginning of the 21’st century were subjected to hybrid and direct military aggression by the Russian Federation. For several decades after the declaration of independence, the countries studied in the article did not develop immunity to hybrid informational threats from the stronger militarily-politically and much larger resource neighbor, the Russian Federation. Low-cost and extremely effective, and most importantly, practically fail-safe information weapons have a much wider range of applications than any other weapon. In informational attacks, the object of impression is the consciousness and will of the society that is subject to aggression. Experts call hybrid war a type of military conflict that will be used more and more often in the 21’st century, and we can list a number of types and examples of hybrid threats today, while information attacks are one of their most common manifestations. The hybrid information war waged by the Russian Federation against Georgia and Ukraine has a lot in common, as well as the reason: the European vector of economic and political development chosen by the countries analyzed in the article, which ran counter to the Russian imperial vision. It was this choice that served as the main reason for hybrid aggression. The methods of information warfare were similar. The author believes that the Russian-Georgian military conflict of 2008 became a rehearsal for the invasion of Russian troops into Ukraine.