Suchergebnisse

Głównym celem artykułu jest przedstawienie, jak w latach 2014–2022 znaczenie Grupy Wagnera ewoluowało w polityce zagranicznej Rosji. Korzystając z ogólnodostępnych źródeł, w tym upublicznionych materiałów wywiadowczych, wyników śledztw dziennikarskich, raportów ośrodków analitycznych i eksperckich, materiałów prasowych oraz dokumentów organizacji międzynarodowych, autor odpowiada na następujące pytania badawcze: 1. Czy Grupa Wagnera może być klasyfikowana jako prywatna organizacja wojskowa w świetle prawa krajowego i międzynarodowego? 2. Jaka jest geneza organizacji i stopień jej powiązań z rosyjskimi strukturami państwowymi? 3. Jaki jest zakres zadań wykonywanych przez wagnerowców w ramach rosyjskich operacji hybrydowych i w związku z wojną na Ukrainie? 4. Jakie działania podjęła społeczność międzynarodowa, by ograniczyć swobodę działania tej organizacji?

Since August 2020, the political situation in Belarus has become one of the key elements of Russia's information warfare against the transatlantic community. The main target of Belarusian and Russian information and psychological operations is Poland, repeatedly accused of interfering in the internal affairs of Belarus, inspiring a colour revolution, waging a hybrid war, supporting separatism, historical revisionism, preparation of military intervention or organising an armed coup and assassination of Lukashenko. The main research problem of this article is the answer to the question: what disinformation activities are Belarus and Russia conducting against Poland in connection with the political situation in Belarus after the falsification of the results of the presidential elections of 9 August 2020. The author analyses, among others, why Poland has become the main target of Belarusian and Russian disinformation operations, what the goals are of these activities, on what issues the Belarusian and Russian information narrative towards Poland is focused, and what the effectiveness is of these influence operations.

The primary purpose of this article is to explain the meaning and consequences of foreign fighters' participation from Western Balkan countries (WB6) in armed conflicts in Syria and Iraq. In the first part, the issue of foreign fighters is discussed in historical terms. The author focuses on the examples of the Soviet inva-sion of Afghanistan and the ethno-religious conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In the second part of the text, the definition framework of foreign fighters' concept and its evolution towards foreign terrorist-fighters is dis-cussed. Then, a detailed analysis of the main problem is conducted, and several research questions are an-swered: 1) What is the scale of the phenomenon of Balkan volunteers (e.g., their number, the structure of origin, and others) in comparison to fighters from other regions? 2) What are their motivations and goals, and what are their recruitment process and ways of moving into the war zone? 3) What is the threat posed by returning fight-ers to the security of the Western Balkans, and how do individual states counteract this phenomenon? The au-thor uses mainly the following research methods: critical content analysis (literature, scientific articles, docu-ments, reports, press materials), and historical and comparative analysis. The author's visits to this country in 2018-2020 constituted an essential contribution to the part concerning the case of Kosovo.

The intention of this paper is to clarify how state patrons control non-state proxy forces fighting on their behalf. In order to address the subject matter thoroughly, specific attention was paid to a number of questions including a) the criteria determining patronproxy relations, b) factors influencing the selection process of proxy forces, and c) principles governing the maximisation of potential benefits of using proxies, whilst simultaneously reducing risks and associated costs. The author applied a neo-realistic research paradigm to his work. Patron-proxy relations were presented in the context of the principal-agent theory, as well as through detailed analysis of ongoing scenarios involving Iran and Hezbollah, Russia and the Donbass separatists, Pakistan and Kashmiri militias, the US and Syrian rebels. The essence of war by proxy is to influence the strategic result of an armed conflict without direct, full-scale, military intervention. The use of non-state proxy, external actors is aimed at maximising their political goals and strategic interests whilst maintaining "plausible deniability". By supporting non-state proxies, indirectly or by providing limited direct assistance, sponsors operate below the threshold of war. Empirical analysis of proxy war cases proves that such models may both guarantee "strategic victory" or become a "double-edged sword". One of the key challenges for external powers engaged in war by proxy is to avoid unintended consequences (blowback). The author argues that elements such as ideology, ethnicity or religion do not necessarily ensure control over proxies, whilst the range of common goals and interests, and the level of the proxy's dependency, are crucial.

Proxy wars are a phenomenon widely encountered in the history of armed conflicts. The character and particularity of a proxy war is not determined by direct warfare but by the orchestration of a military conflict serving the political needs of a third state without its direct involvement. This orchestration may assume a variety of forms, and the scale and specifics of each case are determined by the third party's aims and interests. The category of proxy wars is known in Polish strategic studies, although so far not much attention has been paid to it. This article is an attempt to fill this gap. The main research problem undertaken by the author is to answer the question of what characterises the phenomenon of proxy wars. To answer this question, the author has formulated the following specific problems: 1) what are the definitional frameworks of the phenomenon of proxy wars? 2) what are the strategic goals of waging a war by proxy? 3) what are the forms of the external orchestration of a conflict?