Russia's hybrid war strategy and the Syrian case

The Syrian Civil war that was arisen as a part of the process called Arab Uprisings, has become one of the most significant international crises in recent years with the experiences and its results. Even further collapsing of a state in the civil war atmosphere, Syria has become quite complicated place by existing local groups, non-governmental armed groups and both regional and global actors in the area. The ongoing civil war over seven years seems as a case that influence regional and global politics deeply even leaving aside humanitarian crisis created by civil war. To understand this crisis that has come in possession of irresolvable equation will provide significant clues in terms of foreseeing the future of the Civil War. For this purpose, to analyze Russia's foreign policy on Syrian Civil War as one of the most important actors in concerning crisis and, in particular, to describe its military strategy constitute the main subject of this study. In doing so, the concept of the Hybrid Warfare as a contested subject especially after the Ukraine Crisis and Gerasimov Doctrine that is the adaptation of this concept to Russia will be used as a projection to the Syrian Crisis. Within this framework, the Concept of the Hybrid Warfare was examined in the first part of the study. Firstly, the evaluation of the Hybrid Warfare was tried to place among war studies and focused on placing as a follow-up of the William S. Lind's war generations approach in the literature. In the second part, modernization of the Russian army was explained with regard to faced conflicts and the conditions behind the emerging of the Gerasimov Doctrine were revealed. In the third part, involvement of the Russia to the Civil War, balanced of threats, gains and costs were presented. Moreover, the effect of the involvement of the Russia to relations between Russia and his regional allies was examined. Finally, it was tried to explain to what extend concept of Hybrid Warfare is effective by examining the Russian military strategy on Syria.