Foreign influence operations can do is actually that they radicalize. And although, you know, again, it's not going to create civil wars, but it can certainly worsen them. Once they happen, then other countries can use all kinds of other means of exaperating them. That's why i think it so important that we acknowledge that one of the things that we have to do in our societies is not just demonize and isolate those communities that feel marginalized. We have to find ways of integrating them because otherwise they are precisely the weak link in our secile sociatial chain.
Traditional conflict – fought with guns, bombs, and drones – has become almost too expensive to wage, too unpopular at home, and too difficult to manage. So nations have innovated. Russia wages hybrid warfare on Ukraine. The US threatens Iran with further sanctions. China spends billions buying political influence abroad. The world seems to be heading for a new era of permanent low-level conflict, often unnoticed, undeclared and unending. Mark Galeotti is Honorary Professor at UCL and a specialist in politics, criminology, security studies, international relations and anthropology. His recent book, The Weaponisation of Everything, is a ground-breaking survey of this new way of war. Joining Mark to discuss the book and his work is Carl Miller, Research Director of the Centre for the Analysis of Social Media at Demos.
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