LAST month, Minister for Defence Ng Eng Hen drew Parliament’s attention to the term “hybrid warfare”, describing it as the integration of “conventional and unconventional tools of warfare by both states and non-state actors”.

Technology has lowered the barriers to wage war via such means. Weapons are now drawn from political, economic, information and even humanitarian domains. In theory, anything could become one.

In fact, as Russian General Valery Gerasimov, who Dr Ng cited, put it, “the role of non-military means of achieving political and strategic goals has grown and, in many cases, they have exceeded the power of force of weapons in their effectiveness”.

… The writer is Ho Shu Huang, Associate Research Fellow at the Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University.