The ongoing tragedy at the Belarus–Poland border has been widely described as “hybrid warfare.” This framing, I argue, is deeply misleading. It casts the EU as a victim of geopolitical games while hiding the long-standing violence of Europe’s border regime—and even worse, it helps justify suspending human rights in the name of “defense.”
Why Words Matter
When politicians and media use terms like crisis or hybrid warfare, they do more than describe events. They shape how we think about them, and they legitimize certain responses.
Migration scholar Alison Mountz has shown how calling migration a “crisis” often shifts attention away from displaced people and toward the supposed crisis of the EU itself. The political effect is clear: states expand policing powers, pour money into militarized border control, and normalize restrictive measures against mobility.
Exceptionalising Belarus
The language of “hybrid warfare” makes the Belarus–Poland border seem like a unique, unprecedented situation. In reality, people have been dying at Europe’s borders for years—from the Mediterranean to Croatia—long before Lukashenka’s political maneuvering.
By framing this as a “hybrid attack” on Europe, the violence against migrants is misplaced: it is not the EU waging war on vulnerable people, but supposedly the other way around. This narrative even resonates with civilizational East/West tropes, positioning authoritarian “others” as culprits while concealing Europe’s own complicity.
The EU’s Long Game
Europe has long outsourced migration control to states with terrible human rights records, from Libya to Turkey. Scholars call this refugee commodification: using human beings as bargaining chips in international negotiations. Belarus is not unique in weaponizing migration; the EU itself has relied on similar deals for years.
What we are witnessing is not new. What is new is how quickly “hybrid warfare” has been accepted—even by some human rights advocates—as if the EU itself were under siege.
“Hybrid” Human Rights
The most dangerous effect of this discourse is how it normalizes the idea that human rights, too, can become “hybrid”—suspended when circumstances are deemed exceptional.
In Poland, a few thousand unarmed people stranded in freezing forests are portrayed as a security threat to the entire Union. Calls have already emerged in Finland to revise legislation and potentially shut borders in the name of defending against “hybrid threats.” What was once dismissed as “Trump exceptionalism” is now part of mainstream Nordic debate—even under a social democratic government.
This reveals how quickly Europe is willing to abandon its obligations under international law. And history reminds us: human rights have never been truly universal. The 1951 Refugee Convention originally applied only to Europeans. Only in 1967, after pressure from formerly colonized states, was its scope expanded to cover refugees worldwide.
Beyond the Narrative
If we move away from the language of “hybrid warfare,” the reality becomes clearer: Europe is not the victim of war, but the perpetrator of border violence. Human rights may be fragile and politically contested, but they remain one of the few tools available to defend lives and dignity.
The real “threat” is not migrants at the border—it is Europe’s willingness to normalize the suspension of protection in the name of security.
