Chapter 1: Putin’s Long Game – The Blueprint for Hybrid Warfare

Putin playing video game "Screw the U.S."

“The main thing is to meddle everywhere. Our American friends are using it fully, and they do not hesitate to meddle in our political life.”
— Vladimir Putin, 2016 (BBC, 2016)

From KGB Playbook to Hybrid Warfare Doctrine

Vladimir Putin doesn’t improvise. He plays a long game. The man who rose through the ranks of the KGB—the Soviet Union’s infamous secret police and intelligence service—understands that conventional warfare is obsolete when facing a technologically superior opponent like the United States (Galeotti, 2019). But subversion? Manipulation? Co-opting your enemy’s elites and systems from within? That’s the oldest KGB play in the book.

By the time Putin took power in 2000, the Soviet Union was long gone, but Putin wasn’t interested in leading a humbled, post-Cold War Russia. He wanted revenge for what he saw as Western humiliation in the 1990s. And he didn’t need tanks to get it — all he needed was money, digital tools, and the gullibility of his enemies (Hill & Gaddy, 2013).

Hybrid Warfare: The Art of War Without War

In 2013, Russian General Valery Gerasimov—Putin’s top military strategist—publicly outlined a new vision for 21st-century warfare. His thesis? In the modern world, non-military methods of warfare — cyber-attacks, disinformation, economic manipulation, and political subversion — are often more effective than actual combat (Gerasimov Doctrine, 2013).

This approach, now often (and misleadingly) called the Gerasimov Doctrine, is not a formal Russian military doctrine, but rather a strategic mindset — a fusion of Soviet active measures and modern cyber capabilities. In short: why invade when you can infiltrate? (Galeotti, 2018).

The Five Pillars of Putin’s Hybrid Warfare

Putin’s strategy against the United States didn’t just emerge in 2016 — it was already in motion years before. The Kremlin built its hybrid warfare plan around five interconnected pillars:

1. Cyber Sabotage

The first and most obvious tool. From hacking the DNC (CrowdStrike, 2016) to the SolarWinds attack (CISA, 2020), Russian intelligence has systematically compromised American government, infrastructure, and corporate systems. These breaches aren’t just for espionage — they’re laying the groundwork for future chaos operations, where Russia could potentially shut down critical systems in a crisis.

2. Disinformation and Psychological Warfare

Putin understands Americans better than we understand ourselves. He knows that a polarized society is a vulnerable society, and his troll farms, bot networks, and covert influencers have spent nearly a decade stoking division, amplifying conspiracy theories, and undermining trust in institutions (Senate Intelligence Committee, 2020).

The goal is simple: make Americans hate each other so much, they forget who the real enemy is!

3. Oligarchic Influence Operations

Money talks, and Putin’s oligarch cronies have funneled millions into Western political, media, and corporate ecosystems (Counterintelligence Report, 2020). Trump’s desperate search for financing after his American lenders, tiring of his bankruptcies that left them “holding the bag,” cut him off? A perfect entry point for Kremlin-linked cash (House Intelligence Committee, 2020).

The goal here isn’t just to buy influence, but to compromise key figures who can then be manipulated through kompromat (blackmail material) or simple greed!

4. Subversion of Alliances and Institutions

A strong NATO is a nightmare for Russia. A fractured NATO is a dream come true. From Brexit to Trump’s relentless attacks on NATO, Putin has worked to undermine Western alliances wherever possible (RUSI, 2019).

Why? Because a United States isolated from its allies is an easy mark.

5. Internal Political Sabotage

The final — and most insidious — pillar is using domestic political actors to dismantle their own government. Project 2025, the plan to gut the federal bureaucracy and replace it with loyalists and ideological extremists, aligns perfectly with Russia’s goals. The weaker America’s internal governance, the easier it is for outside actors to manipulate events (Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 Playbook, 2024).

Want to learn more about the internal sabotage by American billionaires? The Koch Brothers Playbook and Chapter 5: Rise of the Oligarchs

From Softened-Up to Takeover-Ready

Putin’s hybrid war isn’t designed to “conquer” America in the traditional sense. The goal is to weaken the U.S. so thoroughly — economically, politically, and socially — that it can no longer project power or effectively resist external influence (Brookings, 2018). In essence, Putin wants to turn America into a chaotic, dysfunctional state, governed by a corrupt oligarchic elite who are either directly compromised or ideologically aligned with the Kremlin’s goals.

This is why Elon Musk, Heritage Foundation, and Trump are so critical to the long game. Whether they know it or not, they are enablers of this strategy, working from the inside to break down American institutions, hollow out the regulatory state, and centralize power into fewer and fewer hands — exactly what Putin did in Russia (Hill & Gaddy, 2013).

Warning

We are not at risk of a Red Dawn-style invasion. We are at risk of becoming Russia — a corrupt, autocratic state where power belongs to billionaires and dissent is crushed with legal tools, digital surveillance, and propaganda. This is the long game. And it’s working.

🛡️ Join the Fight Against Putin’s Digital Coup!
This isn’t a history lesson — it’s a warning shot. Putin’s long game is nearing checkmate, and it’s up to us to stop it.

Next, please read – Chapter 2: The 2016 Experiment – — Russia’s First Digital Coup

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