Armida van Rij
Good morning, everyone, welcome very – welcome to this special event, which we are delighted to host with the Finnish Embassy here in London. I’m Armida van Rij. I’m a Senior Research Fellow here at Chatham House and head up our Europe Programme. It’s great to see so many familiar faces in the audience and I hope you’ll enjoy this event. We are absolutely delighted to be hosting the Former President of Finland, Sauli Niinistö, to discuss his recent report on EU preparedness. Of course, preparedness and resilience has been pretty high, if not at the top of the EU agenda since the COVID-19 pandemic, and, of course, the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. The European Commission has already set up strategic stockpiles, put forward new legislation on resilience of critical infrastructure, and developed initiatives to bolster defence.
But in addition to that, President Niinistö was, in his capacity as Special Adviser to European Commission President, von der Leyen, was asked by her and the High Rep to prepare a report specifically looking at how to enhance Europe’s civilian and defence preparedness and readiness, which was published in the autumn of last year. And the idea behind this report was to – for preparedness to become a new umbrella concept, connecting all of the EU’s various policy efforts into one focus area of preparedness. And of course, there’s a lot to be learnt from the Finnish model of comprehensive security and national preparedness, and Finland has, of course, also advocated for an EU Strategy for a Preparedness Union.
So, we have a great set of speakers, both here in the room with us and online. Immediately to my left, Sauli Niinistö, Former President of Finland, and a Special Adviser to the European Commission President. At the end, Shashank Joshi, who’s a Defence Editor of The Economist, and joining us online from the US, Elisabeth Braw, who’s a Senior Fellow in the Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security at the Atlantic Council.
Quick housekeeping bits, we are on the record, we’re being recorded and we’re being livestreamed, as well. In terms of the format and how this event will run, the President, in a second, is going to present his report, we’ll have a moderated discussion here on the panel and then we’ll turn to you for questions, as I’m sure there will be lots of them. For the online audience, please use the Q&A chat box. Any questions anywhere else, we won’t be able to see them. President…
Sauli Niinistö
Thank you.
Armida van Rij
…the floor is yours.
Sauli Niinistö
[Pause] So, good morning, it’s great pleasure to have a possibility to open a bit to you the security, safety of Europe. Like you said, I’m doing a report for EU, but taking notice to the fact that those challenges we are facing, and threats we are facing, they don’t limit to EU, Europe. They are wide – worldwide in Europe. So, I would imagine that report gives something valid for all Europeans.
One of the starting points in report is a statement that “Security is foundation of everything.” What I mean by this is that to maintain our values, we need security, to have some plans for the future, we need security. If you are insure [means unsure] or we don’t have secure feeling, that will ruin our being. Why this is important, after the Cold War ended, I think it was, in a way, learned by ordinary people, by decision makers, that security and peace, when they are granted, they are something self-evident, you don’t have to care so much about them. Now the time is different and we do have to care about them.
So, I say that it’s time to a wakeup call, to a wakeup call that we all understand, decision-makers, citizens, that security is the basic element of our happy lives. Security is a common code, but it’s also a common responsibility. I used to say in Finland that “Each one of us is defending country.” If anywhere else in between years, what kind of information you accept without critics, what kind of information you believe and share, we should be able to understand that things in information are changing very rapidly.
I want to emphasise participation of citizens, participation in work for security, and now I take the Finnish example. We have conscription, maybe as the only European country. I have always said that conscription, yes, it’s important, surely, that young men, and nowadays also young girls, voluntary basis, learn to shoot, but even more important is that – the meaning of conscription to social cohesion. Different kind of people, different kind of youngsters from very, very different parts of the country, from very different circumstances, collect together in, well, sometimes harsh circumstances that unites. You learn to know that, well, there’s plenty of differences, but you learn to play together, too.
One element we have in Finland is national defence courses, arranged by our defence forces. That has collected tens of thousand adult Finnish people, gathering together some three weeks’ time. They come from business life, from administration, from culture, so they collect different kind of people to understand that, well, we are working for security, and that has been very fruitful. They also arrange regional courses for people. I highly recommend something like that, it’s a easy start. But, nevertheless, I also recommend participation, maybe on olont – voluntary base, if you can’t make a duty of that. In voluntary basis you have to have some, surely, some incentives to get people. It may well be military service, but as well, civil protection. This is the way that security comes closer and people understand that, well, it’s worth – working.
One element is that we have to get out of siloes. In administration, you easily find that, well, we are doing our job, you’re doing your and there’s no connection. Comprehensive security means that you have to have a keen co-operation. And then I raise the word ‘trust’ here. This means also that we have to find ways to create a new kind of PPP, public-private partnership, for security reasons, because what we see now in hybrid, cyber, AI, whatever, space threats, the interest of public sector and private sector for security is becoming very, very similar, and the private sector surely has technology, the public sector has intelligence. You have to have a lot of trust to create a discussion between public and private sector for increasing security.
Why this is of utmost importance? I quote Mark Galeotti, who has written a book, “Weaponisation of Everything,” that raises a question, what is a weapon actually in the future? What is war in the future? It’s not anymore blows and tanks and cannons. It’s something else in hybrid AI world. And well, I take one example, which is quite concrete, of a phenomen, I call that, “Do we really see what we are watching at?” And this example comes from Crimea, 2014. We all were wondering, what are those little green men walking around in Crimea? And after we found out what it was, they had all were – already invaded the peninsula. So, we have to be prepared to see threats, even if they are not that visible.
Then I take a very sensitive issue, that is that we have created in our democracies for individuals, lot of freedom, lot of room to manoeuvre, and this is protected well. You have the right. The dilemma comes that those with malicious thinking, misuse these values, this freedom. It gives room also for malicious actors. How we handle this case so that we maintain our values, but we stop misusing them, that is a real dilemma. We have a proposal here to EU, but that’s, I think, very suitable for all administrations, that is that there has to be a security check every time you regulate something, and that should be done, also, to existing regulation, where we have room to ensure that we have enough means to protect our values but stop misusing them.
To end up, I go to military side. Here in Europe, we have just one problem, that is that we lack armament and troops. This is a sad story in a way, but how to handle with this, we need surely financing. Fortunately, my task was not to show where the money comes, but nevertheless, this is linked outside EU actually, more to NATO and NATO members. We have heard President Trump saying that, “Well, 2% should be 5%.” It will be more than 2%, that’s my expectation for the future. But how often we have been asking, this 2%, I mean, it’s like a mantra, you feel two – you meet 2%, okay, you don’t, that’s not okay. But should we also study what we get with that 2%, how efficiently it’s used, because the statistics are quite bad, in a way, that if you compare amount of armament in Europe in 90, when the Cold War ended, and the present situation, you find that there’s a huge collapse in figures of tanks, fighters, whatever, huge, even though money has been used meanwhile here.
There are a lot of questions on the role of USA with the new President Trump. I don’t believe that we should fear that NATO is vanishing somehow, but we should be prepared to understand that, in some stage, it might be possible that the situation, global situation in Pacific for example, means that USA is reducing its presence in Europe. Then there an extra burden for European NATO members to fill any gap which is left in NATO structures. That is what I think we should altogether start thinking, how we fill those gaps, if they appear.
I would like to end up saying that this is a bit odd world. In 2019, I had a possibility of meeting three gentlema – men, namely Presidents Putin, Trump and Xi. After that, I started to think that, well, how come that there are eight billion of us on Earth, but three men has in their heads and hands the fate of most of us, most of that eight billion people? There’s only one answer we can give to this in Europe, that is Europe has to be strong. Thank you [pause].
Armida van Rij
Thank you very much, Mr President.
Sauli Niinistö
Thank you.
Armida van Rij
I just wanted to – there’s lots in there and we’ll come to that in our discussion. I just want to pick up on one thing straightaway, which is the point you were making about protecting our democracies and protecting our values…
Sauli Niinistö
Yeah.
Armida van Rij
…and how our adversaries are abusing the freedoms that exist in our societies, but don’t necessarily exist in their societies. As one way of addressing this, you talked about mainstreaming security through all EU regulation. Beyond that approach, what else can we do?
Sauli Niinistö
Like I said, it’s very sensitive. I go a bit deeper. We had an example in Finland, in our border, when Russia orchestrated immigrants to ask asylum, and we had to compare what is the interest of common security in comparison with the individual right to ask asylum? And that was very difficult. The answer is maybe in hands of European Court at the end, but nevertheless, I could well imagine that there are means to malicious minds to put governments in position where they have to think and to ponder between common security and individual rights of their own citizens, in a way, trying to put governments and citizens against each others. We have to – I have no clear answer. We have to discuss with, well, people, with – Jurists, Lawyers, very deeply on that, and be prepared so that it’s not a surprise.
Armida van Rij
Thank you. I’d like to come to you, Elisabeth, online, for your initial reflections on what the President said, and I also – I mean, you’ve been working on these issues for years, if not decades at this point. So, I also want to ask you about the report very much puts civilians at the core of preparedness and of resilience and of readiness, how do we do this in member states, or even beyond EU member states, in countries that have large populations, perhaps low trust in public institutions, might support pro-Russian Politicians, which is a very different context than perhaps the one domestically in Finland?
Elisabeth Braw
Well, thank you, Armida, and thank you, Mr President, for that introduction. I have to just make a quick observation, which is that Mr President, you were indispensable in Finland’s accession to NATO, and that was very impressively – you impressively guided Finland into NATO, and as a result, also helped Sweden join NATO. That was – it was a delicate process, but masterfully handled by Finland, and thus, helping also Sweden to – making the choice easier for Sweden to join, as well, so thank you for that.
And when it comes to – Armida, when it comes to how to, essentially, involve citizens more in resilience, I think the key part of society we have to begin with is the private sector, because not just – not just because it is indispensable, but because there is realisation in the private sector that the good times are over, and companies are watching and are feeling up close the threats, and not just threats, but attacks, to – on our societies, because they are being targeted. We have seen it in different ways, cyberattacks, but also physical attacks, of different kinds. So, there is realisation in the private sector that companies are incredibly exposed.
In 2023 – the figures aren’t in yet for 2024, but in 2023, 72% of multinationals experienced political lis – risk losses. So, those are losses relating to – or stemming from anything from government seizure of assets, all the way up to warlike acts. So, 72%, that is a massive figure, and it clearly demonstrates that the good times are over. And so, companies are trying to make themselves more resilient, but you – as a company, you can’t make yourself more resilient, or fully resilient, in isolation. You need to work with the government somehow.
I think this is where there is a massive opening for Western governments that don’t have a tradition of having close consultation with the private sector on matters of national security, the way that it’s done in Finland. This is the opening for Western governments, or other Western governments, to create that dialogue or channel. It doesn’t have to be on the basis of legislation. You don’t have to force the companies to participate in it. You can do it on a voluntary basis, because a large chunk of companies and CEOs are very keen to participate, and not just participate, but for example, to be involved in exercises. We have seen the Czech Republic launch – or create grey-zone exercises that they carry out with invited companies. Similar things are possible – should be possible, and not just possible, but implementable in other EU member states.
Then, when it comes to the public, this is where one would want a Finnish style national defence course to be available to everybody, it’s not going to happen, but I think there too, companies are – could be a fantastic partner of the government. Because companies want employees who don’t make silly national security mistakes, who don’t fall for misinformation and disinformation. And so, if we can see – if we could have some, sort of, arrangement where companies test those they may want to hire to make sure that they are information literate, I don’t think any company today would want to hire a person who is not information literate. That would be a good place to start. If we have people in our society – and we will always have people in our society who fall for disinformation, but the fewer we have, the better it is.
And there is also a role in that for public libraries, they are trusted institutions, in EU member states. What if they were to offer information literacy courses where you could learn how to verify facts? And then, on the basis of that, you would get some, sort of, certificate that you are information literate, and even without a certificate, you would have the knowledge for yourself, that you know how to verify facts. The more we can do without legislating, the easier it will be, because legislation, as I think everybody in this room knows, takes a long time and is a massive headache, most of the times, over.
Armida van Rij
Thank you very much, Elisabeth. Shashank, over to you. What are your thoughts on – in terms of what you’ve heard? One thing that we haven’t talked about yet is the piece around intelligence co-operation, which the report places quite a big emphasis on. How would this work in practice? How do you see that developing?
Shashank Joshi
So, there’s a huge amount of food for thought there, and having read the report, the thing that, sort of – the thread that runs through all of the different elements is mindset, isn’t it? The change in mindset, and I will get onto intelligence in just a second. But what strikes me is how difficult that challenge is outside of a society like Finland, and I’ve so many examples I see here from the last few years. Just a month ago, a Government Minister talking about Russian cyberthreats to the power grid. Very, very important signalling, a real threat, a real concern, including what we’ve seen in America, with Chinese intrusions into critical national infrastructure, but we’re still struggling to calibrate how to talk about, given citizens’ mindset.
And instead of heightening sensitivity and awareness, there is still a resort to fearmongering, to say, “The Russians can pull down our power grid in hours,” which is – I’m actually not convinced true, or the right way to signal this in a way that brings up security levels. So, how do we balance that message of raising awareness, raising sensitivity, but not frightening people?
Sauli Niinistö
Yeah.
Shashank Joshi
And we have struggled with that, we’ve really strug – that’s going to be nationally specific. So, there are many, many other examples we can go into a mindset.
On the intelligence picture, I think intelligence is fundamental to resilience, because in ambiguous situation, it is often intelligence that will make the difference between understanding a situation and being confused and disoriented by it. But we see the challenges of this. Yeah, prior to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, there was fantastic intelligence gathered by the US and UK. They had the Russian war plans going back months. They shared this with allies and it was a great example of intelligence diplomacy. However, even there, there are lessons to learn, because they did not persuade all allies. This was understandable, there are different assessments in different countries, and not all the intelligence at the highest level of classification could be shared with all allies.
Now, obviously, the President has talked about the importance of shoring up the EU’s intelligence assessment capability. Sounds absolutely – very sensible idea. We see how, in situations around cable cutting or other covert activities. You need to have reliable, sensible attribution to guide policy and to guide people. However, this is the big bit, how do we do this in a union where you have a number of countries that are, let’s be quite honest, moving in a nakedly pro-Russia direction, whose domestic institutions aren’t trusted by all members of the bloc? And no country, no respectable intelligence service, is going to share very sensitive intelligence with some of those countries, so how do we balance that? And we have a lesson of what happens when we can’t quite do that in the Russia case.
Armida van Rij
Yes, and I think we can’t detract the politics from the policy thinking about this. I mean, ultimately, they obviously go hand-in-hand, and we must think through the consequences, which President, I want to turn back to you. We’ve had three major reports over the past six months or so, the Draghi report initially, the Letta report, and your report. All of them, while focusing on their own sectors, essentially call for deeper EU integration to address some of the key issues. Again, that is also a difficult call, given the times that we are in. How do you see – but at the same time, the EU was forged best, or integrates best, at times of crises. Do you think that, not just the member states, ‘cause I think we need to talk about the defence of Europe as a whole and the protection of Europe as a whole, do you think that European countries get that threat and are willing to step this up?
And, Elisabeth, we were talking about this earlier in the greenroom upstairs, but maybe we can also talk a bit about the extent to which countries have made progress on this. So, I’ll come to you afterwards, again.
Sauli Niinistö
Yes, in the present situation, there’s an element of common threat that unites and you have already seen, in European Union, discussions that most of the members start to understand better each other.
Armida van Rij
Hmmm.
Sauli Niinistö
It is true that there are maybe some members – I go a bit to the intelligence side. What we see now is that there’s a very keen co-operation in re – between national intelligence agencies, also including, like you said, USA, UK, and many Europeans, many Europeans, not all. From the EU point of view, it is – well, we have to be prepared in the situation where EU has to make decisions on security very rapidly. That’s why EU has to have all the information possible. And the report where this is proposed means that we have to, well, build up more trust in between those agencies which already work together, combining EU too, as much as member states and those agencies are ready to do. But giving the clear information and understanding that, yes, also, EU needs decision-making rapidly sometimes, and EU needs information intelligence to do that. I think that it will be understood.
But otherwise what comes to, well, reports by Draghi and Letta, which are more economic, yes, European Union faces, in a way, but this situation is quite crucial, whether we find each others in EU or not, and well, I have an optimistic opinion on that because of the common thread that unites.
Armida van Rij
And in your report, you talk a lot about the need for “single security, a shared security,” and how one member state’s security affects the others, obviously.
Sauli Niinistö
Well, this, yeah, idea, single security, like, we talk a lot about ‘single market’, which is important, we should talk, also, in European Union about single security. Actually, I ended up to think about that, when you hear NATO leaders speaking, they say that, “We will protect every inch of NATO territory.”
Armida van Rij
Hmmm.
Sauli Niinistö
We hear European Union leaders, very many of them same people, saying that “European Union grants security for all European Union territory.” we don’t hear that, and that’s why I want to talk about single security. Understanding that, well, if one member has huge challenges and difficulties, it’s a huge challenge and difficulty for the whole union.
Armida van Rij
Thank you. Elisabeth, it sometimes feels a little bit, as we were talking about, the “Fearmongering,” “This is all doom and gloom,” “We’re behind,” etc., but you were saying there’s potential lights of – or points of optimism. You’ve already told about – talked about the Czech Republic. Where else – what else are countries doing that is particularly positive, and also, that can be shared with other countries to increase that shared learning and sharing of best practice?
Elisabeth Braw
Yeah, I think the Czech Republic is such a good example, because it’s not one of the countries that you think of when you think about societal resilience and innovation in defence against grey-zone aggression, and yet, they set this up because a Minister decided a few years ago that they needed to do something and he was going to do it. And obviously, the exercise wasn’t perfect in the first iteration, but that just illustrates that we shouldn’t let the great be the enemy of the good. And we are seeing the – a similar mindset among civil contingencies agencies in particular, who are doing – who are trying to innovate in this space. Again, it’s – it is difficult because of legislation, competition rules, and so forth, but for example, the Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency has tried to – or has initiated a, sort of, pilot version of a grey-zone exercise by just inviting companies to a conversation, and then they will build on that. So, it doesn’t have to be more complicated than that.
But I think the area where there is the most innovation going on, perhaps necessitated by the state of affairs of this area, is in the maritime domain. So, we have seen governments, different European governments, co-operate closely with their maritime sectors, not just shipping, but operators of undersea cables, and importantly, maritime insurers, to try to at least make the oceans a little bit safer. It’s maritime grey-zone aggression, of which there are many iterations, ranging from the Houthis to undersea cable sabotage. It’s difficult because there is no global maritime police and there are very few enforcement mechanisms. But nevertheless, what different countries are doing, by – different governments are doing, by at least keeping the private sector informed and consult – and having a dialogue with them, is again, an example of where you can make sure that the great is not the enemy of the good.
For example, in Norway, which is not an EU member state, but obviously one of our great friends of the European Union, we have seen – or not just we have seen, we see on a daily basis, the government and the maritime sector, which is very significant in Norway, exchange threat information. And they do it on a basis of mutual assistance, not because it’s legislated, not because anybody is forcing the maritime companies to do anything for the government, it’s just a matter of good civic citizenship. And I think this is where – something that other countries can learn from. You don’t lose – as a company, you don’t lose anything by essentially, being a good corporate citizen.
In fact, you can establish a relationship, a trustful – or a relationship based on trust with the government that you don’t engage in it immediately and directly benefits you, but it will benefit you in the long run. So – and again, it doesn’t involve any legislation. So, I think on such – on the basis of such informal collaboration and such informal partnerships, more things will develop, and as the threats increase, such partnerships will just become necessary. It won’t be a matter of nice to have but a matter of need to have, and the companies, at the very least, are already seeing this need and I think are, for the most part, willing to do their part.
Armida van Rij
Maybe that should be a trademark, good corporate citizen, for companies who are particularly proactive and helpful. But that segues very nicely to, Shashank, something I want to ask you about, which is the recurring theme throughout all of this is resilience of infrastructure.
Shashank Joshi
Hmmm.
Armida van Rij
You know, we’ve talked about subsea cables, we’ve talked about other pieces of infrastructure. Of course, this didn’t start in – with the COVID pandemic, but we’ve had the debate about Huawei…
Shashank Joshi
Yes.
Armida van Rij
…back in whenever that was, 2018/2019.
Shashank Joshi
Hmmm hmm.
Armida van Rij
We’re seeing these, kind of, ongoing debates about infrastructure protection, how we do this, questions about deterrence by denial or deterrence by attribution, which are very, very difficult. In terms of just protecting our infrastructure from this by design, essentially, what are some of the lessons learnt from Huawei? And then I will come to you, to the audience, for questions.
Shashank Joshi
Well, there’s a few lessons, right? One of them is exactly the point of the report, which is, think about the security before you build all the stuff. We built out Huawei in this country well before having any thought of security in mind, well before China was deemed to be a national security concern. And we then found it was eye wateringly more expensive and difficult to rip all of it out to the point where we are still ripping it out. We are still ripping out Hikvision cameras, Chinese built cameras, from government facilities. So, the lesson number one is, think before you build the stuff in. I think we’ve probably woken up to that by now…
Armida van Rij
Yeah.
Shashank Joshi
…although we face a renewed debate. And this is a debate around electric vehicles, connected vehicles, and what – how we think about the absolutely dominant role of Chinese companies in that supply chain, in that production line, and what it means to have thousands upon thousands of Chinese-built connected devices on our streets in Europe and in the UK. I think this is a huge question. So, that’s one, number one.
Number two is what the Americans do will constrain us and shape us profoundly. It was an American decision to impose heavy sanctions on Huawei that fundamentally changed our, and tilted, our debate from “We can manage the risk of Huawei kit in the periphery of the 5G system,” to, “We cannot manage it, because of the level of insecurity created by the sanctions.” So, that’s number two. We could come across this same issue with semiconductors, or with EVs, or with any number of other emerging technology areas. And I think the third risk is, it is a balance, right?
Armida van Rij
Hmmm.
Shashank Joshi
It’s not always going to be a question of banning and shutting down everything. We – you know, in the Huawei case, there were genuine technical disagreements between American and British and indeed, Australian signals intelligence agencies, and cybersecurity agencies on whether the threat could be managed. So, you’ve got to have these technical dialogues. It isn’t just a political question of shutting it all down out of an abundance of caution.
Armida van Rij
Hmmm, great, thank you very much. We’re coming to you. We have about 20 minutes, and I want to get as many questions in as we possibly can, so please keep your questions brief. Please introduce yourself and wait for the mike to come to you. Down in the middle [pause].
Hugo Barker
Thank you for a very interesting discussion. Name’s Hugo Barker from Imperial College. I have a friend and colleague who’s been writing quite a bit on multilateral lending institutions for security, defence and resilience. Rob Murray, used of the Head of Innovation over at NATO, now a Fellow at the Atlantic Council. Do you think these type of institutions are needed to have proper preparedness and resilience across Europe? Thank you.
Armida van Rij
Great. So, multilateral institutions for security. Jus – sorry, just behind, hmmm, just here.
Kali Tolleson
Well, thank you very much, [Kali Tolleson – 43:20], Consulting Fellow at Chatham House. Trump made it crystal clear that it wants to deal – it wants a deal in Ukraine, possibly over the heads of Ukrainians and Europeans. So, that makes the question of the security guarantees for Ukraine even more pressing and more European issue. So, from your perspective, Mr President, and also from the Finnish Government perspective, what does the security guarantees for Ukraine should entail, and who should part of – who should be the part of such a deal with Ukraine and will guarantee this deal?
Armida van Rij
Thank you, and then we’ll take one more here at the front [pause].
Melinda Simmons
Thank you.
Armida van Rij
Sorry, that’s fine. Take it now.
Melinda Simmons
Okay, fine, thank you, I’ll be brief. Melinda Simmons, formerly British Ambassador to Ukraine. A quick question, which is that part of the main reason actually, I think, why Brits tend to be feel so less – so much less under threat than the Finns do, is just the sense that they are geographically too far away from a war that is being fought primarily in the trenches, and that’s been my sense ever since I’ve returned. And so, the – I think the real question is, how do we present, without the scaremongering that you alluded to, Shashank, the reality that attack on our infrastructure is part of hybrid war, and hybrid war is what we’re facing, and that these are war engagements? How do you bring that to the British public so that they can begin to sensitise themselves?
My second is a comment, actually, in relation to what you said, Shashank. The other thing I’ve noticed since – particularly in the last six/eight months, is that community groups and local councils are beginning to pay this a bit more attention, and my sense is that, actually, this challenge that we have to get the British public to pay more attention to engagements they may have to perform themselves, so take more individual responsibility, needs to come at that level. And that the next opportunity, if you like, is to draw on that increasing combination of interest and unease, at local level, to enable that conversation, where I think it’s much easier to talk about preparedness than it is at a national level. Thanks.
Armida van Rij
Thank you. Mr President.
Sauli Niinistö
Yes, I take the Ukrainian question. First of all, I’m a bit annoyed about an element which we are facing, namely in Europe, we, many of us, very clearly said that “Well, no-one talks to Putin.” Then when Chancellor Scholz did it, he was heavily criticised. But what about now? Trump is going to talk to Putin. Do we complain that well, we are outside, Europe should be in those discussions? I find this a bit strange construction. In a way, we are forced to say something else that we said a mon – a couple of months ago, that nobody talks, now, yes, they talk, and we should be involved. I think we have a lesson here, we Europeans.
Then, what the plans are, this is just my thinking. I don’t know what Finnish government is thinking, but I had a possibility of discussing with General Kellogg, who is an envoy in this for Trump. I do believe that whatever is achieved, and I’m always pro-peace, that would be any attempt for peace is valuable in my opinion. Well, if we get some kind of peace, we have to keep in mind that tensions do remain. We have a tensified Europe for years, maybe decades ahead of us. Why I emphasise this is that we can’t afford to think that, well, Ukraine is solved, everything is okay, we don’t have to do anything. No, we have to understand that tensions will remain.
Then I have been thinking about the Chinese role in Ukraine. Ukraine needs security guarantees, it’s very clear, and the West can kill, at least to a certain extent, those guarantees. Guarantee means that, well, you control the Russians not to come, but also, in a way, you calm down your own people. That’s where China comes to picture, in my opinion, and I think China should be guaranteeing, also, the peace, and in a way controlling its friends, that is, Russia. If such a construction could be done, then we might maybe have a possibility of breathing a bit wider.
Armida van Rij
Shashank, there was a question specifically about messaging to the public, hybrid warfare…
Shashank Joshi
Yeah.
Armida van Rij
…to you.
Shashank Joshi
I think just two things come to mind. I mean, I agree with Melinda on the importance of the local level, that seems very sensible, but the two things I would suggest are, first of all, look at the signalling yesterday by the Defence Secretary on Russian – a Russian reconnaissance surveillance ship in UK economic waters, in the EEZ, the Yantar. And I thought that was a very interesting example of signalling. It was attribution, saying, “We know what you’re doing.” It was clear, it was relatively calm. It wasn’t saying Britain’s on the cusp of losing access to data or cables, but it was pointing out the stakes involved in the connectivity across the channel and what could be at risk. And it was also avoiding that sense of a loss of agency that we’re just victims to cyberattacks, or we’re at the receiving end of nuclear threats. It was a sense that we have agency over this, because he also said, “We’ve been shadowing it, we’ve been watching it, it’s in – under control and we’ve ordered a submarine to surface near it to signal.” And I think giving people a sense that there are ways to handle the problem, as well as what the problem is, is part of that.
The other element is on murkier situations, where we’re not quite sure what’s responsible. It’s getting everyone accustomed to the idea of uncertainty. Attribution is never 100%, it’s never certain, and I think you have to get the public accustomed to the fact that there will be some mistakes made along the way, not attribution will be perfect. Not being scarred by Iraq syndrome, that every intelligence – every piece of analysis is everything rides on this, as in 2003. But that when actions are covert, you have to make judgments on the balance of probability, and being very honest with them that, “We’re not sure, but we suspect this,” and habituating them to that mode of attribution thinking.
Armida van Rij
Hmmm.
Shashank Joshi
We do it all the time with cyberattacks, I think. More and more, we attribute exponentially more than we did ten years ago. When the Americans first attributed a PLA Op – PL –indicted PLA Operators in 2014, we were shocked, you know, the Brits were shocked, no European had done it. In ten years, we attribute cyber operations all the time, and we have to make that same, kind of, journey with other kinds of covert activities.
Armida van Rij
Hmmm. Elisabeth, do you have anything to add?
Elisabeth Braw
Yes. So, Ambassador Simmons raised the importance of local communities. There is actually, in the UK, an impressive amount being done through the local resilience forums, and that’s something – they exist – have existed for a while and they are a phenomenal resource. And I know from the National Preparedness Commission how much they are doing, and how much more they could be utilised. It’s just a question of linking them in a better way with the rest of the – with the government, with the central government.
Then, when it comes to signalling, it’s not just the governments that can or should signal, it’s other institutions, as well. Companies can highlight when they have been targeted or damaged in some way by non-military activities. We saw that in 2017 when Maersk, along with a host of other multinationals, were hit by the Russian NotPetya virus. Maersk talked about it publicly. They were not shy about telling the world that they had essentially gone dark for six days because the cyberattack was so severe. But they also made the point that, “Now we are in a much better position. We have put in place incredibly strong cyber-defence, so please do business with us.” That is the sort of signalling I think other companies can engage in.
And then, lastly, the third sector, so NGOs, and even celebrities, we have seen Greenpeace beginning to speak up very loudly about the shadow fleet, not because Greenpeace is interested in the geopolitics of sanctions, but because Greenpeace is concerned about the potential of oil spills in the Baltic Sea, in particular, but elsewhere, as well. These are unusual bedfellows for governments, but we are in unusual times, so let’s make common cause. Let’s team up with organisations like Greenpeace to message – and indeed, with celebrities who are concerned about the environment, to send a signal to the public, and indeed, to our adversaries, that we are more resilient than the other side might think. And that should, indeed, be the message, we are all – it’s in everybody’s interest to be resilient and I think everybody, or most of us, would be willing to contribute to that.
And then brings – that brings me to another point, which is many people are keen to do something in their communities, in the past, and they may have been involved in trade unions, workmen’s clubs, churches, and so forth, houses of worship. Those institutions are in decline. I think – not – I’m not trying to be Pollyannish about this, but resilience could be a new form of people – for people to gather and interact with one another. They are seeing the damage that hybrid, grey-zone aggression and indeed, climate change, are already doing to our communities. This is an opportunity to get together, do something tangible for oneself and one’s fellow citizens. I think people would want to be involved in such efforts, they just have to be co-ordinated.
Armida van Rij
Thank you also for mentioning climate change. There was a question online about the ‘shadow fleet’, but I think you’ve basically answered that, so we’ll skip over that. There’s a question online asking, “Elon Musk has criticised America’s bloated military procurement and defence contracts.” I’m impressed that we got so far without talking about Musk.
Shashank Joshi
Indeed.
Armida van Rij
Oh, the question has disappeared, but essentially, how do we make the case for further defence spending at a time when it might be difficult to bring the public along with that because of various domestic pressures on social spending? We probably will only be able to get one more round of questions, so apologies about that. There’s a question here at the front, just – yeah.
Robin Potter
Thanks. Robin Potter from the UK in the World Programme here at Chatham House. In the UK, we have a civil preparedness system which explicitly does not address, sort of, systemic threats to our society, to our way of life, doesn’t look at things like, for example, social cohesion or media literacy. Is that sensible? Is that adequate to address the sort of hybrid threats that we’re facing, as well as a government that doesn’t seem to want to broach these topics with the public?
Armida van Rij
Thank you, and there was a question – yeah, you’re going to have to put your hand up. Yes.
Peter Watkins
Peter Watkins, also from Chatham House, Associate Fellow. I would actually like to come back to this issue about wider political and public awareness and engagement, ‘cause it seems to me it’s fundamental. And building on what’s been said so far, could you say a little bit more about how one builds a domestic political consensus…
Armida van Rij
Yes.
Peter Watkins
…around what needs to be done? But also, the need, as just was raised online, about the need to pay for it, at a time when there are huge budget pressures across the system and demands on people’s pay packets.
Armida van Rij
Right, I’ll take one more here at the front.
Charlie Hancock
[Pause] Thank you. Charlie Hancock, Moscow Times. In conversation with people on both sides of the Atlantic, I’ve noticed an increasing number of people who are saying that these acts of hybrid warfare, so whether that be cyberattacks, sabotage, or even assassination attempts, are actually acts of war. And that by discussing them, by calling them ‘grey-zone’ or ‘subthreshold acts’, it’s really an excuse for governments to just brush them under the rug. So, my question is that is considering them that way a wise approach? And if it is, then how do we level up our responses appropriately without creating that hysteria and panic that you were alluding to earlier?
Armida van Rij
Great, thank you very much. I’m going to ask you to be very brief. The good news is, is that there’s a coffee reception upstairs, where we’ll be able to continue the conversations afterwards. But I’ll start with Elisabeth, come to Shashank, and then end with you. Elisabeth.
Elisabeth Braw
Yes, so regarding the need for information literacy. Absolutely, and I think there’s no argument about the need that – need for our citizens to be information literate, and credit to Finland for being, once again, ahead of the curve in including information literacy in school curricula. And – but – and that’s something that every EU and every Western country should do. I think the bigger challenge is those of us who are above the age of 18, how are we going to be trained in media literacy? Educating children in schools is the easy part, they learn quickly and they are a captive audience because they are in school. What about the rest of us? And frankly, a lot of people who should know better, who are above the age of 18, have contributed, and contribute on a daily basis, to weakening – the weakening of our societies by spreading falsehoods online. This, again, is where I think employers can play an important role in having – in essentially, screening potential applicants for, yeah, information literacy skills when they hire them, so that everybody knows that if you’re – if you have – if you intend to work in the future, then you really should be information literate.
Then when it comes to the last question about whether we should call grey-zone, hybrid activities, we – whether we should consider them acts of war. We can consider them acts of war, but that would put us in a very uncomfortable position, because if we consider them acts of war, then we have to respond – correspond – we have to respond correspondingly, and that would be extremely ask – escalatory. Instead, we should respond in the grey-zone. It’s very difficult but the risk of another war triggered by hybrid or grey-zone attacks, is frankly too frightening to consider.
Armida van Rij
Hmmm, thank you. Shashank.
Shashank Joshi
I agree with that. I think that these aren’t acts of war, they aren’t armed attacks, are they? They – these are so, below that, and they are conducted by Russia precisely because it does not want to breach the Article 5 threshold and directly confront NATO.
Armida van Rij
Hmmm.
Shashank Joshi
However, I think the interesting question for us to ponder is, it is explicit NATO policy that an accumulation of acts under the threshold of Article 5 can cumulatively breach the threshold, both for the cyber domain, but also in other domains. I think that’s very interesting, we obviously have quite a lot of ambiguity around where that boundary lies. I’m also interested in what the EU thinks, as an institution, about whether the same is true of Article 42.7, and its own mutual defence clause. Whether an accumulation of acts below the threshold of 42.7 might breach that threshold. 42.7 is increasingly important, is increasingly prominent. I think it was activated by France, if I’m not mistaken, in 2015, and so that deserves a lot more thought on that question.
I’ll pause there because I think – I’d love to tackle Peter’s, but it sounds – it would take us another session, I think.
Armida van Rij
Mr President, final word is to you.
Sauli Niinistö
First, shortly to Lisbon Article 42.7, if compared to Article 5.
Shashank Joshi
Strongly.
Sauli Niinistö
That is very interesting and important question, because nobody has actually been thinking how they fit together, if both of them are needed, and that is one proposal in the report, also. But I shortly go to financing, whatever. I have a long political career behind me, and I have learnt to trust that what people consider valuable, that also happens. And this security need, we – I would rather see it raising from bottom to up, not saying high up that “Well, we have difficulties, you have to learn to read information,” but raising people’s, citizens’ own interest and understanding that it is fundamental to their life. How we do it, that is really, quite a problem, but when we see increasing worriness, hope it’s not panicking anybody, but nevertheless, when worries grow, then people, they also start to think how we can guarantee our wellbeing, and then security comes maybe more important in politics, when people demand it.
Armida van Rij
On that note, we will end it here for now. As I said, we will continue the conversation upstairs. Please do join us there. Thank you so much, President, Shashank, Elisabeth.
