The Role of Criminal Law Approaches Against Hybrid Attacks

Hybrid threats have become a topic high on the international agenda. Hybrid threats and actual attacks may be classical criminal activities driven by personal motives and economic gain. However, this article deals with hybrid attacks that go beyond personally motivated criminal activity, aimed at states’ vulnerabilities in a wider context. The hybrid nature of these attacks can engage different or hybrid legal responses – a criminal law response or an international law response to terrorism or a lead-up to armed conflict. The questions are, what is the role for criminal law in regulating hybrid attacks and what are the challenges of such an approach? Focusing on international and national criminal law regulating hybrid attacks, this article considers the three scenarios of attacks against critical infrastructure, jamming of maritime navigation and physical attacks on submarine cables and pipelines. The chapter highlights the complexities involved in criminal law approaches, requiring interaction and cooperation between the international and national levels, but also the potential advantages of integrating criminal law approaches into a broader military strategy.