NARRATIVE WARFARE ⟩ Kursk Incursion Highlights NATO's Overlooked Doctrine of Joint Operations

Ukrainian analyst Mykola Bielieskov told us in a recent interview, that Syrskyi inherited a highly complex situation when he took over from Valery Zaluzhnyi, the world’s most popular general. However, under Syrskyi's command, the Ukrainian army is equipped with more and better weapons systems than his predecessor had. His relationships with the Americans also seem stronger than Zaluzhnyi's were.

"Unlike Zaluzhnyi, Syrskyi frequently visits the front lines. This has sparked debate about whether he’s overstepping, but that's just his style," says a Ukrainian analyst. For instance, in early May, Syrskyi mentioned to the media that due to the complex situation in eastern Ukraine, he spent two days with units defending the Pokrovske and Kurakhove directions.

Another Ukrainian source describes Syrskyi as a classic representative of the Soviet military school, noting that while he knows the Russians well, he operates in a similar manner—only more effectively. He has been criticized for his perceived insensitivity to losses, especially during the Battle of Bakhmut. Reports have surfaced of tensions between field commanders and the Ukrainian General Staff, with some unit leaders allegedly dismissed for refusing to send their men into near-certain death.

It's in Ukraine’s best interest that the rest of the West focuses less on its prominent figures and more on the structural challenges Ukraine continues to face. The West’s ongoing constraints have a structural impact on the course of this war. Illustrating this was one significant outcome, and perhaps one of the goals, of the Kursk operation. The West is pushing Ukraine to fight by Moscow’s rules—a path Kyiv neither wanted nor could continue on, as the overall course of the war has become too grim.

After the failed counteroffensive of 2023, Ukraine was criticized for its inability to fight like NATO. The Kursk operation seems straight out of NATO’s military bible, Allied Joint Doctrine AJP-01. Its fourth chapter emphasizes the narrative-led execution of military operations: “Every action creates an informational effect, and via the information environment, that effect will influence multiple audiences, be they global, national, or within a theater of operations.”

NATO and the broader West should treat Ukraine's Kursk incursion as a reminder of the crucial value of narrative warfare, which at least on paper seems to be at the very heart of NATO’s military value system.

The victory in the Kursk operation lies in the battlefield of strategic narratives. There are no significant military targets in the Kursk region, which makes the risk-reward ratio of the operation, in purely military terms, seem insane. The prevailing narrative prior to the incursion was that Ukraine was quietly moving towards unfavorable negotiations and that extending the war onto Russian territory would trigger nuclear war.

There are also implications for deterring Russia in the Baltics. Who knows, maybe thanks to Colonel General Syrskyi and his colleagues' decisiveness, we might be discussing collective deterrence in the Baltics in new terms. At the Vilnius Summit in 2023, NATO shifted its military strategy from “deterrence by punishment” (which basically assumed that the Baltics would be defended post-aggression) to “deterrence by denial.”

Based on Kursk, we might see another shift in NATO’s thinking on how to deter Russia in the Baltics - the shift towards "deterrence by reciprocity". The realistic possibility that Russia could lose control over parts of its territory should it engage in territorial grabs in the Baltics would serve as a serious deterrent. Given the structural challenges of defending the Baltics (lack of depth and vulnerable supply lines), declaring "deterrence by reciprocity" would be a significant and reassuring step toward keeping Russia from even contemplating such strategic follies.