Photo By Karlheinz Wedhorn | Security professionals from around the world convene for the Marshall Center's Seminar...... read more read more
The Seminar on Irregular Warfare and Hybrid Threats (SIWHT) kicked off June 3, 2025, at the Marshall Center, welcoming 87 participants from 66 countries for an intensive, hands-on learning experience focused on the evolving nature of hybrid threats. The course explores the tools adversarial states and non-state actors use to destabilize national security, including coercive economics, cyber operations, disinformation, proxy forces, and lawfare.
In his opening remarks, Marshall Center Director Barre Seguin emphasized the urgency of adapting institutional structures to a rapidly changing environment.
“The pace of technological change demands that we not only innovate but also restructure how our organizations work,” Seguin told participants.
The 2025 program, themed "Navigating the Gray Zone: Crafting Multi-Domain Responses and Innovative Strategies," focuses on hybrid threats in the space, cyber, and maritime domains while emphasizing whole-of-government, whole-of-society, and allied approaches to deterrence. Concentrating on activities that fall below the threshold of direct military conflict, SIWHT integrates lectures, panels, and active-learning exercises to help participants navigate complex gray-zone challenges.
May-Britt Stumbaum, Ph.D., professor at the Marshall Center’s College of International Security Studies, and Sae Schatz, Ph.D., executive director of the Partnership for Peace Consortium, discussed the organizational challenges surrounding the adoption of new technologies in the security and defense sectors.
In her lecture on hybrid threats, Stumbaum underscored the complexity of the modern security landscape, explaining how adversaries exploit preparedness gaps and the blurred lines between war and peace.
“Hybrid threats exploit under-defended domains with low-cost, high-effect tactics designed to stay below the threshold of open conflict,” she noted. “We are dealing with a whole-of-society challenge that requires a whole-of-society response.”
In a panel moderated by Professor Monika Wohlfeld, Ph.D., Schatz spoke about the role of emerging and disruptive technologies in amplifying hybrid threats and emphasized the importance of organizational agility over merely chasing the next new tool.
“The biggest threat is getting out of our own way,” Schatz remarked. “Small non-state actors rapidly innovate while large institutions get stuck in multi-year procurement cycles. We need to rethink how we organize, train, and lead for this hybrid, technology-enabled reality.”
Stumbaum added that legacy divides between civilian and military sectors often slow progress.
“We are still socialized in a way that separates civilian and military sectors, but in reality, the same people manage both. This division hinders how we adopt and apply technology effectively,” she observed.
Participants debated how to foster a security culture open to experimentation, continuous learning, and digital transformation across generations. Acknowledging the constant pace of change, Schatz emphasized that adapting to this evolving landscape requires more than experience — it requires the ability to remain flexible and to learn continuously.
“It’s not about age — it’s about mindset. Innovation is learnable. The technology you’re using today, the world you’re operating in, will likely look very different five years from now. We need to be constantly learning, unlearning, and relearning,” she said.
As SIWHT continues through June 18, participants will explore how states and institutions can overcome these barriers, foster agile security cultures, and develop multi-domain strategies to address the increasingly complex hybrid threats shaping today’s global security environment.
| Date Taken: | 06.03.2025 |
| Date Posted: | 06.12.2025 03:32 |
| Story ID: | 500302 |
| Location: | DE |
| Web Views: | 12 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Marshall Center Addresses Challenges of Emerging Technologies, by Sarah Loicano, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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