RUSSIA’S INVASION OF UKRAINE AND THE DOCTRINE OF MALIGN LEGAL OPERATIONS

This article offers a trans-disciplinary legal analysis of the Russian Federation’s total invasion of Ukraine from the perspective of Malign Legal Operations (MALOPs). Known colloquially as lawfare, the notion of MALOPs in this article is defined as ‘the exploitation of legal systems by employing disinformation to shape perceptions of legitimacy, justify violations, escape legal obligations, contain adversaries, or to advantageously revise the rule of law’. Unlike the bumper-sticker term lawfare, MALOPs offers a theoretical approach to conceptualise, identify, and ultimately disrupt the practice of legal exploitation, particularly as it relates to international security. This article asserts that Russian MALOPs provided a nearcertain indication of attack in the months leading up to Russia’s total invasion of Ukraine. Furthermore, this research suggests that MALOPs are a principal tool for revisionist states like the Russian Federation and the People’s Republic of China to pursue legal asymmetries in pursuit of geopolitical objectives. Finally, this research recommends a novel approach for responding to this behaviour in the form of the Counter-MALOPs Toolkit: Identify; Disrupt; and Defend.