Balkan Training Camps Reflect Moscow’s Expanding Definition of War

Executive Summary:

• A recent joint investigation by the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) and Moldovan outlet CU SENS confirmed that Moscow had established secret paramilitary camps in the Balkans to train Moldovan citizens in destabilization tactics ahead of Moldova’s October 2024 presidential elections.
• The Kremlin regards the Balkan region as a frontline in its confrontation with the West and has frequently carried out destabilization operations when countries in the region seek closer integration with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) or the European Union.
• Russian military theorists have increasingly concluded that war need not be declared, nor purely kinetic, to achieve political ends. The secret training camps in Serbia and the Republika Srpska illustrate how Moscow’s evolving definition of war manifests in practice.

On July 15, the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) and Moldovan outlet CU SENS published an investigative report confirming Moldova’s claims that Russia had established secret paramilitary camps in Serbia and the Republika Srpska in Bosnia-Herzegovina in the months leading up to the October 2024 Moldovan presidential elections (Balkan Insight, July 15). Just days before the election, Moldovan authorities announced that they had foiled a plot to destabilize the country, conducting dozens of raids and identifying over 100 individuals of interest (Danas, October 17, 2024). In a press conference, Moldova’s Security and Intelligence Service claimed that exiled pro-Russian oligarch Ilan Shor had bankrolled the scheme by sending Moldovan citizens to Moscow for initial training in orchestrating protests (Facebook/sis.mid.official, October 17, 2024; see EDM, November 6, 2024). 

From this pool, a select group of operatives was then allegedly sent for more advanced instruction in the Balkans. At these camps, Russian instructors affiliated with the private military company (PMC) Wagner Group taught the participants to fly drones and fight while training them in “sports and psychology” (European Pravda, July 21; Sloboden Pečat, July 22). Soon after the plot in Moldova was thwarted, evidence of this Balkan dimension of the operation surfaced in Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina as investigators began uncovering the clandestine training sites and tracing their Russian connections (Serbia Monitor, October 25, 2024; Blic.rs, October 27, 2024). These revelations have only added to the documentation of unprecedented Russian interference in Moldovan politics and follow the current trend of Moscow relying on local proxies and disposable agents to carry out its operations (see EDM, April 25, 29, September 26, November 6, 2024, July 9, 22).  

The investigative report from BIRN and CU SENS provided first-hand evidence of how these camps were conducted. According to interviews conducted with Maxim Rosca, a participant in the training, he and other Moldovan citizens were promised between $300 and $500 after ten days of training. Rosca also claimed that Moldovan businessman Anatolii Prizenko recruited him and other participants. Prizenko has been under EU sanctions since December 2024 for allegedly dispatching several citizens of Moldova, at the behest of the Main Directorate of the Russian General Staff (GRU), to paint the Star of David around Paris in October 2023 to fuel tensions in French society over the war in Gaza (Council of the EU, December 16, 2024). Moldovan member of parliament Lilian Carp of the ruling pro-European Party of Action and Solidarity, who chairs the Parliamentary Security Committee, corroborated Rosca’s story. He claimed, “In Bosnia, [participants] trained with drones and learned how to organize mass riots and how to provoke the police into a violent reaction” (United24 Media, July 16). 

The Kremlin’s attempt to influence Moldova’s presidential election in favor of Moscow-approved candidate Alexandr Stoianoglo is just one example in a long list of Russian operations conducted in the Balkans. Moscow has long regarded the Balkan region as a frontline in its confrontation with the West. Whenever countries in the region seek closer integration with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) or the European Union, Russia has responded with subterfuge and destabilization (European Parliament, 2023). 

A notorious example was the attempted coup in Montenegro in 2016. On the eve of Montenegro’s NATO accession, Russian GRU officers allegedly orchestrated a plot to storm parliament and assassinate the pro-Western prime minister, installing a pro-Moscow government in his stead (Meduza, November 7, 2016; Radio Svoboda, November 22, 2018). The scheme was foiled, and Montenegro joined NATO in 2017. Subsequent court convictions of the GRU agents and local conspirators underscored the Kremlin’s involvement (Vedomsti, May 9, 2019). Russian operations in the Balkans are not limited to coup plots. They also involve ideological and paramilitary grooming of local populations, often under innocuous guises. In August 2018, for example, Serbian authorities shut down a so-called “patriotic youth camp” in Serbia’s Zlatibor district, which was jointly run by Russian and Serbian war veterans (see EDM, October 24, 31, 2018). 

Russia additionally uses regional civilian platforms as covers for wider regional exploitation. In 2012, Russia and Serbia agreed to establish a joint humanitarian center in the Serbian city of Niš, which is officially responsible for humanitarian assistance to people affected by emergencies and the implementation of joint projects and programs (Parliament of Serbia, April 25, 2012; RSHC, accessed July 30). In practice, though, the center offers Russia a foothold on a critical regional logistics route near Serbia’s borders with Kosovo and NATO-member Bulgaria. Western officials have flagged suspicious behavior, such as the center’s repeated efforts to secure diplomatic status for its personnel, a common tactic Russia uses to hide its spies behind the immunity granted to diplomats (Detektor, September 6, 2023; Ukrinform, March 25). In 2022, open-source researchers from Kosovo documented instances of supplies bearing the humanitarian corridor’s insignia surfacing in northern Kosovo areas controlled by Serbian nationalist groups aligned with the Veselinović Organised Crime Group. [1] The leader of the Russian “Night Wolves” group, Aleksandr Zaldostanov, also confirmed that some of its members helped transport these supplies from the humanitarian center into northern Kosovo (The Geopost, December 18, 2022; 3Gimbals, June 18). [2]

These examples of ideological and security measures demonstrate a common operational blueprint for the Kremlin: build civilian-facing platforms, infiltrate and co-opt the local population, and then exploit them for covert purposes. Moscow’s use of the Balkans as a theater for clandestine operations is enabled by the presence of local allies and a permissive environment in parts of the region. Serbia, for example, maintains close ties with Russia, is militarily neutral and not a member of NATO, and its leadership has pursued a strategy of balance between the East and West (European Security, December 10, 2023). This makes Serbia relatively safe ground for Russian activities, compared to its NATO-member neighbors. 

Friendly countries in the region function as logistical hubs and recruiting grounds for Moscow while it targets adversaries elsewhere. The Balkan training camps exemplify this. Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina’s autonomous Republika Srpska, led by pro-Russian leader Milorad Dodik, were used as staging areas to project Kremlin influence into Moldova. By cultivating regional networks of veterans, paramilitary groups, and fringe political organizations, Russia can conduct disruptive missions across borders under the guise of plausible deniability (Balkan Insight, October 18, 2024). 

Russian operations in the Balkans are not one-off, unconnected schemes. Rather, they are part of a broader phenomenon—Moscow’s evolving definition of war. Valery Gerasimov, chief of the Russian General Staff, articulated the principle that in modern conflicts, “the role of non-military means of achieving political and strategic goals has grown, and, in many cases, they have exceeded the power of weapons in their effectiveness” (Military Industrial Courier, February 18, 2013). This ethos is evident in Russia’s reliance on tools such as cyberattacks, disinformation, economic coercion, and clandestine force, rather than overt military action (In Moscow’s Shadows, July 6, 2014). While the “Gerasimov Doctrine” is often cited as the foundation of Russia’s “war by other means” strategy, it is not the first iteration of the idea; rather, it is part of a broader debate that has been ongoing within Russian military circles (see EDM, October 17, 2014, April 3, 2018, March 7, 2019; Military Review, January–February 2016). The table below displays a selection of quotes from some of the most influential Russian military leaders, showing how deeply the idea of non-linear warfare has permeated Russian thinking.

The use of proxy training camps in the Balkans, along with other instances of disruption in Europe, reflects a deeper evolution in Russian military thought—namely, the redefinition of “war” itself. This broadened concept of warfare treats subversive operations not as separate from or less than overt war, but rather as integral components of it. Russia’s approach to conflict is comprehensive, opportunistic, and unconstrained by traditional limits. Moscow’s view of war is thus far broader than conventional Western notions, which helps explain the inconsistent steps taken in response to Russia’s subversive actions. 

Notes: 

[1] The Veselinović OCG is engaged in a large-scale bribery scheme with Serbian and Kosovar security officials who facilitate the group’s illicit trafficking of goods, money, narcotics, and weapons between Kosovo and Serbia. The group’s ties with Serbian officials allegedly reach as far as Serbia’s president, Aleksander Vučić (OCCRP, December 10, 2021).

[2] The “Night Wolves” group (Nochnye volki/Ночные волки) is the largest motorcycle club in Russia and operates as a far-right nationalistic group in support of the Kremlin. Their primary motivation is to restore Russia as a great power and reclaim the lands that constituted the Soviet Union. The group has developed strong ties with Putin, who often describes them in the media as “friends” (see Pomerantsev, Nothing is True And Everything is Possible, November 2015; YouTube.com/TheGuardian, January 29, 2016; President of Russia, August 10, 2019).