Perego (FI): “Anyone who fails to see the Russian threat is short-sighted”. The 13th aid package for Kyiv has been signed

“Drones crashing into homes and cyber-attacks are certainly different, but they stem from the same source. Failing to recognise this is short-sighted. That is why we must tackle them as an absolute priority. By strengthening the Defence Ministry’s capabilities.” This is what Undersecretary Matteo Perego di Cremnago, Crosetto’s second-in-command, said whilst speaking to Il Foglio. Is this a message to those – such as the Lega – who continue to downplay the Russian threat? “Hybrid warfare operates in a subtle manner. There isn’t a single person in the Kremlin pressing a button, but it is clear that bots and disinformation linked to Russian agencies played a role in the squares of Maranza,” says the Forza Italia member. In his view, the centre-right’s election manifesto should explicitly state support – including military support – for Kyiv. The government signed the new aid package yesterday.

Yesterday, Defence Minister Guido Crosetto, speaking about the cyber threat in an interview with Corriere, referred to an “extraordinary phase”. For this reason, “all branches of government should bury the hatchet, shut themselves in a room and decide together on a strategy for survival”. This was a reference to the “clash” with the intelligence services, which fall under the remit of Undersecretary Mantovano. “We are faced here with a unique situation; it is not a traditional domain like the others, but a hyper-pervasive domain – a dimension that touches on every aspect of security, defence and everyone’s daily life,” argues Undersecretary Perego di Cremnago. “And so it is perfectly normal that, over time, expertise has developed, both within the intelligence sector, at the Ministry of the Interior with the Postal Police, and at the National Cybersecurity Agency. Each has, to some extent, developed its own ‘area of responsibility’. But just as the Ministry of Defence has jurisdiction over all domains, from space to the underwater realm, so I believe it would be desirable for the Ministry of Defence to also assume responsibility for the cyber domain, without prejudice to the respective competences of each body. Not least because cyber-attacks are now increasing by 50 per cent every year.” To update the picture of cyber threats, Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi has today convened a National Committee for Public Order and Security to seek to adopt protective measures for the most vulnerable institutions. The other front is the work – also mentioned by Crosetto – to equip the defence sector with stronger tools to combat hybrid warfare, for which draft bills have been tabled in Parliament. “I worked personally on the one tabled by Forza Italia,” Undersecretary Perego explains further to Il Foglio. “There are two articles that specifically relate to the field of cyber threats. Article 2 refers to the Training Centre for Combat and Countering Hybrid Threats. In Article 7, on the other hand, we have proposed formalising something that already exists in substance: namely, the powers granted to the Chief of the Defence Staff as the cyber authority. There is also the identification of cyberspace as being of national interest to defence, and the establishment of the role of cyber specialist. All this bearing in mind that I dealt with this some time ago, when last November the Minister wrote a non-paper on hybrid warfare. The Ministry of Defence’s ambition is to establish a fully-fledged cyber armed force, modelled on the US NSA. A step forward has already been taken with the merger of the Joint Intelligence Centre – which is a sort of military intelligence body, or rather a military information support unit – with the Network Operations Command, which is the core group of operators responsible for our country’s cyber defence.”

Beyond the hesitations of a section of the majority, there is, in short – particularly within the Ministry of Defence – an awareness, adds Perego, that “the single driving force behind these attacks is a mechanism of competition between the West and our primary adversaries: Russia first and foremost, but also China, Iran, aimed at destabilising our democratic system and which takes the form of election interference, cyber-attacks, drone incursions into borders – particularly those of NATO to the east and north-east – and the theft of data from sensitive companies”. One of the victims of this disinformation campaign is support for the Ukrainian cause, which is now being called into question even within the centre-right. Yesterday, Tajani announced the signing (together with Ministers Crosetto and Giorgetti) of the thirteenth military aid package: should such support not be explicitly enshrined in the centre-right’s election manifesto? “Ask the Italian politician who was the first to visit Ukraine after the Russian invasion,” replies Perego di Cremnago in conclusion. “Support for Kyiv remains a cornerstone of our foreign policy. And it must go hand in hand with the ability to devise a way out of the conflict, which for me certainly involves supporting defence capabilities. Whilst also considering what the future might look like once the war is over.”