Vladimir Rauta's research while affiliated with University of Reading and other places

... To summarise the argument developed both here and in our special issue itself (Biegon, Rauta & Watts 2021;Rauta, 2021b): as a 'buzzword', remote warfare has gotten people talking about a range of issues including on the role of technology in war, the use of different 'light-footprint' practices of military intervention, and the consequences of recent Western security and counterterrorism policy. As often happens with buzzwords, however, their over-use can be damaging. ...

... Among others, this concerns the principal-agent and proxy warfare frameworks (see, e.g. Ahram, 2011;Bar-Siman-Tov, 1984;Karlén et al., 2021;Mumford, 2013;Rauta, 2021aRauta, , 2021bSalehyan, 2009;Salehyan et al., 2014). They are relatively interrelated with the patron-client concept, and, as such, they are likely to provide additional valuable insights. ...

... A su vez, la salida de Gran Bretaña de la Unión Europea (UE) converge en la transición hacia un paradigma internacional focalizado en lo global por sobre lo europeo por parte del gobierno británico (Zappettini, 2019;Turner, 2019). Si bien el comercio ha representado el principal vector de la nueva gran estrategia británica post Brexit, el paradigma de defensa lanzado en 2021 no es ajeno a esta visión (Ministry of Defence, 2021; Rauta & Monaghan, 2021). ...

... While the US headed multiple alliances namely NATO, CENTO and SEATO, the USSR headed alliance named as Warsaw Pact containing countries in Eurasian landmass. Both proxy wars and alliances were built to limit the political and economic ideologies (Rauta, 2021). Both these nations were also involved in Arms Race in the field of Land, Air, Sea, Subsea and Space. ...

... This type of war has always been seen as a way to gain advantages, to achieve political and military objectives without direct military intervention, by using an armed force willing to do anything to satisfy the needs and interests of the power that supports and directs the intervention, which cannot be held accountable most of the time because it does not represent a state entity. The support from the powerful state can be direct and visible or indirect, invisible, difficult or impossible to attribute to someone and therefore it can be a preferred form of intervention to promote some interests, some objectives, to reduce the influence of a potential adversary, to cause damage etc. Proxy warfare is not something new on the international scene, it has been used since ancient times, but it returned to the attention of researchers during the Cold War [1], when the great powers, faced with the risk of a total, nuclear war, sought new forms of confrontation, repressing tensions, promoting ideologies, obtaining or maintaining spheres of influence, etc. Thus proxy war became the main form of confrontation on the international stage, with great powers choosing to support DOI smaller states or even armed groups that were involved in regional, local conflicts or civil wars. ...

... In the transactional relationship, the intermediary possesses a military force that allows him to act, but believes that the involvement of a sponsor increases his chances of success. Examples of the materialization of this model are: the support given by the US to Iraq for the defeat of ISIS, the support provided by Russia to Syria in the framework of the civil war, etc. Regardless of the model in which proxy warfare fits, it will remain a preferred form of conducting conflicts, repositioning spheres of influence or releasing tensions on the international stage and will remain "a core feature of the contemporary and future strategic and security environment" [9], because, in theory, proxy war is a simple solution to a complex problem. In practice, however, it has been found that proxy war is actually a simple solution only in the short term, because the evolution of events is unpredictable and most of the time the consequences and effects are not anticipated and are very difficult to manage. ...

... First, as with International Relations scholarship more broadly (Berenskoetter 2017), conceptual evaluation has major implications for the debates on contemporary political violence (Rauta et al 2019;Rauta 2021aRauta , 2021b (Ucko & Marks 2018). That said, the identification and addressment of conceptual problems is integral to the sustainable development of any research agenda (Rauta 2021a). ...

... State and non-state actors can be coordinated together, and as a result become blurred into one force (Hoffman 2007, 8). The strategic relation between state-sponsor and non-state actors is a proxy one (Rauta 2019). This relation implies that a state can delegate, orchestrate or sanction nonstate actors (Maurer 2017). ...

... Salisbury (2015) e Munteanu (2015) exploram o jogo geopolítico entre os dois poderes regionais no conflito entre os Houthis e o governo iemenita reconhecido internacionalmente. Rauta (2018Rauta ( , 2021 foca-se na conceptualização do termo "guerra por procuração" e nas dinâmicas de envolvimento das partes. Karakir (2018) avalia a natureza da guerra iemenita, questionando-se acerca da viabilidade em descrever o conflito como uma guerra por procuração. ...

... As Riedel argues, "Pakistan's army believes these surrogates are critical to its sixty-year-old campaign against India and to securing Pakistan's influence in Afghanistan" (Riedel 2008, 32). This complexity is more than proxy war relations, which focuses on the dyad of supporting state, proxy actors, and the target country (Rauta and Mumford 2017). In securitization, actors define their friends and enemies within security patterns and form alignments. Subsequently, securitization alignment at the cross-level connects a war to broader regional and global security dynamics. ...