Reinventing Cyber Defence: A Call for a New Doctrine
On 23 May 2025, the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) published an article by Andrea Rigoni, Managing Partner of Altirium and Nonresident Senior Fellow of the Atlantic Council, titled “Reinventing Cyber Defence: Why We Need a New Doctrine to Defend Our Nations.” You can read the full commentary directly on the RUSI website.
In this piece, Andrea argues that Europe is facing unprecedented pressure to strengthen its cyber defences in light of shifting US strategic priorities and increasing hybrid threats. While cyberspace has been formally recognised as the fourth operational domain, it is still not treated as central in strategic and operational planning. What is missing is a true doctrine for cyber defence — a framework capable of integrating civilian, military, and private-sector actors into a cohesive ecosystem.
The article highlights three priorities to accelerate this convergence:
Expand National Cyber Coordination Centres (NCCCs) into real-time operational hubs that combine military intelligence with civilian monitoring to ensure shared situational awareness and faster decision-making.
Institutionalise civil–military integration by embedding private operators and critical infrastructure into national defence strategies, moving beyond regulatory compliance to operational participation.
Establish an Extended Permanent Cyber Defence Force (EPCDF), composed of civilian cybersecurity professionals embedded in their daily roles but permanently linked to national defence structures, ensuring scalability and speed of response.
These steps would transform today’s fragmented, reactive approaches into an enduring doctrine for cyber defence, capable of reducing systemic risk and strengthening Europe’s collective security posture.
At Altirium, we believe that readiness—the ability to anticipate, absorb, and react dynamically to threats — is the decisive factor for the next generation of national and European defence strategies. The RUSI commentary provides a clear roadmap: cyber must move from the margins of policy into the core of doctrine.