Mikael Weissmann

Docent Dr Mikael Weissmann is a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Systems Science for Defence and Security, Swedish Defence University. He serves as the Deputy Director of the Swedish Defence University Centre for Land Warfare. He is also an Associate Professor in War Studies and an Affiliated Researcher at the university’s Centre for Wargaming (CWG). He also co-convenes the Hybrid Threats Research Group (HTRG).

Weissmann has previously held positions at, among others, the Swedish Institute of International Affairs, the Swedish Defence Research Agency, Copenhagen University, Stockholm University, Uppsala University, and the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). He has been a visiting fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, the University of Warwick in the United Kingdom and Peking University, Renmin University, and China Foreign Affairs University in China.

Weissmann is the lead editor for the books Hybrid Warfare: Security and Asymmetric Conflict in International Relations (I.B. Tauris, 2021), Advanced Land Warfare: Tactics and Operations (Oxford University Press, 2023), Russia's War in Ukraine and Modern Warfare: Strategy, Tactics, and Technology (Oxford University Press, 2026), and for two Special Issues in Asian Perspective (2019) and Asian Survey (2015). He is also co-editor of the book Russian Hybrid Warfare and Influence: Small States in the intersection between the East and West (Bloomsbury Academic, 2024). His work has appeared in journals like International Affairs, Survival, the Journal of the Royal Swedish Academy of War Sciences, Washington Quarterly, Defence Studies, Dynamics of Asymmetric Conflict, Asian Survey, Asian Perspective and the Journal of Baltic Security. Weissmann is also the author of the monograph The East Asian Peace: Conflict Prevention and Informal Peacebuilding (Palgrave Macmillan, 2012).

Weissmann’s research focuses on Security, Strategy, and Intelligence, structured around the following six core themes: Hybrid Threats, Cognitive Warfare and Psychological Defence, Strategic Intelligence, Technology and Defence, Modern Warfare, and China and the Indo-Pacific.

He also maintains a strong interest in Teaching and Learning in Professional Military Education (PME) — particularly in practical, scenario-based instruction, such as staff rides and wargames.