The proliferation of false bomb threats has created confusion across Europe. These incidents resemble new episodes in the hybrid war led by certain states such as Russia in Europe, but there is nothing to formally accuse Moscow. And then, there is this strange claim of “fighters of the male state”, a small masculinist group which seems linked to an obscure Russian far-right network...

Published on: 06/11/2026 - 18:17 Modified on: 06/11/2026 - 18:18

The list of affected countries is growing longer and longer. The wave of false bomb threats against planes which is shaking Europe now concerns at least 14 states and around 40 flights.

Prague airport warned on Friday November 6 of multiple bomb threats concerning several flights. Shortly after, that of Lisbon also reported a new alert. In France too, the authorities had recorded four new false alarms.

“Significant impact at several levels”

The pace of these incidents appears to be accelerating. On the single day of November 5, false bomb threats forced 13 flights across Europe to either make emergency landings or not take off.

The first recorded case dates back to October 18, when an Austrian Airlines flight between Tel Aviv and Vienna had to be diverted to Sofia following a false bomb alert while the plane was flying over Bulgaria.

Since then, France, the United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, Finland and even Denmark have all experienced similar incidents in early November.

“Airports are used to dealing with alerts and have well-established procedures for assessing their seriousness, and it is very unusual for such a large number of threats considered serious to occur in such a short period of time,” underlines Graig Klein, specialist in international terrorism and violence by non-state groups at Leiden University.

This accumulation of false bomb threats "has a significant impact on several levels. Air traffic disruptions affect the national security of the countries concerned, induce a feeling of insecurity among the population and have an economic cost", summarizes Veronika Hinman, specialist in international conflicts who works on airspace at the University of Portsmouth.

For this expert, “it is a particularly effective way of causing disruption on a continental scale, because with few resources and efforts, the impact can be very strong”.

Indeed, airports are obliged to take this type of alert seriously, which means that "it is not necessary to take any particular material action to make the threat credible", underlines Graig Klein. “It’s quite easy to organize, because you just need to obtain flight information and understand how the airport works to know who to send the threat to,” explains Veronika Hinman.

And for this relatively small effort, the impact is all the greater because the disruption goes to the heart of the idea that Europeans have of their continent, "that is to say an open space where it is possible to move around easily", adds Mark Lacy, specialist in hybrid warfare at Lancaster University.

Russian hybrid war?

In this sense, these false bomb threats fit perfectly with the pattern of hybrid warfare. “The goal of hybrid operations, that is to say those which remain below the level of what is considered an act of war, is to cause more fear than destruction,” explains Mark Lacy.

But hybrid war also raises the specter of Russian activity. Indeed, since the start of the Ukrainian conflict, Moscow has been accused of carrying out sabotage, disinformation and drone incursion operations across Europe in an attempt to destabilize the Old Continent.

In this case, no concrete evidence has made it possible, until now, to point an accusing finger towards Moscow for this campaign of false bomb threats.

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Thus, it could as well be an opportunistic group linked or not to another country like Iran which intends to benefit from the effect of Russian hybrid warfare. “The atmosphere of anxiety aroused by these hybrid operations has an amplifying effect. Even if the false alarms were the work of an isolated individual, the fear aroused and the reaction of the authorities would be multiplied because of this general climate,” assures Graig Klein.

However, eyes are naturally turning towards Moscow. Firstly because of the context. These disruptions to European air traffic "come shortly after a Ukrainian bombing campaign which aimed precisely to pin Russian planes to the ground", underlines Anton Shekhovtsov, director of the Center for Democratic Integrity in Austria and expert on relations between Russia and the far right in Europe.

For this specialist, it may be a "signal that the Russian authorities want to send to the Europeans to make them understand that they would do better to put pressure on Ukraine to stop its bombings."

Real fake masculinist terrorists

And then there's the strange claim of some of these fake bomb threats. In Italy and Bulgaria, airport authorities received emails from a group calling themselves "male state fighters." He claims to "want to punish the feminist regime" in the West by blowing up planes in flight.

“I was surprised to see this name appear in connection with these false bomb threats in Europe,” notes Anna Kruglova, specialist in terrorism and radical movements in Russia at the University of Salford, in the United Kingdom.

The “fighters of the male state” appear to be a direct reference to the Russian far-right nebula Muzhskoe Legion – that is, the “male legion” – whose former name was “the male state”.

Anna Kruglova worked specifically on this small group founded in 2016 on the social network VKontakte which was officially designated as an extremist organization and declared illegal in Russia in 2021. "It is a far-right supremacist and nationalist network active online with a Telegram group which before its ban targeted mainly ethnic, racial or sexual minorities. These extremists have notably boycotted Russian companies which used non-white models in their advertisements", underlines Anna Kruglova.

What does this have to do with masculinism? Their leader, Vladislav Pozdniakov, "wrote a manifesto in favor of a nationalist patriarchy which aims to exclude women from the public sphere in order to confine them to roles compatible with 'traditionalist values'", explains Anna Kruglova.

Also read: The Base: these American neo-Nazis, agents of the chaos of the war in Ukraine

Vladislav Pozdniakov and his "Male State" gained a little international fame when he was compared to a Russian "Andrew Tate" (named after one of the central figures of the masculinist movement).

But from there to imagining this “Male Legion” sowing confusion in European airspace, there is a step that the experts interviewed find difficult to take. “They have always acted only in Russia. Moreover, issuing false bomb threats against planes is far from their traditional modus operandi which is based more on intimidation and violence,” assures Anton Shekhovtsov.

They are no longer as openly masculinist as before. "Since the start of the war in Ukraine, this nebula has devoted itself mainly to the glorification of the Russian invasion and the fight against 'a feminist regime' is a theme which is no longer part of its usual narratives", notes Anna Kruglova.

For Anton Shekhovtsov, this strange claim may make sense in the event that Russia is indeed involved in a campaign to destabilize European air traffic. “Using an outlaw movement in Russia as a false lead avoids any official attribution,” he assures. If Moscow were to come under official suspicion, the Russian authorities could brandish the 2021 ban to claim to have no links with these extremists.

Not to mention that a masculinist demand evoking "a feminist regime" only adds to the confusion around these repeated false bomb threats.

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