The grim situation on the on Polish-Belarusian border, where thousands of migrants are attempting to cross into the EU, threatens to spiral into a much more serious geopolitical crisis. Warsaw and Brussels accuse Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko of waging a “hybrid war” against Poland and Europe by encouraging asylum seekers from the Middle East, whose ultimate destination is Germany, to pass through Belarus. They allege that the Kremlin is tacitly backing the operation, in a bid to destabilize Vladimir Putin’s European foes.

In the meantime, a serious humanitarian tragedy is unfolding, as encampments of migrants needing food, shelter, and medical attention are stranded in the freezing borderland forests. The situation has become so desperate that migrants have tried to storm the border unarmed — only to be repelled by Polish border guards. In total there have been thirty-three thousand recorded attempts to cross the border: one solidarity activist compared the back and forth to a soccer game. On Friday, a Syrian man was found dead near the village of Wólka Terechowska, the ninth dead since this crisis began.

Even if the EU’s accusations are true about Belarus’s plans, “hybrid war” is an inappropriate term for what Lukashenko is doing. He is attempting to extract a deal from the EU, where Belarus will be paid — like Turkey — to keep migrants out of Europe. In particular, his aim is to get Brussels to lift sanctions imposed after his repression of protests last summer. He can also look to the example of Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, whom the EU has granted €6 billion euros in aid since 2016 to keep Syrian refugees in Turkey. Erdoğan has himself has threatened to open the border when he feels the Europeans aren’t coddling him enough. This is not war, but business — the act of a smart opportunist with good commercial sense.