Abstract. Special military operations are associated with the establishment of a special legal regime in a certain territory or in relation to certain actions, as well as with the special activities of collective subjects and military officials. Difficulties in international legal and law enforcement conceptualization give rise to various forms of legal understanding of the phenomenon of “special military operation”. The article discusses interrelated conceptual, legal, and institutional issues of special military operations, including the way they apply to Russia’s special military operation (SMO) in Ukraine at different stages of legal regulation. In terms of differentiation of the legal regulation’s object, SMO is already regulated by over 30 federal laws and subsidiary legislation acts, and this list continues to grow. The specifics of the formation of special legislation on SMO that forms a separate subject area of the Russian law is revealed. Specialization of legislation first manifested itself at the level of individual legal norms (such as military award procedures in SMO area) and sub-institutions (such as ensuring monetary and social security of its participants, partial mobilization procedures etc.), with subsequent optimization and integration of legal regulation into single legal institution of SMO. Legal regulation problems in the field of military confrontation in cyber-space and at sea actualized by SMO are also addressed. The authors conclude that some features of social relations to be regulated in the case of SMO require certain legal norms and the method of legal regulation to be revised, as the existing legal mechanisms do not always function effectively.