Baltic Sea Cable Incidents Pile Up

In the three months between November and January, three incidents of damage to Baltic Sea underwater cables have taken place, severing at least partly seven different telecommunication links that connect Baltic states like Sweden, Finland, Germany, Estonia and Latvia. All in all, Statista has counted damage to 10 different Baltic underwater cables and three gas pipes, starting with the highly publicized rupture of the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines back in 2022.

A report by The Washington Post citing anonymous officials said on January 19 that intelligence and other evidence pointed to negligence rather than malice in the case of the three incidents that took place in 2023 and 2024. Suspected in these are two Chinese-registered ships - both reportedly with Russian links - and one vessel believed to be part of Russia's so-called shadow fleet dodging sanctions by transporting oil. Since then, however, an additional incident - the third in just three months - took place, stoking suspicion of sabotage once more. Another Russian-crewed cargo liner was detained and searched by Norwegian authorities on January 31 near Tromso at the request of Latvia after the incident that took place five days earlier, but was cleared later. Sweden meanwhile detained another ship, the Bulgarian-operated Vezhen, and determined it had damaged the cable, if accidentally.

Doubts about the events being a coincidence are persistent, however, mostly due to the 2022 Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 incidents that have at this point almost certainly been deemed sabotage. The damage done on September 26, 2022, was as dramatic as it was symbolic when detonations ruptured the two gas pipelines connecting Russia and Germany seven months after the Russian invasion - amid Europe finding it near impossible to wean itself off Russian fossil fuel. However, Russia has not been zeroed in as the only likely perpetrator in the case, with some theories now also pointing to Ukraine.

Considering this background, it’s not a surprise that Norway's search of the Silver Dania wasn’t the only one in the context of ruptured Baltic undersea cables. Denmark intercepted and boarded the Chinese Yi Peng 3, suspected to have caused cable damage in November, while Finland seized the Russian Eagle S that it identified as having caused cable and pipeline damage this past Christmas Day. It did not help suspicion that the last remaining ship implied in the damages, the Chinese Newnew Polar Bear, carried on into Russian waters after the incident that took place in 2023 and was escorted by a Russian state-owned ice breaker.

The way in which commercial vessels have been damaging pipelines and cables is different from the initial Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 ruptures, where traces of explosives were found. The ships have been slicing the cables and pipes by dragging their anchors - often for extended periods of time. While this has led some experts to believe that the vessels in question are poorly maintained and have poorly trained crews, others have said that they find it unlikely that the crews would not notice such an issue. While damage by anchors is not as extensive as by explosives, it is still costly and can disrupt communications, electricity and gas supply for the countries in question significantly until repairs can be carried out.

With uncertainty about accident or attack persisting in Europe, other cable cutting incidents have likewise raised suspicion, for example in Taiwan earlier this month. A governing body estimates that around 150 to 200 cable damage incidents happen per year around the world mostly from anchoring and fishing - which equates to around three cable repairs per week. While this makes the recent cluster of Baltic Sea cable incidents not impossible but still unlikely to occur, suspicion will continue amid ongoing tensions of Europe and other Western powers with China and Russia as well as the history of almost definite sabotage incidents in Baltic waters.