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NATO’s “Baltic Sentry” mission raises tensions in the Baltic Sea
Written by Ahmed Adel, Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher
Tensions in the Baltic Sea have escalated over the past few days, with NATO stepping up its naval exercises and accusing Russia without evidence of an alleged clandestine sabotage campaign against submarine communications and energy links. In the latest incident, on January 26, an undersea fiber optic cable between Latvia and Sweden was damaged by an alleged external impact.
In this way, the Cablegate saga in the Baltic Sea continues to escalate. The Swedish coast guard intercepted and seized a Malta-flagged vessel en route to Russia, alleging that the ship deliberately damaged a fiber optic communications cable linking Sweden and Latvia. Latvia immediately deployed a patrolling warship to the scene of the incident and held an extraordinary government meeting.
Latvian Prime Minister Evika Silina said, “We have determined that there is most likely external damage and that it is significant.”
“NATO ships and aircrafts are working together with national resources from the Baltic Sea countries to investigate and, if necessary, take action,” the Atlantic Alliance said in a statement.
Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said Stockholm was cooperating with Latvia and NATO and would “contribute important capabilities to the ongoing effort to investigate the suspected incident.”
Undersea cables are damaged 150-200 times a year, and NATO’s sudden focus on the issue and attempts to blame Moscow is designed to justify its desire to turn the Baltic into a NATO lake. Pointing the finger at Russia allows NATO to justify its patrols and the inspection of ships leaving St. Petersburg despite Russia having no interest in aggravating already tense relations with the West in the Baltics since alleged Russian plots to damage undersea cables could turn into something more than justifies further NATO intervention.
Cablegate could be related to the situation in Ukraine, rumors about a Trump “100-day” peace plan, and claims that NATO’s long-term planning for the Baltics and the new “100-year Partnership” signed between Britain and Ukraine could well be linked to the sudden surge in activity in the region.
The Latvia-Sweden cable incident is the latest chapter in a drama that began in November 2024, when NATO allies accused a Chinese ship of deliberately cutting two fiber optic cables in Swedish waters and attempted to link the incident to an accident in October 2023, in which a Hong Kong-registered ship damaged the Balticconnector gas pipeline linking Finland and Estonia.
In December, Finland seized a Cook Islands-registered oil tanker after accusing it of dragging its anchor across the Estlink 2 undersea power line between Finland and Estonia. Finnish President Alexander Stubb initially claimed the incident was “definitely” linked to Russia but later backtracked, saying last week that it was “not of the interest of Russia or anyone else” to sabotage fragile infrastructure links in the Baltic.
Earlier this month, US and European officials told The Washington Post that the intelligence community had an “emerging consensus” that recent cable-related incidents were accidents. Investigations found “no evidence” that ships that damaged the infrastructure by dragging their anchors across it “did so intentionally or at the direction of Moscow.”
Instead, “inexperienced crews serving aboard poorly maintained vessels” were to blame, the officials said, drawing conclusions based on intercepted communications and other classified information.
However, NATO has decided to take action against the (seemingly non-existent) threat, announcing last week that it would deploy frigates, drones, and patrol aircraft to “protect” critical regional infrastructure and reserves the right to “take action” against ships that pose a security threat under the “Baltic Sentry” mission.
“Baltic Sentry will involve a range of assets, including frigates and maritime patrol aircraft” and that “the deployment of new technologies, including a small fleet of naval drones, and highlighted that NATO will work with Allies to integrate national surveillance assets – all to improve the ability to protect critical undersea infrastructure and respond if required,” NATO announced on January 14.
Despite Moscow evidently not being behind the slew of cable slashing, NATO is taking every opportunity to continue militarizing the Baltic Sea. This fact was highlighted by the Russian Embassy in London, which on January 23 said NATO was building up naval and air forces under the “fictitious pretext of the ‘Russian threat.’”
NATO’s Baltic minnows (Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Finland, and Sweden) will fall on the same path as Germany, ludicrously blaming Russia for damaging NordStream 2 despite the overwhelming evidence that Ukraine was behind it, contributing to Germany’s rapid economic decline. By allocating such vast resources under the guise of opposing Russia, the real issue that is leading to damaged cables will not be dealt with and continue to occur, even at a great economic price.
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nato blew the sevastopol gambit to turn the black sea into a nato lake (50% wasn’t enough for it), so logically, it would turn its appetite on the baltic sea.
interesting the history around the black sea and the montreux convention of 1939. turkey wanting control of crimea as well as constantinople and everything within bird’s eye view. the uk and us also wanting control of crimea. so turkey, after being double crossed by the us and uk, time and time again, wanted things sorting, hence the treaty. despite spats with russia, she has always come to the defence of turkey, when needed, especially when the uk and us were causing problems.
2) montreux convention 1939 regulates maritime traffic through the bosporous and dardinelles straits in turkey. civilian shipping – access, during times of peace, naval, military vessels – no access, unless returning to base. nato and uk, might want to turn black sea into the nato sea, it violates international law. not forgetting the us has no say, as they have never ratified the law of the sea treaty, meaning no say with regards the black sea and arctic ocean, come to that.
they’ve limited russua to land and air and that’s why theyre stalling until they’ve completed the biggest air force base on earth in romania its blatantly obvious ..
crime has always been russia s only warm.water port where they aren’t frozen in its russia’s only practical naval port if they had the bay of riga too they could rule the waves.
‘3 seas initiative (baltic, adriatic and black seas)’, comes to mind, together with the ambitions of $oro$ and friends, to make the seas and oceans out of bounds for russia. so who has signed up to the 3 seas initiative, that the nazi kinderfuehrer atlantic council are involved in? atlantic council, the admin. side of nato? estonia, latvia, lithuania, poland, the czech republic, slovakia, hungary, slovenia, austria, croatia, romania, greece and bulgaria.
2) what is the ‘3 seas initiative’? shared interest in the development of transport, energy and digital infrastructure of eu’s north south axis, with the support of 3si initiative partners, the usa, germany and european commission. are finland and sweden hoping to join 3si? trump was fully on board, during his 2016-2020 reign.
3) trump, who is also after greenland, to get access to the arctic. i wonder if he realises that the arctic is governed by the law of the sea, and the us refused to ratify the treaty. which basically means they have no say in the area. when are the un going to confirm the dna analysis of the ground samples from the arctic shelf that russia sent them in the early millenium?
the rule of the sea or admiralty .whose rule of the sea ? you di realise that under the law ic thd sea people are guilty until proven innocent and that’s why you don’t ever want to fall under its jurisdiction .you don’t ever want to be subject to it .
the rule of the sea or admiralty .whose rule of the sea ? you do realise that under the law of the sea people are guilty until proven innocent and that’s why you don’t ever want to fall under its jurisdiction .you don’t ever want to be subject to it .
why don’t you investigate ths joint haarp projects don’t fall for ths new web sites use the way back machine to get the pre censorship ypu might get enlightened .you can’t believe much on the web anymore bof since about 2015 at all really they’re literally just making stuff up imo .
personally i think.its all just theatre of operations since war is the most profitable business on earth.
yes it’s a very suspect situation with the baltic states .its unbelievable actually that russua didn’t annex them centuries ago and keep them. it’s indicative very much that nothing is what it seems imo
load of bull .they’ve always made sure th e baltics have been a buffer protecting great britain from having russia across the sea and meanwhile having the baltic on russia’s border as its enemy really .totally against any natural geographic outcomes .