High-tech against Russia's shadow fleet – NATO exercises emergency scenario in the Baltic Sea

A ship drifts off the coast of Finland without a clear course. Its radar antenna rotates incessantly. Directly beneath it, dozens of meters below the surface, lies a gas pipeline. An anchor deliberately dropped and dragged across the seabed could damage it—and disrupt Europe's energy supply.

But the ship is under close observation.

A bright yellow, torpedo-shaped glider drone hovers beneath its hull. It's the ear, detecting every sound and transmitting data to a situation center. Approaching on the water's surface is the eye, a robotic boat with a cable-connected flying drone on board.

It identifies suspicious ships from the air. If the captain prepares to drop anchor, he is warned by radio. In an emergency, a frigate is alerted and dispatched to the scene.

NATO is currently rehearsing such a scenario in the Baltic Sea. The ship is not part of the Russian shadow fleet, but rather of the defense alliance: The "Alliance" is a research vessel on board which military personnel and scientists are testing new technology, unmanned systems, and AI applications. All with the goal of better protecting Europe's vulnerable underwater infrastructure.

It's about both technology and speed. The exercise, called "Task Force X Baltic," also represents a shift in strategy in equipment procurement. For the first time, NATO is focusing on testing commercially available technology directly and under realistic conditions and, if successful, introducing it into the armed forces as quickly as possible.

In the past, procurement followed a rigid procedure. Armed forces would report their needs and then wait five to ten years for delivery. "Today, it's the other way around," says David Portal, who is responsible for exercises and training at the NATO Maritime Command (MARCOM).

We look at what is available on the market and test it in an operational environment to find out for which military purposes the material is suitable.

In other words: You look at what's available and then figure out what it's suitable for. This is faster than first formulating requirements and then waiting years for customized developments. At the NATO summit in The Hague, this approach – the "Rapid Adoption Action Plan" – was officially enshrined for the first time and adopted as a guideline for future innovation and procurement.

The exercise in the Baltic Sea is part of a response to a threat that has long been a reality. Ninety-nine percent of global data traffic runs over underwater cables. Without them, there would be no financial trade, no communication. Added to that are power cables and gas pipelines. All of them are vulnerable. And Russia has them in its sights.

Two years ago, former President Dmitry Medvedev wrote on Telegram that there were "no longer any restrictions, including moral ones, that prevent us from destroying our enemies' cable connections laid on the seabed." Moscow has been conducting intensive deep-sea research since the 1960s and has built up capabilities that NATO has neglected in recent decades.

The Baltic Sea is already the scene of suspected sabotage. In October 2023, the Balticconnector gas pipeline and several data cables between Finland and Estonia were damaged; in November 2024, the internet connection between Gotland and Lithuania and the C-Lion1 telecommunications cable between Finland and Germany were affected. Finally, in December of the same year, the Estlink 2 power link between Estonia and Finland and several more data cables were damaged.

It is often difficult to determine the cause of the damage. Several thousand merchant ships operate in the Baltic Sea every day. Fishing boats and anchors inadvertently cause much of the damage to critical underwater infrastructure – and aggressors try to disguise themselves as harmless sailors. Sabotage has so far been easy to accomplish with inexpensive means and usually has no consequences.

To change this, NATO is relying on a combination of conventional and unmanned systems. They are intended to transform the Baltic Sea into a glass sea. A NATO official hopes this will have a deterrent effect. The idea is that if potential attackers know they are being observed, this could deter them from committing acts of sabotage.

Such attacks are not only aimed at financial damage – they also have an impact through the uncertainty about the perpetrators and the insecurity this causes among the population.

Those who aren't caught can't be held accountable. Sabotage of Western underwater infrastructure can have serious security consequences: "Even in the case of a hybrid operation, consultations under Article 5 could trigger the Alliance's case—provided the incident can be clearly attributed," says the NATO official.

NATO leaves open the conditions that must be met to keep potential adversaries guessing. Eero Kytömaa, a national security advisor at the Finnish Ministry of the Interior, cites the noticeable deterioration of normal living conditions in a NATO member state as a possible trigger for debates on the obligation to provide mutual assistance.

NATO states, however, are struggling to keep pace with rapid technological developments. The use of innovative systems such as fiber-optic drones in the Ukraine war demonstrates that those who learn faster have a military advantage.

NATO is recommending the drones and systems that prove their worth during ongoing tests in the Baltic Sea to its member states. In a first step, the eight Baltic Sea states, as well as Belgium, the Netherlands, France, and Norway, can order them. Delivery is scheduled for within one year.

The concept will then be transferred to different environments, such as the Atlantic, the Black Sea, or the Mediterranean, and expanded to include other NATO members. Discussions with NATO officials have made it clear how seriously the Russian threat is being taken.

The Baltic Sea exercise is intended to prepare for an emergency, both technologically and structurally. By no means will every act of sabotage against critical underwater infrastructure be preventable. But that isn't the goal either; rather, it's to prevent perpetrators from going unnoticed in the future.