NATO turned to elite divers to test sabotage defenses for increasingly vulnerable undersea cables

• NATO deployed elite divers with new sensors to protect undersea cables from damage.

• Foreign adversaries have increasingly targeted submarine cables and underwater infrastructure.

• The training marks another shift in how NATO countries are preparing for future war.

NATO deployed special operations divers to test new systems designed to help protect critical underwater infrastructure from damage and sabotage, a growing problem.

Underwater cables and pipelines that provide internet connectivity and energy have been damaged in a series of alarming incidents in recent years, with allegations of sabotage surrounding several in just the past couple of months who left

These events highlight the fragility of these lines, but the NATO alliance is looking for answers.

Last fall, elite special operations divers from within the NATO alliance used underwater electronic tracking sensors as part of an effort to boost protection for critical underwater infrastructure. NATO shared images this week of the November training event – Exercise Bold Machina 2024 in La Spezia, Italy – as well as a statement from the leadership.

The 13-nation event was the first of its kind, said US Navy Capt. Kurt Muhler, director of maritime development at NATO's Headquarters for Special Operations, and was designed to test new sensors that could be used to protect against underwater sabotage attempts. This exercise, first reported by Defense News reported further, they also tested joint special operations divers and their abilities to operate in increasingly exposed battlefields.

Divers on offensive operations may not always be able to rely on dark, murky waters to conceal their movements, said Muhler, who has held SEAL team leadership positions, citing greater advances in the underwater detection system technologies.

“You don't know if somebody knows, or if you've been found,” Muhler told Defense News last fall. “It's understood that there's a system that has the ability to find you, but you don't know. about and you don't know exactly what it is.

Undersea cables, pipelines and other critical underwater infrastructure are at risk

The exercise came together in Italy as damage to critical underwater infrastructure has become a growing concern for Western officials who are scrambling to prevent further damage to cables from ships that are often docked. quietly to the Russian and Chinese governments.

Several underwater cables have been damaged in the past two months, including one telecommunications line connecting Finland and Germany and another connecting Finland and Estonia.

Finnish officials said they found a 60-mile seabed path recommending a Russian-bound tanker might be responsible for cutting cables. And around the same time, cables connecting Germany and Finland and Sweden and Estonia were damaged by a Chinese vessel found nearby when the damage occurred.

Such damage has prompted British defense officials to a a new collaboration with 10 European countries across the Baltic Sea region, using artificial intelligence to monitor potential threats from ships.

There are submarine cables urgent parts of the international telecommunications infrastructure and the global economy – approx 745,000 miles of cables cross the seabed and help transmit 95% of international data, including approximately $10 trillion in financial transactions each day.

NATO officials highlighted growing threats to cables from Russia last year, noting search activity from Russian units that specialize in underwater sabotage. But the barrier to entry for sabotage is not particularly high. Russia has submarine units known to specialize in underwater sabotage, but cables have also been damaged by commercial ships simply dragging their anchors to the seabed.

And the concerns about the risk of damage to underwater cables and infrastructure are not limited to European waters. Damage just last week to cables off the coast of Taiwan left that island's officials suspecting damage from China.

“The underwater area is both difficult to defend and difficult to attack,” said Alberto Tremori, a scientist from the NATO Center for Maritime Research and Experimentation who helped oversee the NATO exercise in November “It's not easy to protect because it's a complex environment, it's a big environment.”

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