Intentional Or Not, the Shadow Fleet Is a Problem

The question of intentionality does not change the need to deal with the hazards posed by the Russian shadow fleet. It does not fundamentally change European countries' response options either.

The past couple days have seen a heated debate over whether the three incidents of damage to undersea cables in the Baltic Sea since fall 2023 have likely been accidents or intentional sabotage. The issue flamed up after the Washington Post published an article citing anonymous US and European intelligence sources, saying that a consensus was forming in the intelligence community that these incidents were, in fact, accidents, not acts of sabotage.

What has been said about the WaPo article since then:

• Sami Liimatainen, lead investigator at the Finnish National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) in the latest Eagle S case, which the NBI is investigating as “aggravated sabotage”, said he had not heard such claims before.

• Jukka Savolainen, ex-Commander West Finland Coast Guard District and now expert at the European Centre for Excellence for Countering Hybrid Threats, dismissed the idea of accidents as an agenda benefiting only Russia and pointed out, as many other experts have done (including in the original WaPo article), that it is impossible to drag an anchor for over 100km unnoticed, as was the case with the Eagle S ship.

• The Norwegian VG confirmed the WaPo claims from what seems to be the same Allied intelligence sources and cites an anonymous Norwegian official saying that it would be counterintuitive for Russia to risk any disturbance to its oil export operation, which provides crucial funding for its war in Ukraine.

• The Finnish Helsingin Sanomat reported that according to (again anonymous) sources, the Finnish Security and Intelligence Service (Supo) has so far not found proof that Russia is linked to the incident and the NBI has not found proof of intentionality either - so far. The investigation continues, however, and the NBI is currently going through the crew’s communication devices.

• Swedish authorities remain skeptical of the accident theory. Minister of Defence Pål Jonson dismissed the WaPo article as claims that “come and go” and emphasized that the investigation is still ongoing. The Swedish lead investigator, public prosecutor Henrik Söderman agreed with Jonson. Hans Liwång, professor at the Swedish Defence University, points out that it has been proven in all three cases (NewNew Polar Bear in October 2023, Yi Peng 3 in November 2024 and Eagle S in December 2024) that it was the ship in question that broke the cables with its anchor. Whether it was deliberate or accidental is, however, much harder to prove.

The main question is whether intentionality really matters. It has been proven beyond any reasonable doubt that Russia does use the shadow fleet to circumvent Western sanctions, which in itself is a problem that needs to be tackled. It is also a fact that the shadow fleet’s rusty ships pose a grave environmental, navigational and infrastructure hazard in the Baltic Sea. Granted, the increased number of incidents in a short period of time could be attributed to the fact that the shadow fleet has expanded since 2022 as Russia’s response to Western sanctions. The ships are in a bad condition and tend to have loose anchors, so increased traffic can increase the number of accidents. But intentional or not, causing such damage to critical maritime infrastructure is unacceptable and requires robust countermeasures. As Johannes Koskinen, head of the Foreign Affairs Committee at the Finnish Parliament points out, the magnitude of damage caused by Eagle S amounts at least to gross negligence and thus comes close to the threshold of intentionality. Koskinen also says that it is unlikely to get a confession from the crew in the normal criminal investigation.

It cannot come as a surprise to anybody if the Finnish investigation of the Eagle S incident finally has to conclude that there is no evidence to prove intentionality and the case is closed as accident rather than sabotage. It is also unlikely that Russia can be directly linked to the incident. Nevertheless, by way of using the shadow fleet, Russia is responsible. And the question of intentionality does not fundamentally change anything regarding the need to deal with the hazards posed by the shadow fleet, or even the response options. In any case, legal measures have to be found to restrict the poorly maintained and insured ships’ access to the Baltic Sea or at least to carefully monitor their movements and stop any strange manoeuvres (this Finnish news article traced the very curious movements of the Eagle S in the past two years, including around military zones and NATO exercises). In that sense, even NATO’s Baltic Sentry operation is not an overreaction, as better situational awareness and monitoring capacity is urgently needed due to the frequent manipulation of the ships’ AIS signal, which has already led to a number of close calls in the Gulf of Finland. The swift Finnish reaction to confiscate Eagle S and detain its crew was also the right call, as it causes costs or at the very least, a delay, which is a warning to other similar ships operating in the Baltic Sea.

The debate caused by the WaPo article is essentially a storm in a teacup, as lack of evidence of intentionality does not give European governments a free pass. Deniability is an important part of the whole operation and it is unlikely that Finnish authorities will find such conclusive evidence that they can pin intention on the crew and tie it to Russia. But it is equally unlikely that the public will believe that everything has been a pure coincidence. Finding effective countermeasures to Russia’s sanction circumventing scheme is crucial either way, for the Baltic and North Sea and for Ukraine.