athenasius
Well-Known Member
As Garak the spy, a fictional character on the TV series Deep Space Nine once famously observed: "I believe in coincidences. Coincidences happen every day. But I don't trust coincidences."
And neither do I but I don't draw immediate conclusions either. These coincidences are piling up and may or may not be linked.
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-63326102 -- in which we learn that not one but TWO undersea cables are damaged in a mysterious incident last week that Nicola Sturgeon the first minister said "was accidental, adding: "There is nothing to suggest otherwise, but work is continuing to assess exactly what the cause of the problem has been."
Accidental but they don't know for sure. Here's a clue. One maybe but two? In very far apart areas no less.
Another official blames fishing boats "The cable that was damaged between Faroe and Shetland last week will be repaired on Saturday, according to Faroese Telecom's head of infrastructure Páll Vesturbú.
He said: "The damage is affecting most of telecom services to Shetland. There are some services still working but we will try to establish more services during the day if that's possible.
"We expect it will be fishing vessels that damaged the cable but it is very rare that we have two problems at the same time."
Yes very rare that 2 boats in different locations would suddenly have the same accident affecting vital communications undersea cables.
now
Lets go to the south of France where this is reported 3 days ago
https://www.brusselstimes.com/311704/fibre-optic-cable-sabotage-causes-global-internet-slowdown
and here again the mystery deepens because "In the early hours of 18 October, a cable was cut at a major landing point for several undersea internet cables, causing a chain reaction of connectivity problems across Europe and further afield. Connectivity was especially disrupted on internet cable between Marseille-Lyon, Marseille-Milan, and Marseille-Barcelona.
According to Zscaler CEO Jay Chaudhry, the vandalism caused connectivity problems across the world. “We are aware of a major cable cut in the South of France that has impacted major subsea cables with connectivity to Asia, Europe, US, and potentially other parts of the world… Customers may see packet loss and or latency for websites and applications which traverse these impacted paths,” Chaudhry told CNN."
going back in time a little to early January-- Jan 6 of 2022, this year off the waters of Norway! https://thebarentsobserver.com/en/s...man-activity-behind-svalbard-cable-disruption
In which some unknown human activity results in the Svalbard Cable being cut. Who cares we wonder? It's a remote, really remote Arctic Island chain deep in the Arctic Circle off the coast of Norway.
Well actually this article mentions a 2021 cable cutting that affected various submarine observation posts and keeps track of subs going in and out of the area. And it connects some of the dots-- I've bolded the important bits below.
https://www.highnorthnews.com/en/nord-stream-pipeline-sabotage-mirrors-svalbard-cable-incident.
"From cables to pipelines
The sabotage of the two pipelines is not the only incident during which critical subsea infrastructure was damaged.
At the beginning of 2022 a Norwegian communications fiber optics cable, the most northerly cable of its kind in the world, connecting the Svalbard Satellite Station with more than 100 satellite antennas to the mainland, was cut.
The station is of crucial importance as it is one of only two in the world which can communicate with satellites in polar orbits. The Svalbard Undersea Cable System runs for more than 1,300km between Longyearbyen and Andøya in northern Norway.
A few months earlier, in 2021, cables part of the Lofoten-Vesterålen (LoVe) Ocean Observatory, a network of undersea sensors, were also cut, raising concerns about deliberate sabotage.
Aside from scientific applications, such as the monitoring of emissions and fish stocks, the network is also used to collect data on passing submarines, including those of Russia’s Northern Fleet coming out of or entering the Arctic.
As part of the incident several nodes – research platforms – had been moved and the cables connecting them were either damaged or missing.
For now, some security experts say, it is too early to draw connections between this week’s pipeline sabotage and the earlier cable incidents, but as more information becomes known this may change.
“I am afraid that we do not have enough data and facts on the table to say anything for sure. But it is a good question and if it is confirmed that it was Russia then it would be possible to draw some similarities. We need to wait however to see what the preliminary findings are,” cautions Katarzyna Zysk, Professor of international relations and contemporary history at the Norwegian Institute for Defence Studies (IFS).
However, normally subsea infrastructure very rarely gets damaged naturally. Thus the fact that these normally rare events occurred within a relatively short time span raises questions in itself.
“While there are multiple plausible explanations, these types of events are quite rare. To see a cluster of human-caused damages to subsurface critical infrastructure of NATO allies certainly raises questions,” concluded Pincus."
YES INDEED IT DOES!
and of course I followed up on the 2021 incident as reported here in the link from the article above. https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zo...lance-network-had-its-cables-mysteriously-cut where we can read more about what that means.
And not surprisingly that goes back to a time before that when one of the Northern fleet of Russia's subs had a terrible fire. The Losharik incident. as reported by the New York Times here: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/20/world/europe/russian-submarine-fire-losharik.html from April 20, 2020 Updated April 21, 2020
I remember this because we had a thread on it in the Gog Magog section, and it was fascinating hearing the tidbits that leaked out of Russia because this was a new class of subs that Russia was heavily investing in, with the capability of
DEEP SEA DIVES and missions that potentially could cut UNDERWATER CABLES and of course pipelines or anything else they wanted to interfere with.
as the Times points out here:
"The only thing more mysterious than what exactly went wrong that day is what the sub was doing in a thousand feet of water just 60 nautical miles east of Norway in the first place.
The extraordinary incident may offer yet another clue to Russia’s military ambitions in the deep sea, and how they figure into a plan to leverage Arctic naval power to achieve its strategic goals around the globe — including the ability to choke off vital international communication channels at will.
Moscow has been unforthcoming about the Losharik disaster, and insists that the sub was merely a research vessel. The Norwegian military, whose observation posts, navy and surveillance aircraft track Russia’s Northern Fleet for NATO, refuses to say what it may have seen. The only civilian witnesses to the rescue that followed the fire may have been a ragtag band of Russians fishing illegally in the area.
But it was clearly a mission of the highest sensitivity, and the roster of the dead included some of the most decorated and experienced officers of the Russian submarine corps.
To understand why these men may have found themselves on a submarine that can dive to perhaps 20,000 feet — more than 10 times deeper than crewed American subs are believed to operate — consider what crisscrosses the floor of the North Atlantic: endless miles of fiber-optic cables that carry a large fraction of the world’s internet traffic, including trillions of dollars in financial transactions. There are also cables linking the sonar listening devices that litter the ocean floor.
Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin, and his commanders have increasingly stressed the importance of controlling the flow of information to keep the upper hand in a conflict, said Katarzyna Zysk, head of the Center for Security Policy at the Norwegian Institute for Defense Studies in Oslo.
No matter where in the world a conflict might be brewing, cutting those undersea cables, Professor Zysk said, might force an adversary to think twice before risking an escalation of the dispute.
“The Russian understanding is that the level of unacceptable damage is much lower in Europe and the West than during the Cold War,” she said. “So you might not have to do too much.”
Not just any submarine can do that — at least, not across nearly the entire expanse of the sea bottom.
But the Losharik is not just any submarine."
It goes on to explain a bit about why it can dive and work so deep.
I could say more but I think these coincidences speak for themselves.
And neither do I but I don't draw immediate conclusions either. These coincidences are piling up and may or may not be linked.
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-63326102 -- in which we learn that not one but TWO undersea cables are damaged in a mysterious incident last week that Nicola Sturgeon the first minister said "was accidental, adding: "There is nothing to suggest otherwise, but work is continuing to assess exactly what the cause of the problem has been."
Accidental but they don't know for sure. Here's a clue. One maybe but two? In very far apart areas no less.
Another official blames fishing boats "The cable that was damaged between Faroe and Shetland last week will be repaired on Saturday, according to Faroese Telecom's head of infrastructure Páll Vesturbú.
He said: "The damage is affecting most of telecom services to Shetland. There are some services still working but we will try to establish more services during the day if that's possible.
"We expect it will be fishing vessels that damaged the cable but it is very rare that we have two problems at the same time."
Yes very rare that 2 boats in different locations would suddenly have the same accident affecting vital communications undersea cables.
now
Lets go to the south of France where this is reported 3 days ago
https://www.brusselstimes.com/311704/fibre-optic-cable-sabotage-causes-global-internet-slowdown
and here again the mystery deepens because "In the early hours of 18 October, a cable was cut at a major landing point for several undersea internet cables, causing a chain reaction of connectivity problems across Europe and further afield. Connectivity was especially disrupted on internet cable between Marseille-Lyon, Marseille-Milan, and Marseille-Barcelona.
According to Zscaler CEO Jay Chaudhry, the vandalism caused connectivity problems across the world. “We are aware of a major cable cut in the South of France that has impacted major subsea cables with connectivity to Asia, Europe, US, and potentially other parts of the world… Customers may see packet loss and or latency for websites and applications which traverse these impacted paths,” Chaudhry told CNN."
going back in time a little to early January-- Jan 6 of 2022, this year off the waters of Norway! https://thebarentsobserver.com/en/s...man-activity-behind-svalbard-cable-disruption
In which some unknown human activity results in the Svalbard Cable being cut. Who cares we wonder? It's a remote, really remote Arctic Island chain deep in the Arctic Circle off the coast of Norway.
Well actually this article mentions a 2021 cable cutting that affected various submarine observation posts and keeps track of subs going in and out of the area. And it connects some of the dots-- I've bolded the important bits below.
https://www.highnorthnews.com/en/nord-stream-pipeline-sabotage-mirrors-svalbard-cable-incident.
"From cables to pipelines
The sabotage of the two pipelines is not the only incident during which critical subsea infrastructure was damaged.
At the beginning of 2022 a Norwegian communications fiber optics cable, the most northerly cable of its kind in the world, connecting the Svalbard Satellite Station with more than 100 satellite antennas to the mainland, was cut.
The station is of crucial importance as it is one of only two in the world which can communicate with satellites in polar orbits. The Svalbard Undersea Cable System runs for more than 1,300km between Longyearbyen and Andøya in northern Norway.
A few months earlier, in 2021, cables part of the Lofoten-Vesterålen (LoVe) Ocean Observatory, a network of undersea sensors, were also cut, raising concerns about deliberate sabotage.
Aside from scientific applications, such as the monitoring of emissions and fish stocks, the network is also used to collect data on passing submarines, including those of Russia’s Northern Fleet coming out of or entering the Arctic.
As part of the incident several nodes – research platforms – had been moved and the cables connecting them were either damaged or missing.
For now, some security experts say, it is too early to draw connections between this week’s pipeline sabotage and the earlier cable incidents, but as more information becomes known this may change.
“I am afraid that we do not have enough data and facts on the table to say anything for sure. But it is a good question and if it is confirmed that it was Russia then it would be possible to draw some similarities. We need to wait however to see what the preliminary findings are,” cautions Katarzyna Zysk, Professor of international relations and contemporary history at the Norwegian Institute for Defence Studies (IFS).
However, normally subsea infrastructure very rarely gets damaged naturally. Thus the fact that these normally rare events occurred within a relatively short time span raises questions in itself.
“While there are multiple plausible explanations, these types of events are quite rare. To see a cluster of human-caused damages to subsurface critical infrastructure of NATO allies certainly raises questions,” concluded Pincus."
YES INDEED IT DOES!
and of course I followed up on the 2021 incident as reported here in the link from the article above. https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zo...lance-network-had-its-cables-mysteriously-cut where we can read more about what that means.
And not surprisingly that goes back to a time before that when one of the Northern fleet of Russia's subs had a terrible fire. The Losharik incident. as reported by the New York Times here: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/20/world/europe/russian-submarine-fire-losharik.html from April 20, 2020 Updated April 21, 2020
I remember this because we had a thread on it in the Gog Magog section, and it was fascinating hearing the tidbits that leaked out of Russia because this was a new class of subs that Russia was heavily investing in, with the capability of
DEEP SEA DIVES and missions that potentially could cut UNDERWATER CABLES and of course pipelines or anything else they wanted to interfere with.
as the Times points out here:
"The only thing more mysterious than what exactly went wrong that day is what the sub was doing in a thousand feet of water just 60 nautical miles east of Norway in the first place.
The extraordinary incident may offer yet another clue to Russia’s military ambitions in the deep sea, and how they figure into a plan to leverage Arctic naval power to achieve its strategic goals around the globe — including the ability to choke off vital international communication channels at will.
Moscow has been unforthcoming about the Losharik disaster, and insists that the sub was merely a research vessel. The Norwegian military, whose observation posts, navy and surveillance aircraft track Russia’s Northern Fleet for NATO, refuses to say what it may have seen. The only civilian witnesses to the rescue that followed the fire may have been a ragtag band of Russians fishing illegally in the area.
But it was clearly a mission of the highest sensitivity, and the roster of the dead included some of the most decorated and experienced officers of the Russian submarine corps.
To understand why these men may have found themselves on a submarine that can dive to perhaps 20,000 feet — more than 10 times deeper than crewed American subs are believed to operate — consider what crisscrosses the floor of the North Atlantic: endless miles of fiber-optic cables that carry a large fraction of the world’s internet traffic, including trillions of dollars in financial transactions. There are also cables linking the sonar listening devices that litter the ocean floor.
Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin, and his commanders have increasingly stressed the importance of controlling the flow of information to keep the upper hand in a conflict, said Katarzyna Zysk, head of the Center for Security Policy at the Norwegian Institute for Defense Studies in Oslo.
No matter where in the world a conflict might be brewing, cutting those undersea cables, Professor Zysk said, might force an adversary to think twice before risking an escalation of the dispute.
“The Russian understanding is that the level of unacceptable damage is much lower in Europe and the West than during the Cold War,” she said. “So you might not have to do too much.”
Not just any submarine can do that — at least, not across nearly the entire expanse of the sea bottom.
But the Losharik is not just any submarine."
It goes on to explain a bit about why it can dive and work so deep.
I could say more but I think these coincidences speak for themselves.
