We all live in a [Russian submarine]

Echo

So here are some news from Sweden.

Thursday, October 16

• A Russian distress signal is intercepted by Swedish SIGINT.

Friday, October 17

• At around noon, an "underwater vehicle" is detected deep inside Swedish waters and Swedish military deploys assets to investigate.
• Swedish SIGINT intercepts a new encrypted transmittion on a Russian frequency, coming from the Stockholm archipelago. The signal destination is determined to be Kaliningrad, where Russia has a naval air base.
• A sketchy-looking Russian-owned oil tanker, the NS Concord, suddenly parks in the middle of the Baltic Sea. It's generally suspected that this is a ship equipped for deploying and supporting small underwater landing craft.

Saturday, October 18

• Swedish media starts reporting on the NS Concord. Very soon after this it starts to move slowly to the east, but still staying in the vicinity. Their logged destination is Denmark.

Sunday, October 19

• A Russian science wessel -- sorry, vessel, the Professor Logachev, left St Petersburg on Saturday evening, setting a course for Stockholm at maximum speed. The Professor Logachev is built for underwater exploration and mapping, has capacity for arctic diving and is frequently on loan to other nations for science purposes. At 14:30 local time it was spotted south of Åbo in international waters. The ship's owners have been contacted to ask about the ship's purpose and destination, without answers. It is currently being followed by three Dutch navy ships - the frigate Evertsen, the corvette Zeeland and the replenishment ship Amsterdam.

Swedish response

• Sweden currently has a poor submarine-hunting capability -- that part of the military was severely scaled down after the Soviet Union fell.
• There is strong evidence that Russia has converted fishing boats/oil tankers to deploy small underwater vehicles for inserting troops.
• Russia has a long history of poking around inside national waters along the Baltic Sea. See the story of U 137 from 1981 when a Soviet sub ran aground inside Swedish waters.

Trace

We all live on a Red Submarine.

RMS Oceanic

In tangent with Russian planes constantly playing the "I'm not touching you" game, I see the submarine as part of that game.

The Ender

Experts see it as very likely that Sweden will fire upon the underwater vehicle as soon as it is located.

...Which experts?

Echo

RMS Oceanic wrote: »

In tangent with Russian planes constantly playing the "I'm not touching you" game, I see the submarine as part of that game.

Yeah, there's been a lot of that lately. We've had a few cases of Russian planes inside Swedish airspace a few times, and they've been following Swedish SIGINT planes over international waters. We recently had one that followed like ten meters to the side, helpfully tilting to show its missiles.

Echo

The Ender wrote: »

Experts see it as very likely that Sweden will fire upon the underwater vehicle as soon as it is located.

...Which experts?

Ex-military commenters. I assume the guy that did sub-hunting in the 80s knows a few things.

davidsdurions

BBC says Russia denies any sketchiness.

Sounds sketchy to me.

surrealitycheck

Echo wrote: »

RMS Oceanic wrote: »

In tangent with Russian planes constantly playing the "I'm not touching you" game, I see the submarine as part of that game.

Yeah, there's been a lot of that lately. We've had a few cases of Russian planes inside Swedish airspace a few times, and they've been following Swedish SIGINT planes over international waters. We recently had one that followed like ten meters to the side, helpfully tilting to show its missiles.

thats the plane equivalent of unsolicited dick picks

report to the un!

durandal4532

I don't even understand the person-to-person dick waving.

Do you get orders from up high to remind people that every single military in the world has the capacity to down an unarmed plane?

Echo

People have reported a man dressed in black with a backpack "acting suspiciously". Säpo (Swedish security police) and MUST (Military intelligence and security service) have deployed to the area to search.

https://twitter.com/dagensnyheter/status/523824080290861056

Commenters named two likely reasons for the Russians to snoop here: a Spetsnaz drill for blowing up Swedish communications infrastructure, or the sub being there to listen in on the Dutch ships in the NATO exercise taking place recently, to record the noise from the ships, which is way easier to do in the Baltic compared to hanging out outside of Amsterdam with its massive ship traffic.

Echo

A Swedish professor in signals intelligence does some theorycrafting. He sees is as most likely that it's a Russian operation (well, duh), but the op might already be finished, or had unintended activity.

Since there's so much information about this in Swedish media, he sees it as an intentional military leak from Sweden- a psyop to stress Russia and make them react. The NS Concord started moving to the east almost immediately after Swedish media started paying attention to it.

He also sees it as possible that Russia manufactured the situation to test Swedish military reaction times.

Trace

I'll take the wingnut title and ask the obvious.

What are the chances Russia's thinking about pulling a Ukraine of some sort?

Echo

Trace wrote: »

I'll take the wingnut title and ask the obvious.

What are the chances Russia's thinking about pulling a Ukraine of some sort?

Against Sweden? Really unlikely. Sweden isn't a NATO member, but our neighbor Norway is. And Sweden practically has a golden VIP guest card for NATO.

Echo

The "underwater vessel" is probably something along these lines. Swedish military has denied that they're hunting an adult, fully-grown submarine.

davidsdurions

Is it like April Fools' Day in Sweden?

rockrnger

Here's hoping no one gets killed over something this dumb.

Echo

Another military expert dudefella comments on Russian language: they denied submarines, but Russia has a history of being very picky about the definition of a sub. That's not a sub pictured above.

Quid

Echo wrote: »

The Ender wrote: »

Experts see it as very likely that Sweden will fire upon the underwater vehicle as soon as it is located.

...Which experts?

Ex-military commenters. I assume the guy that did sub-hunting in the 80s knows a few things.

As someone also familiar with the general concept I don't find it likely unless the Swedish government is more touchy than most about this sort of thing.

RMS Oceanic

Echo wrote: »

Another military expert dudefella comments on Russian language: they denied submarines, but Russia has a history of being very picky about the definition of a sub. That's not a sub pictured above.

This year's shenanigans have shown that Russia is all about semantics.

see317

Echo wrote: »

Another military expert dudefella comments on Russian language: they denied submarines, but Russia has a history of being very picky about the definition of a sub. That's not a sub pictured above.

Well, it's obviously not underwater, so how could it be a submarine?
It's clearly some kind of prototype tank.

Echo

see317 wrote: »

Echo wrote: »

Another military expert dudefella comments on Russian language: they denied submarines, but Russia has a history of being very picky about the definition of a sub. That's not a sub pictured above.

Well, it's obviously not underwater, so how could it be a submarine?
It's clearly some kind of prototype tank.

Russia did actually have underwater vehicles with tank treads that crept along the ocean floor...

Echo

Some random blogger's wild speculation that actually sounds really plausible: they were here to put/repair wiretapping equipment on underwater cables.

Scooter

I'm still confused about this claim that they'll sink any Russian submarine they find. Surely subs are sailing through national waters all the time?

Shadowhope

RMS Oceanic wrote: »

Echo wrote: »

Another military expert dudefella comments on Russian language: they denied submarines, but Russia has a history of being very picky about the definition of a sub. That's not a sub pictured above.

This year's shenanigans have shown that Russia is all about semantics.

Definitely.

I'm sure Putin will understand that if there is a damaged sub, it should be taken to the nearest port, for safety's sake. And then, while at that Swedish port, it should be very thoroughly examined, so that the cause of the problem can be definitively identified. Every system should be inspected and documented; you never know where problems can come from. Only once the Swedes are fully satisfied in the condition of the sub and that it would be safe to return it to Russia should it be taken out of port.

OK, maybe not.

Sparvy

Scooter wrote: »

I'm still confused about this claim that they'll sink any Russian submarine they find. Surely subs are sailing through national waters all the time?

Mines and sinkbombs were used to hunt unknown subs in the 80's

But that was the cold war so who knows

Echo

If anything, the Spetsnaz on board (because who else gets these toys? Also Kaliningrad is a known base of operations for them) will blow the sub themselves and hide on land, waiting for support from sleeper agents that are known to exist in Sweden. The last thing Russia wants is for Sweden to get its hands on the sub in working condition.

It's also the Stockholm archipelago. Lots of empty summer houses out there.

Apparently Russia has been throwing tons of money at underwater military tech in recent years. This vessel might be a Triton-NN, which became available to marine Spetsnaz units 4-5 years ago.

Echo

Swedish military doing a press conference in 15minutes.

More military dudefella speculating: they were practicing approaching our underwater detection thingamabobs, in practice for actual war. He says they train on Sweden first before training on NATO bases.

Same guy says Russian submersibles like the Triton-NN have been in Swedish waters for five years and the Swedish military has known about it, but hasn't reacted, and that for some reason they decided to react this time.

Quid

Scooter wrote: »

I'm still confused about this claim that they'll sink any Russian submarine they find. Surely subs are sailing through national waters all the time?

If a sub of any kind is operating in national waters they'd presumably be known to the local government and also give a heads on where they'd be for the sake of safety.

A quick look at wikipedia says the kilo Alrosa was relocated to the Baltic fleet back in 2011. The kilos are already spectacularly difficult to find but that particular submarine is equipped with pump jet propulsion instead of a propeller which allows for quieter operation and, depending on the set up, to hover in place.

If there's a sub there I'd put my money on that one. And given it's a kilo I'd also put my money on Sweden not finding it unless that distress signal was from it being damaged.

Echo

Quid wrote: »

If there's a sub there I'd put my money on that one. And given it's a kilo I'd also put my money on Sweden not finding it unless that distress signal was from it being damaged.

Yeah, Swedish ability to hunt subs is crap right now. I'll bet we see a sudden defense budget escalation.

The Stockholm archipelago is also really horrible to find anything in - very uneven, lots of crevices a small submersible can hide in.

The Ender

The training thing sounds pretty plausible (laying down hard lines for wiretapping doesn't seem all that practical to me, nor like the sort of job you'd send a submarine out to do).


Russia's military 'training' programs are just the fucking worst.

Echo

Press conference going on. I'll give a summary later, but so far they've stated that they treat this as an intelligence-gathering operation.

Echo

• The military so far treats this as an intelligence-gathering operation, not an active submarine hunt. Marine troops are searching the coast and islands, and are authorized to fire for effect. (use more than warning shots, in Swedish military lingo.)
• It's "likely" (the second highest degree after positive confirmation) that it was "foreign underwater activity". It's a military guy and as expected they're playing by the books, and unlike media they won't speculate about the nationality without hard evidence.
• There have been visual sightings at three different locations in the Stockholm archipelago.
• They'll release a photo one of the witnesses took.
• He elaborated about the difference between an intelligence-gathering operation and an actual submarine hunt. For a submarine hunt, he listed several operative requirements that the Swedish military has discontinued. I guess that'll come up in the next defense budget...
• They have several "reliable" witnesses. They interviewed them and had them make sketches of what they saw, and decided to act on that information.
• What they're looking for can range in size from a diver using a very small "moped-like" vehicle, up to a submersible craft up to ten meters in size.

Here's a shitty pic of a shitty pic (photo of the screen at the press conference). The object was visible on the surface and then sank below the surface.



edit: less shitty pic.

Sparvy

That is some god tier "point-camera-at-wrong-object-and-get-fucked-by-auto-focus" level photography

Comradebot

Wait wait wait... Sweden, one of like... two nations (that people care about) in all of Europe to "sit out" that whole "WWII business", has folks saying "Yeah, we'll shoot at that sub if we see it!"

I don't buy it. I buy that it's chest thumping in an attempt to stand up to Russia and their Cold War 2.0 shenanigans, nothing more.

Which I think is reinforced by the whole "Yeah, we've known about it sorta thing." I don't think Sweden would dare fire on a Russian military vessel: Russia has a scary bloated military and the last time Sweden was a major player in a sizable conflict, James Madison was President of the US. Also, not in NATO and we've seen how well that played out for the Ukraine.

What they are doing is sending an international message that they're sick of this shit and letting everyone know that Russia is doing shady stuff off the waters of one of the most peaceful, unoffensive nations in the entire world. Which I guess will lead to... more economic sanctions if they don't stop dicking around, or whatever it is we're doing to Russia that Putin seemingly doesn't give two craps about?

Comradebot

Also, really Russia? You don't even share a border with Sweden! Surely you could limit your underwater hypothetical war scenarios in Scandinavia to like... Finland.

Echo

One commenter made the good point that if you want to do military dickwaving, you buzz with some bomb planes. Not with a small submersible.

The civilian sightings probably made the military decide that it was time to put the foot down.

silence1186

Every time I see a new thread about Russia, I wonder when it will get the [WW3] tag.

Kipling217

The current Swedish National defense policy is a Small Yellow Post-It Note that says "Call Nato".

They have really let themselves go in the last 20 years.

Any talk about violent action is talk for the cameras. Its a replay of :"Vår beredskap är god" (Our [state of] readiness is good) from 1939

Echo

Kipling217 wrote: »

Any talk about violent action is talk for the cameras. Its a replay of :"Vår beredskap är god" (Our [state of] readiness is good) from 1939

"Vi har förmågan att möta upp", as the current minister of defense just put it. "We have the capability to muster".

I'm doubtful.

archivistkitsune

silence1186 wrote: »

Every time I see a new thread about Russia, I wonder when it will get the [WW3] tag.

Hopefully, never. By never, I hope it doesn't even get the [WW4] tag either.

So besides this likely prompting Sweden to start putting more money towards their defense capabilities. Could this also make them start considering joining NATO? Sure they have a golden VIP card with NATO, which is better than like the 1 hour guest pass that Ukraine, may or not have or had. It's just things didn't go well for Ukraine, partly because no one really had any treaty obligations to help them out against Russia militarily.

Hevach

So, I'm wondering... Has Russia started randomly ramming other people's ships yet? Because I'm about two spots away from a full clear on my Cold War Bingo card here.