Russian submarines are prowling around vital undersea cables. It's making NATO nervous. (WP)

[dalton99a]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/russian-submarines-are-prowling-around-vital-undersea-cables-its-making-nato-nervous/2017/12/22/d4c1f3da-e5d0-11e7-927a-e72eac1e73b6_story.html
Russian submarines are prowling around vital undersea cables. It’s making NATO nervous.
By Michael Birnbaum | December 22 at 6:56 PM

BRUSSELS — Russian submarines have dramatically stepped up activity around undersea data cables in the North Atlantic, part of a more aggressive naval posture that has driven NATO to revive a Cold War-era command, according to senior military officials.

The apparent Russian focus on the cables, which provide Internet and other communications connections to North America and Europe, could give the Kremlin the power to sever or tap into vital data lines, the officials said. Russian submarine activity has increased to levels unseen since the Cold War, they said, sparking hunts in recent months for the elusive watercraft.

“We are now seeing Russian underwater activity in the vicinity of undersea cables that I don’t believe we have ever seen,” said U.S. Navy Rear Adm. Andrew Lennon, the commander of NATO’s submarine forces. “Russia is clearly taking an interest in NATO and NATO nations’ undersea infrastructure.”

Britain’s top military commander also warned that Russia could imperil the cables that form the backbone of the modern global economy. The privately owned lines, laid along the some of the same corridors as the first transatlantic telegraph wire in 1858, carry nearly all of the communications on the Internet, facilitating trillions of dollars of daily trade. If severed, they could snarl the Web. If tapped, they could give Russia a valuable picture of the tide of the world’s Internet traffic.

[Demtexan]

1. Not surprised.

Trump will tell Puten everything anyway.

[elleng]

2. 'The apparent Russian focus on the cables, which provide Internet and other communications

connections to North America and Europe, could give the Kremlin the power to sever or tap into vital data lines, the officials said. Russian submarine activity has increased to levels unseen since the Cold War, they said, sparking hunts in recent months for the elusive watercraft.'

World Cyber War I, or WW III?

[AmericanActivist]

10. Hmm, World Cyber War I a term I never

heard before but it sure fits eh. Maybe WW III is cyber? Who was it that said, I don’t know what wedpons will be used in WW III but WW IV will
Be fought with sticks and stones.”

[elleng]

13. I made up 'World Cyber War I.

Yes, maybe WW III is cyber. I can't think past that (at the moment.)

[Liberal In Texas]

3. Just great. The Ruskies have never been trustworthy.

The Soviet mindset has never been dead even after the fall the the SSR.

We are still at some kind of war, cold or otherwise.

[elleng]

4. Yes we are, it appears.

WHO can deal with it?

[Demtexan]

5. Not with what is living in the white house.

I wonder what military information has already passed on.

[elleng]

7. Maybe NATO will act. Sure won't be trump.

[Liberal In Texas]

6. Democrats. n/t

[world wide wally]

8. Here is a strange thought:

If I had read this a year ago, I would have thought to myself "Obama will get on it and fix it". Now my first thought was I hope Europe does something about it because I know trump won't.

Sad.

[elleng]

9. Gotta be Europe, or NATO+.

[dchill]

11. Torpedoes.

One Russian sub would be the warning. Good morning. Don't play near the cables.

[greytdemocrat]

31. I agree.

[DFW]

12. The EDF is being revived

With the USA now considered to be a completely unreliable partner in case of an emergency, the concept of a European Defense Force is off the drawing board and is now in the organizing stage. Merkel and Macron have both met Trump. They know they're on their own if a dire threat is posed.

I WOULD tell the Republicans, "nice going, guys," but they probably wouldn't catch my sarcasm, and say, "thank you!"

[elleng]

14. Thanks, DFW.

Will help with sleep (maybe.)

Any thoughts about a role for NATO?

[DFW]

16. There will be a role for NATO for as long as it can be taken seriously.

Turkey might become a big problem, as it's leadership is currently closer to Putin than to the rest of NATO (though Erdoğan does like Trump--more because he is useful than because he is a kindred spirit).

The EDF will essentially supplant NATO if the USA doesn't act sane again, and soon. I'm NOT clear as to how the UK would fit in to either an active EDF or an emaciated NATO. For that matter, I'm not sure the UK is, either. Much will depend on how much longer Teresa May hangs on. The EU is not enthralled with her, but they like Corbyn even less. Much of the European left sees him as an opportunistic ideologue they don't trust much more than Erdoğan.

[elleng]

18. Thanks for all the info, DFW.

[Liberal In Texas]

15. They snoop around these cables to intercept all kinds of traffic.

They've been doing it for at least 30 or 40 years. Read some James Bamford books if you're interested.

The cables carry information and data and they don't even have to splice into them like in the old days.

[DFW]

17. No, these days, they can just pick it up with the electronic version of a microphone

I don't know, but have to assume they have the same kind of "sorting" capabilities we do so they don't get overwhelmed with data, 99% of which they have no use for.

It's not really the eavesdropping that represents the biggest threat, but rather their willingness to do some serious physical disruption in the form of damaging or severing cables. They are like undersea oil pipelines--easy to blow up, but extremely complicated to repair or replace.

[C Moon]

19. We need to make sure communicating through the print world is ready at any given moment. nt

[bitterross]

20. So they're just now catching up with the NSA?

Kind of surprised it took so long.

[Sedona]

21. Why am I not surprised?

What would surprise me is if the orange blow hard actually does anything about his boss Putin threatening our national interests.

[MelissaB]

22. I posted this as well before I saw your thread.

Thanks for this!

[flotsam]

23. What kind of sneaky bastards pull this shit???

Operation Ivy Bells was a joint United States Navy, CIA, and National Security Agency (NSA) mission whose objective was to place wire taps on Soviet underwater communication lines during the Cold War.[1]

n the early 1970s the U.S. government learned of the existence of an undersea communications cable in the Sea of Okhotsk, which connected the major Soviet Pacific Fleet naval base at Petropavlovsk on the Kamchatka Peninsula to the Soviet Pacific Fleet's mainland headquarters at Vladivostok.[2]:172 At the time, the Sea of Okhotsk was claimed by the Soviet Union as territorial waters, and was strictly off limits to foreign vessels, and the Soviet Navy had installed a network of sound detection devices along the seabed to detect intruders. The area also saw numerous surface and subsurface naval exercises.

Despite these obstacles, the potential for an intelligence coup was considered too great to ignore, and in October 1971 the United States sent the purpose-modified submarine USS Halibut (SSGN-587) deep into the Sea of Okhotsk. Funds for the project were diverted secretly from the deep-submergence rescue vehicle (DSRV) program and the modified submarines were shown with fake DSRV simulators attached to them. These were early diver lock outs. Divers working from the Halibut found the cable in 400 ft (120 m) of water and installed a 20 ft (6.1 m) long device, which wrapped around the cable without piercing its casing and recorded all communications made over it. The large recording device was designed to detach if the cable was raised for repair.

Eventually, more taps were installed on Soviet lines in other parts of the world, with more advanced instruments built by AT&T's Bell Laboratories that were nuclear-powered and could store a year's worth of data.[2]:189 Other submarines were used for this role, including USS Parche (SSN-683), USS Richard B. Russell (SSN-687), and USS Seawolf (SSN-575). The Seawolf was almost lost during one of these missions—it was stranded on the bottom after a storm and almost had to use its self-destruct charges to scuttle the ship with her crew.[4]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Ivy_Bells

[Roland99]

24. Why is the WH and Congress silent on this issue of potential national security?

[disalitervisum]

25. Because we don't make public comments on submarine operations

[fescuerescue]

27. Someone isn't being silent.

Good chance it's a member of congress of the Whitehouse who leaked this.

[fescuerescue]

26. Those lines have absolutely already been tapped long ago

by all the worlds major intelligence services.

In the middle of the sea, unprotected, outside of any borders, local privacy laws and a treasure trove of intelligence? Irresistible.

Anyway, what I'm wondering is why this information is being leaked. The position of Russian subs at sea is something that only major intelligence agencies, and top government would be aware of.

[Fred Sanders]

28. Yawn. American submarines are also "prowling" around the oceans of the world. Same as it ever was.

[disalitervisum]

29. It's one thing for a NATO commander to talk about Soviet submarine activity

quite another for anyone in our own community to describe tactical ops of US submarines.

[bitterross]

30. Were they nervous when US subs did the same thing?

You know the NSA/CIA have been there too!