cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/6252199
[UK] General Sir Gwyn Jenkins, the first sea lord, [said] that Moscow was renewing investment in the Main Directorate of Deep-Sea Research (GUGI) team and that Britain could not afford to ignore the threat posed by Russia’s advanced underwater capabilities, which were “improving all the time”.
The unit of expert submariners is responsible for mapping and potentially disrupting seabed infrastructure — such as internet cables and gas pipelines — on which Britain and its Nato allies rely for communications and power supplies.
“We’ve seen GUGI’s subsurface capabilities restarting,” Jenkins said in an interview. “We know that they’ve had some issues with that programme. It appears that they have reset that programme. So we’re expecting them to deploy again.”
GUGI can operate submersibles at extreme depths, which “gives [Moscow] the option for physical action, if they want it,” he added.
While GUGI has been conducting underwater missions for several decades, its actions are highly classified and UK naval chiefs have, until recently, refused to acknowledge its existence or discuss what they know of its activities.
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Jenkins — who was appointed first sea lord and chief of the naval staff in May this year — declined to say exactly what “physical action” by GUGI might constitute.
But naval experts have suggested that Moscow could plant explosives at the nodes where cables meet.
“You have an aggressive regime with an acknowledged capability, an acknowledged desire to implement sabotage and transition towards points of tension, and you have a facility that enables them to go to depths with submersibles on mapped infrastructure that is sensitive to us,” Jenkins said. “That doesn’t seem like a good combination to me.”
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“The Russians continue to invest in these [naval] capabilities, and they’re improving all the time . . . we should take that threat very seriously, because the comfort that we take from being an island that is separated from continental Europe is a false comfort,” added Jenkins.
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His comments come as spies and defence chiefs have drawn attention to the increasing threat of Russian sabotage in the UK and across Europe.
In her first public remarks since taking the helm of the Secret Intelligence Service in October, MI6 chief Blaise Metreweli last week accused Moscow of “testing” Britain with “grey zone” activities including state-sponsored sabotage, cyber attacks and drone harassment at airports and military bases.
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