Journal on Baltic Security

This article explains the importance of the underwater critical infrastructure as a domain of hybrid warfare operations and the setting for increasing strategic competition. In addition, the article highlights the growing need for NATO and European Union (EU) defense cooperation in this area, particularly to respond to the strategic ambitions of the Russian Federation and its strategic partnership with China as revisionist powers. Taking a pragmatic case study approach, the article evaluates Russia’s current maritime doctrine and characteristic cases of undersea hybrid tactics with several operational examples of Russia’s undersea sabotage capabilities. This leads to outlining the emerging NATO–EU inter-organizational defense cooperation in protecting undersea infrastructure. The article concludes with policy advice that the Baltic states, as small open-to-sea member states, should take an active interest in the capability development of the undersea infrastructure protection in both NATO and EU formats.

This article addresses the hybrid challenges to the maritime security of the European Union. While hybrid threat issues are generally extensively reported in scientific literature, the authors point out that their integration with EU maritime safety issues represents a novel study strategy. The article contends that the maritime space is crucial for the prosperity and safety of EU Member States. The authors suggest potential applications for using the maritime environment as a site for hybrid impacts. The results of the conducted research are essential in determining the directions in which EU security and safety policy and those of the various Member States will develop. Attention to the possibility of using maritime spaces for hybrid warfare is a necessary condition for an effective response. Proper threat identification requires monitoring and cooperation of many actors.

Meanwhile, energy security is threatened in new domains - maritime and cyber. In the maritime domain, military operations target construction works of the new objects as well as operating interconnectors, cables, LNG terminals, and other strategic assets. Regular situational awareness in the Baltic Sea region is lacking, as is sufficient naval and civilian maritime cooperation. In the cyber realm attacks become more frequent and more complex, critical infrastructure being the main target. As cyber security expertise and exercise are lacking and integration into European natural gas and electricity systems is not completed, blackout scenario in Baltic States remains possible.