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| Caucasus/Russia/Central Asia | |
| Russia's Shadow War Against the West | |
| 2025-10-12 | |
| [CSIS] Russia is conducting an escalating and violent campaign of sabotage and subversion against European and U.S. targets in Europe led by Russian military intelligence (the GRU), according to a new CSIS database of Russian activity. The number of Russian attacks nearly tripled between 2023 and 2024. Russia’s primary targets have included transportation, government, critical infrastructure, and industry, and its main weapons and tactics have included explosives, blunt or edged instruments (such as anchors), and electronic attack. Despite the increase in Russian attacks, Western countries have not developed an effective strategy to counter these attacks. INTRODUCTION Russia is engaged in an aggressive campaign of subversion and sabotage against European and U.S. targets, which complement Russia’s brutal conventional war in Ukraine. The number of Russian attacks in Europe nearly tripled between 2023 and 2024, after quadrupling between 2022 and 2023. Russia’s military intelligence service, the Main Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation (or GRU), was likely responsible for many of these attacks, either directly by their own officers or indirectly through recruited agents. The GRU and other Russian intelligence agencies frequently recruited local assets to plan and execute sabotage and subversion missions. Other operations relied on Russia’s "shadow fleet," commercial ships used to circumvent Western sanctions, for undersea attacks. The data indicate that Russia poses a serious threat to the United States and Europe and that the Russian government, including President Vladimir Putin, cannot be trusted. Roughly 27 percent of the attacks were against transportation targets (such as trains, vehicles, and airplanes), another 27 percent were against government targets (such as military bases and officials), 21 percent were against critical infrastructure targets (such as pipelines, undersea fiber-optic cables, and the electricity grid), and 21 percent were against industry (such as defense companies). Many of these targets had links to Western aid to Ukraine, such as companies producing or shipping weapons and other matériel to Ukraine. Russia also used a variety of weapons and tactics. The most common (35 percent) involved explosives and incendiaries. Other weapons and tactics included blunt or edged instruments (27 percent), such as anchors used to cut undersea fiber-optic cables; electronic attack (15 percent); and the weaponization of illegal immigrants (8 percent). The increase in attacks indicates that the West has failed to coerce Russia from stopping its campaign of sabotage and subversion. Russian attacks are not just a European problem, but a U.S. problem as well. The GRU and other organizations have conducted operations against U.S. targets, such as U.S. bases in Germany. The United States and European countries, including the European Union and NATO, have largely focused on defensive measures to counter Russian actions, such as sharing intelligence and strengthening resilience (including cyber defense). While these efforts are necessary, they are not sufficient. NATO countries should develop a calibrated offensive campaign against Russia that includes several components: escalating sanctions against Moscow; targeted offensive cyber operations against important Russian military and commercial targets; information and influence operations targeting the populations of Russia and its partners, such as Belarus; and more aggressive actions against assets valuable to Russia, such as its shadow fleet. In short, NATO should design a campaign to escalate the costs on Russia should the country continue such operations. To better understand Russian actions, this brief asks several questions. What are Russian objectives in conducting these attacks? What are the main tactics and targets of Russian actions? And what should the United States and other Western countries do to better deter and counter Russian activity? To answer these questions, the analysis utilizes several sources of data. Most importantly, it builds and analyzes a database of Russian destructive attacks and plots between January 2022 and March 2025, including date, location, target, weapon, and other information.1 In addition, it supplements this database with an overview of historical Russian and Soviet activity. It also utilizes data from other sources, such as CSIS’s database of hundreds of cyber incidents since 2006. Finally, it uses information from interviews with U.S. and European government officials. The recent explosion at the munitions plant in Tennessee needs further examination. Did intelligence intercepts prompt the Hegseth meeting with the nation's top military leaders ?
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| Posted by:Besoeker |
| #1 |
| Posted by: Grom the Affective 2025-10-12 01:06 |