Russia orchestrating sabotage attacks at European arms plants to sow discord: Report

Russia has launched a fresh wave of attacks on weapons factories and other defence industry facilities across Europe under the guise of ‘plausible deniability’, according to Western intelligence sources, reported the Telegraph.

The intelligence sources believe that the Kremlin is recruiting local criminal gang members in European nations to sabotage their defence manufacturing units to test NATO’s resolve. The sabotage attacks are organised in such a way that it is very difficult to establish a link between the perpetrators and Moscow.

The attacks appear carefully calculated to fall just short of triggering Article 5, NATO’s mutual defence clause, intelligence officials believe.

Latvia detains three for arson attack at Ukraine supplier

This week, Latvia detained three of its own nationals on suspicion of an arson attack against a drone manufacturer in neighbouring Estonia after a building housing Milrem Robotics, a Tallinn-based firm that supplies weapons to Ukraine, was set ablaze on the night of Aug 14-15.

The firm is among the two foreign suppliers of unmanned ground vehicles to Kyiv’s armed forces.

Estonia’s Prime Minister Kristen Michal said investigators were looking into whether it was an act of sabotage and if Russia was involved.

In recent years, Russia has accelerated its destabilisation campaigns against allies through cyberattacks, assassination attempts and acts of sabotage, said a NATO official, adding,

“These actions by the Kremlin are aimed at escalating tensions among allies and deterring support for Kyiv.”

Spate of unexplained attacks across Europe since full-scale invasion of Ukraine

There has been a steady stream of unexplained attacks across Europe since Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, point out intelligence sources.

Besides the Estonian arson incident, there have been explosions at major arms manufacturers in both Italy and Bulgaria this month.

Earlier this year, a fire virtually destroyed a Czech plant making drones and thermal optics for Ukraine. Four suspects were detained as part of the investigation into Russian involvement.

Lithuania also charged six people for an attempt to burn down a factory supplying radio-wave scanners to Kyiv.

On August 10, a major explosion ripped through a plant belonging to EMCO, one of Bulgaria’s largest private arms manufacturers, which produces 155mm artillery ammunition for Ukraine.

The blaze was triggered by a fire in a lorry parked near a storage warehouse.

On August 13, a blast rocked a munitions factory operated by KNDS Ammo Italy in Colleferro on the outskirts of Rome.

The cause of the explosion was said to be a so-far unexplained fire that had broken out in a gunpowder processing unit.

‘GRU cultivating sources within criminal gangs in target nations’

In all cases, there was hardly any evidence to link the attacks directly to Moscow.

A previous Western intelligence assessment reported earlier by the Telegraph explained how Russia’s GRU military intelligence agency, known for its foreign soil attacks using highly trained agents, had since turned to using criminal gangs.

GRU officers are cultivating sources within criminal gangs to act as intermediaries in the targeted country through online messaging apps like Telegram.

These middlemen then hand out local tasks to recruits, who are paid in cryptocurrency and often never know that they are working for the Russians.

The covert nature of the attacks is seen as a deliberate ploy to sow discord amongst NATO allies.

Eastern member states, like Poland or the Baltic states, have been far more vocal in calling out Russia’s aggression in Europe.

However, countries further west, like Italy and Germany, are not inclined to attribute the sabotage incidents to Moscow over fears of an escalation.