Eagle S, the Russia-linked tanker suspected of damaging an underwater electricity cable on Christmas Day, was kitted out with special transmitting and receiving devices that were used to monitor naval activity, according to a source with direct involvement in the ship, which has since been detained by Finnish police
The ship in question MIGHT have had some equipment on board at SOME POINT in time. As of now it’s unclear if the devices are still on board and even if they are on the ship we don’t know if they’re packed in crates or wired to power and antennas. And even if it had, it might have legitimate uses and carrying a load like this is not in itself illegal.
And the source is pretty much ‘some guy told us so’. So, as a fellow Finn, I’m glad that our officers are up to their task and the ship is secured for further investigation, mostly regarding to damaged electric and data lines and I trust that they do a proper search and report accordingly at some point.
But right now this James Bond-stuff is getting far more news articles than it deserves. For that headline alone I can understand why it gets traction, our local news very much included, but there’s very little meat on the story at least for now.
Fucking Vatnik
It probably has something to do with the fact that this is at least the second, I think it might be the third, Russia-affiliated ship that has intentionally cut undersea data cables within the past year.
It’s actually 4 in the last 2 years. There was also a gas pipeline damaged in October of 2023 in addition to 2 data cables about a month ago.
Of course it does. But the others were (legally speaking) just suspicions and the vessels in question weren’t in Finnish waters, so there was only so much our officials could legally do (and one could pretty strongly argue that they should’ve done more).
But on this particular case with a whole cargo ship apparently filled to brim with spying equipment, there’s very little hard facts on the story and the best approach would be to wait until our officials conduct their search and write reports. Then, after official and confirmed facts, we can discuss about it further. Right now spreading news like this doesn’t really cause anything more than even more distruption to global situation which is already a pretty complex mess.
And even the ‘russia links’, on this individual case, are a bit thin line to walk. Assuming russians are behind it (and I would be the least surprised if that was actually proven) they’ve hidden their tracs pretty well, so now it’s only a domestic tool for them: “Look how the Finnish people among others doubt us for everyting even if we’ve done nothing and there’s a paper trail to prove it”. Facts are the hard currency with the information war going on, and this is not it.
And, as I’ve got decent chunk of downvotes on previous comment, I would very much like to see the Russian federation to collapse eventually and for the situation in Ukraine to smooth out, but on their own terms. Should Ukraine fall I’m afraid we’d be the next to defend our borders and I’m too old for that shit. I’ll of course do my part should the need rise, but I’m not looking forward on it. I’ve spoken to enough of our veterans to know that the saying ‘war is war and hell is hell, and the first one is way worse’ is a fact and I don’t want my kids to experience that.