While the world was watching U.S. forces’ spectacular kidnapping of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, dramatic happenings were unfolding in the Baltic Sea and its Gulf of Finland arm, too. But with Venezuela holding the world’s attention, few people paid any mind to the Baltic Sea. That’s a pity, because within the course of less than a week, six cables were mauled there. After a yearlong hiatus, the cable-cutting specter appears to have returned. Now, with NATO distracted by a crisis over Greenland, the question is what Western states can do about these attacks.

The United States’ Jan. 3 intervention in Venezuela was an operation perfectly suited to television: explosions; darkness; and low-flying helicopters carrying troops who descended, seized Maduro and his wife, and whisked them out of the country. No wonder large chunks of the world could think and speak of nothing else.

While the world was watching U.S. forces’ spectacular kidnapping of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, dramatic happenings were unfolding in the Baltic Sea and its Gulf of Finland arm, too. But with Venezuela holding the world’s attention, few people paid any mind to the Baltic Sea. That’s a pity, because within the course of less than a week, six cables were mauled there. After a yearlong hiatus, the cable-cutting specter appears to have returned. Now, with NATO distracted by a crisis over Greenland, the question is what Western states can do about these attacks.

The United States’ Jan. 3 intervention in Venezuela was an operation perfectly suited to television: explosions; darkness; and low-flying helicopters carrying troops who descended, seized Maduro and his wife, and whisked them out of the country. No wonder large chunks of the world could think and speak of nothing else.

On the other side of the world, a completely different drama was unfolding. On Dec. 31, a data cable connecting Finland and Estonia malfunctioned, and it quickly became clear that it had been struck by an external object. The Finnish and Estonian authorities quickly identified the likely perpetrator among the ships navigating the Gulf of Finland: the St. Vincent and the Grenadines-flagged cargo vessel Fitburg, which was en route from the Russian port of St. Petersburg to Haifa, Israel, and had been on top of the cable when it stopped working. What’s more, the Finnish authorities could see that the ship appeared to be dragging its anchor.

In a swift operation, the Finnish Border Guard approached the suspect, which had crossed  into Finland’s exclusive economic zone from Estonia’s, and instructed it to enter Finnish territorial waters. (Finland is the sort of country that abides by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.) As soon as the Fitburg crossed into territorial waters, a Finnish helicopter appeared, from which police officers descended and took control of the ship. It had indeed been dragging its anchor.

The authorities detained both the ship and its crew—seafarers from Russia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, and Azerbaijan. Finnish President Alexander Stubb tweeted about the matter, the police, the customs authority, and the border guard held a press conference.

In October 2023, when a cable and pipeline in the Gulf of Finland were hit by the Chinese-owned box shipNewnew Polar Bear, such a swift and resolute response was inconceivable. Since then, regular cable incidents have made the Baltic Sea nations more experienced and vastly more coordinated.

But there was another thing about the Fitburg’s New Year’s journey through the Gulf of Finland: a second cable had been mauled, too. It belonged to the Swedish company Arelion, which saw one of its cables struck during the Newnew Polar Bear’s destructive journey in October 2023. (More about this and other incidents in my upcoming book, The Undersea War.) The Fitburg had, in fact, been dragging its anchor for several hours when the Finnish authorities detained it.

That hardly looked accidental, especially considering the enormous attention that the Baltic Sea cable-cutting series that began with the Newnew Polar Bear has received.

Not knowing that one’s ship was dragging its anchor is hardly a believable excuse after several high-profile incidents in which crews have claimed such ignorance. After the shadow tanker Eagle Scut five cables on Christmas Day in 2024, the Baltic Sea nations and NATO rapidly created new procedures. They established Baltic Sentry, essentially a patrol-and-alarm function on the Baltic Sea. They created Nordic Warden, an artificial intelligence detection system. They’d already improved information sharing.

It seemed to work. Since the Eagle S massacre in the Gulf of Finland, no anchors had been accidentally dragged across the Baltic seabed for months. “From the beginning of Baltic Sentry, nothing has happened. So this means that this deterrence is working,” Adm. Giuseppe Cavo Dragone, NATO’s top military officer, told the Financial Times in November 2025.

Until New Year’s. The trouble didn’t just concern the two cables cut on New Year’s Eve. Three cables had been damaged in the preceding few days. The authorities thought this might be weather-related, but nobody was sure; the weather during those days hadn’t been especially severe.

On Jan. 3, a cable connecting Lithuania and Latvia (from where it travels on to Estonia) also broke. The Latvian authorities responded quickly, identifying and detaining the ship that seemed to have caused the break. The crew was cooperative, which was a positive sign: Cable saboteurs would hardly cooperate with the local authorities. But it turned out to be the wrong ship. The Latvians are still looking for the suspect. The Finns, meanwhile, have arrested one of the Fitburg’s crew members, an Azerbaijani, and imposed a travel ban on two others.

All told, six cables malfunctioned in the Baltic Sea around New Year’s. Even if bad weather was the culprit in one or two of the cases, that’s a serious situation. In fact, this appears to be the first-ever case of six cables being crippled within days in the very same waters. Evidence against the three crew members of the Fitburg, whose owner is an Azerbaijani with close links to Russia, is clearly strong, and suspects in the other cases may yet emerge. After nearly a year of apparent undersea calm in the Baltic Sea, the cable-cutting specter has returned.

That has practical effects, because even in the cable-rich Baltic Sea, being six cables down is a serious matter. While the cables are out, the region is, in fact, in an acutely vulnerable situation. If more cables break before these ones have been repaired, connectivity will be impaired.

Then there’s the security aspect. The Baltic Sea nations’ efforts to keep their small but perfectly formed ocean safe may not have worked. What can they do next? It certainly won’t involve NATO, which—as the world has dramatically learned—faces an existential crisis over Greenland.

In fact, the Baltic seabed may be the juncture at which it becomes clear that NATO has entered that existential crisis. That leaves the Baltic Sea nations to find another way of enhancing protection. It’s a good thing that they have been practicing: While Baltic Sentry has a NATO label, it’s executed only by the Baltic Sea nations themselves.

But the most alarming outcome may be this: Cable saboteurs will conclude that the world is distracted by other events. The New Year’s drama in the Baltic Sea received only the most perfunctory media attention, and considering the news from Venezuela and elsewhere, that’s hardly surprising. Who is going to pay attention to cable breaks when the United States deposes rulers or when it considers seizing allied territory and possibly goes to war against Iran?

Would-be cable saboteurs and their prospective backers may, in fact, conclude that the coast is now clear for cable sabotage. You will know of their decision when the conveniences and necessities of your daily life become sluggish or, heaven forbid, unavailable.