Defense Secretary John Healy issued the claim at a press conference that Russian submarines were prowling British waters for the purpose of sabotaging underwater infrastructure in the High North maritime region, home to key shipping routes and critical infrastructure such as undersea cables. He said that British forces and allies, including Norway, tracked and deterred (alleged) malign activity by the Russian vessels. He added that the submarines had now left the area and there were no signs of damage to underwater infrastructure.
Healey’s press conference was to call out Russian President Vladimir Putin on his malicious activity: “To President Putin, I say ‘We see you. We see your activity over our cables and our pipelines, and you should know that any attempt to damage them will not be tolerated and will have serious consequences. Our armed forces left them in no doubt that they were being monitored, that their movements were not covert, as President Putin planned, and that their attempted secret operation had been exposed.”
After detecting the Russian vessels passing into international waters, Britain sent a frigate, a support tanker and a maritime patrol aircraft to monitor their movements. Norway’s defense ministry said its armed forces had also deployed a P-8 maritime patrol aircraft and a frigate. Healy claimed the Russian operation involved a Russian Akula-class attack submarine and two specialist submarines from Moscow’s Main Directorate for Deep Sea Research (GUGI). “They are designed to survey underwater infrastructure during peacetime, and sabotage it in conflict,” Healey said.
