We assume damage to Baltic Sea cables was sabotage, German Defence minister

[jmward01]

From a tech standpoint, what are countries doing to prepare for the possibility of future malicious cuts? Is there a minimum viable number of links that matter before things would get really bad? What does 'really bad' actually look like?

[yencabulator]

Multiple cables routed via very different paths. For example, Finland also has connectivity through Sweden and Estonia. Finland could lay more cables to Sweden in the Gulf of Bothnia, there's very little reason for large Russian ships to be there.

Increased spending on "unused" capacity via slightly higher-latency links (so less commercially desirable, in normal times), so you can fall back on those if needed.

Improved seafloor cable technology, perhaps means of burying the cable for shelter, perhaps better means of repairing them in-place.

More secrecy on the exact locations of the cables? Not sure if this is realistic.

Slight bias away from sea cables, where realistic.

More research into high bandwidth microwave transmission? The islands between Finland and Sweden are close enough to each other that horizon distance might not ruin that.

SpaceX making a bunch of money, others making a lot of noise about competing constellations.

[neom]

https://archive.is/s66Pl

[Teever]

I wonder how long it will be before one of these ships mysteriously sinks.

[benterix]

No need to sink, the Dutch Navy is taking action right now:

https://eadaily.com/en/news/2024/11/20/the-danish-navy-board...

[yanko]

Wow Germans speaking out loud so much and even making case this time just for bunch of cables.

I remember last time well known blew up their 5 billion out of 10 billion gas pipeline north stream and Germans ware quite and handled the case like provincial road accident with unknown perpetrator lol

[ashoeafoot]

The crack addict not complaining about the pipe blowing up after it turns out selling your family to the dealer is not a good longterm strategy.

[jovas]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_submarine_Losharik

Seems relevant

[ChrisArchitect]

Related:

Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42172565

[grahamj]

I also assume that.

[oysterville]

Kinda doesn't seem necessary to make this about Trump, but you are entitled to your conspiracies.

[jacknews]

Yes, it's a possible reading of events and makes more sense than Russia bothering with such insignificant targets, if they even have that capability.

Escalate the Ukraine war by allowing use of long range missiles to attack Russia, then a bunch of accusations and scaremongering about hybrid warfare and whatever in the press to prime everyone for more.

Someone appears to want some decisive progress, or just to turn up the heat in Ukraine, before Trump comes in and tries to freeze it.

"I also don’t want to believe that the ships’ anchors caused the damage"

Of course you don't. Never waste a crisis.

[cynicalsecurity]

No way! Did Germans grew a pair? What happened, I thought they are going to give their firstborns to Russians just to avoid confrontation and escalation.

[lazide]

They did the math after the recent US elections and realized the nice outcome just isn’t going to happen.