Oligarch spy yachts feared to have helped scout undersea cables as part of Russian plot to black out Britain: Putin ‘had billionaire cronies send vessels fitted with mini-submarines to carry out reconnaissance’

Superyachts belonging to Russian oligarchs were likely involved in covert maritime operations around the British Isles prior to Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, defence sources have claimed.

Russia, a world leader in submarine and undersea technology, routinely sends what it claims are research vessels into waters around Britain and in the North Atlantic. 

By the Russian parliament’s own admission, these vessels carry a host of technologies, including equipment ‘designed for deep-sea tracking, as well as equipment for connecting to top-secret communication cables’.

Some ships, including the notorious Yantar that was warded off by the Royal Navy after it was discovered loitering in the Irish Sea earlier this year, can also deploy unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs) and mini-submarines to access internet cables and energy pipelines up to six kilometres deep.

Britain depends on a vast network of gas pipelines, electrical cables and offshore energy hubs to function, but many of these vital arteries lie relatively undefended. 

An attack on any one of these energy pipelines or communications cables could plunge Britain into chaos.  

Now, military and government sources told the Sunday Times they suspected superyachts belonging to Russian oligarchs had also been involved in nefarious undersea operations. 

They claimed some of these ships are fitted with ‘moon pools’ – protected openings in a vessel’s hull that allow crews to deploy and retrieve deep-sea diving equipment. Others are able to deploy mini-submarines and submersible crafts. 

This allows the stunning yachts to float innocuously on the surface of the water, all while underwater vessels dive deep to sabotage undersea cables or deploy reconnaissance equipment. 

Indeed, sources also revealed that the Ministry of Defence and Royal Navy had found reconnaissance devices and sensors in various locations off Britain’s coastline.

Military and government sources told the Sunday Times they suspected superyachts belonging to Russian oligarchs had been involved in covert maritime operations on the orders of Vladimir Putin (pictured)

Military and government sources told the Sunday Times they suspected superyachts belonging to Russian oligarchs had been involved in covert maritime operations (Pictured: The yacht Amadea of sanctioned Russian Oligarch Suleiman Kerimov. There is no insinuation this vessel conducted spy operations on behalf of the Kremlin)

Russia’s Yantar ‘research vessel’ is widely thought to be a spy vessel. It is fitted with a range of technologies to conduct covert operations deep underwater, including unmanned underwater vehicles and mini-submarines

The Estlink 2 power cable in the Gulf of Finland was ruptured in suspected Russian interference

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These devices, some of which were found as early as 2020, are thought to have been deployed to gather data on the movement of Britain’s four Vanguard-class nuclear submarines (SSBNs), which constitute the UK’s nuclear deterrent.

Some were discovered when they washed ashore, while others were reportedly found by Royal Navy minesweepers. But defence sources admitted they did not know how many sensors were still operational.

The unsettling discoveries, revealed in the Sunday Times investigation, led one senior UK military official to declare: ‘There should be no doubt, there is a war raging in the Atlantic. This is a game of cat and mouse that has continued since the ending of the Cold War, and is now heating up again.’

Britain and NATO are now cognizant of the threat posed by Russian spy vessels and oligarch pleasure craft alike. 

In January, NATO dispatched a fleet of ten ships to the Baltic Sea to protect Europe’s crucial undersea cables.

The ships, which are set to end their deployment this month, conducted patrols in the vicinity of energy pipelines and undersea data cables in an effort to monitor suspicious activity and deter any attempt to sabotage these vital assets.

The move came off the back of a number of disruptions in the Baltic Sea that are widely believed to have been sabotage operations.

In February, Swedish and Finnish police said they were investigating a suspected case of sabotage of an undersea telecoms cable in the Baltic Sea, while Sweden’s coast guard deployed a vessel to the location where the damage occurred.

Finnish operator Cinia said it had ‘some time’ earlier detected problems on its C-Lion1 link connecting Finland and Germany and that it had eventually received confirmation that the cable was damaged even as data traffic continued to flow.

The incident marked the third time in just a few months that the C-Lion1 cable was damaged after it was completely severed in November and December of 2024.

And on Christmas Day in 2024, the Estlink 2 undersea power cable connecting Finland and Estonia was damaged along with four telecoms lines.

Finland seized the Cook Islands-registered Eagle S tanker on suspicion it caused the damage by dragging its anchor, adding that the ship was part of a ‘shadow fleet’ circumventing sanctions on Russian oil.

The Finns found tracks on the seabed where they suspected the Eagle S of damaging the cables, and investigators later recovered a lost anchor they said was believed to belong to the ship.

Britain and the EU are now working hard to scale up their underwater reconnaissance and warfare capabilities, with this maritime realm being identified as a critical vulnerability.

The Royal Navy currently operates one ‘multi-role ocean surveillance ship’ (MROSS), named RFA Proteus.

The vessel was originally built in 2019 in Norway as an offshore support ship but was acquired by the MoD in January 2023 for £70 million.

It underwent an extensive retrofit to carry military surveillance technologies, including unmanned submersibles, and by October 2023 entered service as the Royal Navy’s MROSS.

RFA Proteus now works in conjunction with Royal Navy mine-hunting crews, submarines and the Royal Air Force’s reconnaissance planes to track suspicious underwater activity around the British Isles.

But Britain’s capabilities lag far behind those of Russia when it comes to conducting underwater warfare, and Proteus remains the Royal Navy’s only MROSS.

The Yantar is just one of many ships operated by the Russian Navy’s Main Directorate of Deep-Sea Research (GUGI). 

Former defence minister Tobias Ellwood warned that Britain is ‘behind the curve’ in tracking Russia’ deep sea operations. 

One insider told the Sunday Times: ‘Our adversary has multiple points of action that they can be playing, and we’ve only got one ship that can deal with it,’ one insider said.

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Nuclear submarine HMS Vanguard arrives back at HM Naval Base Clyde, Faslane, Scotland following a patrol

A handout picture released by the Britain’s Ministry of Defence (MOD) in London on January 22, 2025 shows Royal Navy Royal Navy of RFA Proteus (R) patrolling near the Russian vessel Yantar (L), in November 2024

Britain’s Defence Secretary John Healey (R) talks to Commanding Officer of RFA Proteus, Captain Martin Jones (L) as he sits at the dynamic positioning desk on the bridge during his visit to RFA Proteus on February 20, 2025

Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) at sea. These unmanned robotic craft have revolutionized deep ocean survey and exploration

The Royal Navy’s Vanguard submarine, a cornerstone of Britain’s nuclear deterrent, is seen arriving at the Clyde Naval Base

Later this year, the British government is expected to publish a strategic defence review (SDR). 

Led by Lord Robertson, a former Labour Defence Secretary and Secretary General of NATO, the review will identify critical vulnerabilities in the UK’s defence posture and recommend measures to shore up these areas.

Two parameters of the ongoing review are a ‘total commitment to the UK’s nuclear deterrent’ and ‘options to reinforce homeland security’. 

Britain’s underwater warfare capabilities and the security of undersea infrastructure are therefore expected to constitute a key part of the review. 

In the meantime, the MoD and Royal Navy have begun work on an ambitious programme known as Project CABOT – a proposed two-stage anti-submarine warfare (ASW) operation in the North Atlantic. 

The first stage of the operation, called Atlantic Net, will see the Royal Navy work with private contractors operating drones at sea to collect acoustic data, which is then processed using AI to detect potential threats. 

The system is designed to ‘digitise’ the Atlantic, complementing existing Royal Navy patrols to help monitor vital underwater infrastructure. The first trials for this stage are set to take place later this year. 

In the second stage of CABOT, named Atlantic Bastion, the Royal Navy plans to take full operational control, using its own uncrewed surface and underwater vehicles, including the future Type 92 and Type 93 unmanned maritime drones. 

These assets will provide persistent surveillance and allow the Royal Navy’s manned warships to focus on other tasks. Bastion Atlantic is expected to launch around 2028.

He insisted that officials now ‘realise that there is a delta between our resilience and the threat that we face’.

‘The scale of damage [they could do] is enormous and it’s deniable and it’s cheap to do,’ he told the Guardian. ‘That’s the worrying dimension of all of this.’

Meanwhile, the EU is set to allocate almost €1 billion to boost surveillance of undersea cables and establish a fleet of emergency repair vessels after a spate of sabotage attacks. 

‘We want to make sure Europe is equipped not only to prevent and detect sabotage to cables but also to actively deter, repair and respond to any threat to critical infrastructure,’ said Henna Virkkunen, the executive vice president in charge of security at the European Commission.

‘We know that this is a threat for our security and for our environment, not only in the Baltic Sea area, but all over the European Union,’ Virkkunen told reporters in Helsinki.

In its action plan, the Commission pledged action to deter, prevent, detect and respond to cable damage. 

The reallocated budget cash would be used to develop a new data-sharing surveillance mechanism and drone programme.

It also outlined a goal to ensure supplies of spare parts for broken cables and to work towards the creation of an emergency reserve fleet ‘to deploy or repair electric or optical submarine cables’.

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