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A comment on 'Shadow fleets' and sabotage: are Europe's undersea cables under attack?. Parent comment

Re:'Shadow fleets' and sabotage: are Europe's undersea cable... by anovikov on Wednesday March 05, 2025 @01:22PM (#43270278)
A mine can't harm the anchor, but to drag the anchor, the ship must cross the minefield first.

What's going to happen? The ship will sink. In practice, that will either force Russians to sweep the mines thus attracting too much attention, or to give up on this idea of damaging cables.

It doesn't matter if people are directly involved. When a bunch of crews will die... well nothing will happen because for shipowners they are entirely disposable. But loss of ships will prompt shipowners to be extra careful to where the take orders from.

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Re:'Shadow fleets' and sabotage: are Europe's undersea cable... by grayhatter on Wednesday March 05, 2025 @02:45PM (#43271330)
I wonder if there's a word for killing or harming people who are bystanders to try to change the behavior of some other person or some group.
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Re:'Shadow fleets' and sabotage: are Europe's undersea cable... by anovikov on Thursday March 06, 2025 @12:16AM (#43276659)
Well, if the maps of the minefields are public, why would any ship with the crew in their sane mind, sail towards it?
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Re:'Shadow fleets' and sabotage: are Europe's undersea cable... by Tarq0n on Thursday March 06, 2025 @01:57AM (#43277232)
Do you understand that by their very nature, underwater cables have to span the width of a body of water? What are you going to do, draw a line of mines from Denmark to Sweden?
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Re:'Shadow fleets' and sabotage: are Europe's undersea cable... by anovikov on Thursday March 06, 2025 @05:34AM (#43278549)
Make passageways or even deactivate mines using signal from the same cable it is safeguarding. Ship needs to pass, captain sends an SMS from a sat and the mine is deactivated for half an hour. If ship is suspicious, a destroyer escorts at at gunpoint - cable signal lost, torpedo goes off automatically.
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Re:'Shadow fleets' and sabotage: are Europe's undersea cable... by ben_w on Thursday March 06, 2025 @06:14AM (#43278816)
> and the mine is deactivated for half an hour

Congratulations, the minefield is permanently switched off: https://www.marinevesseltraffic.com/BALTIC-SEA-AIS/ship-traf...

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Re:'Shadow fleets' and sabotage: are Europe's undersea cable... by 542354234235 on Thursday March 06, 2025 @02:05PM (#43283925)
Great idea. I was thinking of something similar after 9/11. Install explosives on all commercial airliners and have them automatically detonate and destroy the plane if it gets too close to a building where it isn't supposed to be. It's foolproof!
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Re:'Shadow fleets' and sabotage: are Europe's undersea cable... by 542354234235 on Thursday March 06, 2025 @01:26PM (#43283394)
Why would anyone in their right mind run their ship into a bridge, or run it aground navigating a canal? Mistakes, misjudgments, or just confusion happen and killing innocent people because some equipment might be damaged by a hostile actor seems closer to a war crime than a reasonable policy.
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