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The decline in incidents may have started in fall 2024 after high-level US officials reached out to their Russian counterparts to warn them against conducting future operations, people familiar with the conversations said, asking not to be identified because the issue is sensitive. The contacts took place amid American fears that Russia would put incendiary devices on cargo planes bound for the US, following a fire at a DHL facility in Britain in July 2024.
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Hybrid attacks are defined as hostile state-backed threats using both conventional and unconventional military methods, designed to destabilize opponents while blurring the threshold of a declared act of war.
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Three UK residents were convicted in July of carrying out a March 2024 Russia-backed arson attack on a London warehouse of a firm that supplied goods, including Starlink satellite equipment, to Ukraine. Ken McCallum, head of Britain’s domestic security service MI5, said last year that Russia was on a mission to generate “sustained mayhem on British and European streets.”
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In May, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk accused Russian intelligence services of orchestrating a 2024 arson attack that almost completely destroyed a shopping center in Warsaw.
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Other incidents attributed to Moscow include vandalism, the jamming of GPS signals and a foiled plot to assassinate the CEO of a German arms company.
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“Russia is currently waging two wars,” Finnish President Alexander Stubb said last year. “One is a kinetic, conventional war in Ukraine. The other is a hybrid war in Europe and the West with the aim of influencing the tone of public discourse or in some way shake our sense of security.”
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Russia may be struggling to maintain strict control over operations, with some cases of sabotage and arson going beyond the aims of those who commissioned them, some of the officials said. That may be due in part to the incompetence and unreliability of petty criminals hired to carry out the actions, they said.
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There’s also evidence that some individuals, described as self-starters, have acted on their own initiative in hopes of impressing potential Russian paymasters, again risking erratic outcomes, the people said.
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In response, Russia has increasingly ordered local proxies to film themselves carrying out attacks to try to ensure plots unfold as planned, the people said.
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The diverting of Russian intelligence resources to Ukraine was revealing of the Kremlin’s struggles to secure breakthroughs on the ground this year, despite Putin’s public narrative that he’s winning the war, the people said. It also suggested Russian resources are stretched.
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Changes to the law in countries like the UK have increased prison sentences for involvement in such incidents. That has raised the risk for potential recruits, who are often paid only a few hundred euros or pounds by Russian intelligence and have no diplomatic protection if they’re caught.
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While plots have declined this year, European governments continue to record regular and serious cases of Russian cyber attacks and more traditional espionage attempts, some of the officials said.
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—With assistance from Alberto Nardelli.
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English (US)