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00:00Not far from Copenhagen, a Russian ship is making its way from St. Petersburg across the Baltic Sea.
00:09The Sibiri Yakov is no ordinary research vessel. It does not simply explore sea routes and oceans. It has a secret mission.
00:19A mission that has put the military and intelligence services in Europe on alert.
00:25The Danish military does not let the ship out of its sight.
00:29On board the supposed research vessel, armed soldiers.
00:37What is the mission of the Sibiri Yakov?
00:50The Baltic Sea has become the theatre of a new Cold War.
00:54Here below the water on the seabed, Europe is vulnerable.
01:07That's where essential modern infrastructure is located. Pipelines, data cables, power lines.
01:15If they are destroyed, gas and electricity supplies will be cut off.
01:20That would be a catastrophe. Millions of households depend on them.
01:29Intelligence services like Germany's BND are nervous. They're keeping a very close eye on Russian activities.
01:42It's not just the war in Ukraine that has shown that Russia is willing and able to use violence.
01:48Violence against property, violence against infrastructure, to spy, to prepare sabotage operations.
01:56We consider the danger to be very real. This is not something abstract we'll be facing in 10 or 20 years' time.
02:03The pace at which Russia is raising tensions and speeding up measures to make it militarily capable of acting against the West
02:11means we have good reason to take a very concrete look at this threat of espionage and sabotage.
02:18These constitute an important part of this threat, more than 70 research vessels, most of which answer to the Russian Ministry of Defence.
02:28They have sensitive technology on board, such as sonars, huge radar systems or even laboratories.
02:37On the one hand, of course, supply and communication can help in possibly making preparations for acts of sabotage.
02:45On the other hand, they are checking out military structures.
02:49This, too, is about communication. But this is also about ships, armaments and submarines.
02:55It is about energy farms, which can also be subject to sabotage. It's about pipelines.
03:03The growing underwater threat is not only directed at Germany.
03:06NATO has set up its own intelligence unit. The aim is to provide more security for underwater infrastructure.
03:15Lieutenant General Hans-Werner Wehrmann was temporarily recalled from retirement for his expertise.
03:23There are two strategic areas that Russia has continued to invest in without interruption since the end of the Cold War.
03:30One is the nuclear sector. The other is the underwater sector.
03:35Spending here has continued unabated and this shows the importance Moscow attaches to that sector.
03:46The seabed would be an important theatre of war. This is where Europe is vulnerable.
03:53Russia has obviously always realised this.
03:57We know that there are a number of Russian ships, classic ships, that can serve both civilian and military purposes.
04:06These are all ships that are prefixed with the words academic or professor.
04:11They can be equipped with measurement technology, such as high-resolution acoustic sensors or underwater video systems,
04:18which can, of course, also be used to pinpoint cables and pipelines. So they are ready if it comes down to it.
04:26The automatic identification system can be used to monitor shipping activities.
04:32Routes can be tracked online in real time.
04:36We can see that a Russian research vessel is approaching.
04:40The academic Karpinsky.
04:42How is it equipped and how close can we get?
04:47We leave the port of Rostock early in the morning.
04:51The ship is due to pass less than 10 nautical miles off the coast.
04:56Suddenly, it appears in front of us.
05:03The Karpinsky is old, but it clearly has special capabilities.
05:07At its stern, we can see a huge capstan that can be used to lower measuring equipment into the sea.
05:14We're not the only ones keeping a close eye on the vessel.
05:18Just a few hundred metres away, a German police ship is tailing it.
05:24Supposed research vessels such as the academic Karpinsky no longer sail unescorted through the Baltic Sea.
05:32We don't go unnoticed either.
05:35A police launch approaches.
05:42We are coming on board to make checks.
05:50We are coming on board to make checks.
05:53We are coming on board to make checks.
05:55We are coming on board to make checks.
06:01The reason is you are accompanying this Russian ship and recording it on film.
06:09Everyone out here seems to be jittery.
06:12The mere fact that we were near the Karpinsky alarmed the police, who took our personal details.
06:18The ship continues on its way.
06:20Only people who have been on board such research vessels really know what happens below deck.
06:26We want to find them.
06:28We search crew lists, seafaring job portals and social media.
06:32After a long search, we find a former crew member of the Siberiakov willing to talk to us.
06:38That was the ship on whose deck we had observed armed soldiers.
06:43The man now lives in the UK.
06:46His work as a seaman on the research ship ended shortly before the war against Ukraine began.
06:55It's the first time he has spoken to journalists about his time on board.
07:01Although he has left Russia, he does not want to be identified.
07:06And his own voice has been replaced.
07:09He is worried about his family, who still live in Russia.
07:12After all, he is sharing military secrets.
07:17They zigzag at low speed when they're looking at the seabed.
07:21That's always an indication that they're doing the real work, the spy work.
07:28They don't want people to know when they're working.
07:32And if the ship is just drifting in the current, that means the engine is switched off.
07:37Then they are using the sonar and therefore have to switch off all ambient noise.
07:44He shows us videos that he shot himself on the Siberiakov.
07:49He worked and lived here for months at a time.
07:52He was allowed to move around freely, but some of the rooms on the ship were off-limits to him.
07:58Most of the time, the Siberiakov kept its position tracking system switched off, he tells us,
08:04so as to go undetected if possible.
08:08But what are the Russian research vessels doing exactly?
08:14Anything detected on the seabed, whether an internet cable or a power line,
08:19is a strategic enemy object.
08:22If you destroy it in the event of war, you have an advantage.
08:25The direct function of the research vessels is, therefore,
08:29to scan the seabed and supply this information to the military.
08:34And we're going to discover even more about this research vessel.
08:39We follow the Siberiakov's journey and find out that its name is associated
08:45with an unprecedented case of sabotage,
08:48and that the Soviet Union was responsible for it.
08:52The Baltic Connector was built in Estonia in 2018.
08:56It was intended to make Estonia independent of Russian gas.
09:00But then, last fall, came this announcement.
09:04A year after the Nord Stream pipeline bombings, Finland confirmed this week
09:09that it is investigating a rupture in a subsea gas pipeline
09:13that stretches all the way to Estonia.
09:15On the morning of October 8th, 2023, it became clear that parts of the pipeline
09:20were completely destroyed.
09:23The Finnish authorities launched an investigation.
09:28The focus of the preliminary investigation was on the Hong Kong-registered vessel,
09:33New New Polar Bear.
09:36We have also investigated the wreckage of the New New Polar Bear.
09:40We have also investigated a significantly large area of the seabed
09:45and found a fairly large object close to the damaged site.
09:49The Navy pulled the object out early this morning.
09:54It's an anchor with the dimensions in metres of 2.5 by 2 by 1.
10:00It's an anchor with the dimensions in metres of 2.5 by 2 by 1.
10:05It's an anchor with the dimensions in metres of 2.5 by 2 by 1.
10:10The anchor weighs almost six metric tons.
10:15The Chinese ship it belongs to is this one, New New Polar Bear.
10:20Investigators still don't know exactly what happened during its journey,
10:25but we can reconstruct it in part.
10:28On October 6th, 2023, the vessel left the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad.
10:33A storm blew up.
10:35While travelling at full speed, the ship dropped its anchor,
10:39dragging it more than 200 kilometres along the seabed with it.
10:43Later, there was a huge leak in the pipeline.
10:47Three data cables were also damaged.
10:50Neither the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs
10:54nor the shipping company involved responded to our questions.
10:58Beijing has since admitted the New New Polar Bear caused the devastation,
11:02allegedly by mistake.
11:05The investigation is ongoing.
11:08Stefan Kröger is a naval architect.
11:11He has also worked on the case.
11:14He finds China's claim that the anchor dropped by accident absurd.
11:18An anchor winch is pure mechanical engineering, to put it bluntly.
11:23You have a giant anchor winch with a chain attached,
11:27and there is a chain stopper and a chain lock at the front
11:30to prevent the chain from accidentally slipping out.
11:34If you want to drop an anchor,
11:37you have to mechanically remove this very bulky chain stopper.
11:41You have to remove the chain lock and operate the anchor winch.
11:45That would wake up everyone on board.
11:48The chain links are very heavy and really rumble.
11:51Does that square with the accident theory?
11:54It's completely out of the question.
11:56Unless they were on magic mushrooms or whatever.
11:59You could only do this in a controlled and conscious manner.
12:04So what actually happened?
12:07Rumors start to emerge that Russia might have something to do with the case.
12:11We decide to find out which ships were in the area before the accident.
12:17Conventional tracking data isn't any help.
12:20Some ships switch off their systems to remain undetected.
12:23We know this from our informant.
12:26Is there any other way?
12:29Together with journalists from Norway, Estonia, the Netherlands and the UK,
12:33we come up with a solution,
12:36decoding the Morse code messages sent in the area.
12:39Russian research vessels send out weather reports every six hours.
12:43They are transmitted by Morse code and contain location data.
12:47We analyze all the Morse code signals in the area.
12:50This message, sent near the Baltic Connector, belongs to a ship we know.
12:55The Siberi Yakov, the ship with the soldiers on board.
13:01In the weeks leading up to the destruction of the Baltic Connector,
13:05its position data keeps on appearing to the left and to the right of the pipeline.
13:10In other words, it passes over it several times.
13:14Whether the ship had anything to do with the destruction cannot be proven beyond a doubt.
13:18Certainly its activities in the area are striking.
13:22From now on, we can use Morse code messages
13:26to track the secret research fleet to follow its movements,
13:30even if its aim is to remain unidentified.
13:34The data analysis will take months.
13:38German research vessels also collect information
13:42with completely different goals but similar technology.
13:45The Deneb is part of Germany's Maritime and Hydrographic Agency
13:50and carries out surveys that are important for nautical charts, for example.
13:55Particularly shallow areas, abnormalities on the seabed,
13:59or wrecks are examined by Captain Andreas Thies and his crew.
14:15Today they are surveying a site using sonar technology.
14:23We have a multi-beam echo sounder.
14:26That means we can survey 80 meters of the seabed beneath us.
14:30You can see small stones lying there. They're really not big.
14:34We can see all the foreign bodies rising up out of or lying on the seabed.
14:40The Deneb collects information to warn other ships of any danger
14:45to the public.
14:47But, of course, the special capabilities of research vessels
14:51can also be used in other ways.
14:54A Russian research vessel, the Goi Gletsa,
14:57appeared very close to here last year.
15:00What was it doing?
15:02We show the captain of the Deneb the course it took.
15:07On October 15, 2023, the ship zigzagged around
15:11near the German island of Fehmarn for over a day.
15:16In some places, it remained stationary for hours.
15:24That looks like a classic search course.
15:28In principle, it's crossing a position with flat intersections
15:32and keeps on passing over it with certain variations.
15:35And this indicates that, in principle,
15:38it is looking for something in the area of those intersections.
15:45But what exactly is so interesting there?
15:51You can take a picture of the seabed there.
15:54And with modern sonar technology, you can also detect things
15:57that are much smaller than a metre in dimension.
16:03What kind of area is this?
16:06That's a submarine exercise area.
16:09In other words, where NATO submarines generally dive.
16:16It is impossible to say exactly what the Goi Gletsa was doing.
16:20But it was surely no coincidence
16:23that the ship was in the submarine exercise area.
16:27The technical sensors on the submarines
16:30are of particular interest to Russia.
16:33How do they communicate?
16:35How do they control their weapons systems?
16:38All this technical data can be collected in these areas,
16:41and we assume that this is exactly what these research ships are doing.
16:45Our informant, who worked on the Sibiri Yakov,
16:49also travelled to submarine diving areas.
16:53What we did was to wait until a submarine
16:56had dived as deep as it could.
16:58Then our ship tried to find it.
17:00It's like a game of hide-and-seek, but on a military scale.
17:04You try to find the exact border
17:07where you can still identify the submarines
17:09with the same special equipment that a NATO ship has.
17:12That was the reason we went to these areas.
17:16The ostensible research vessels
17:19are systematically spying in the Baltic Sea.
17:22In their sights, submarine areas,
17:25cables and underwater pipelines.
17:28A hidden infrastructure that only rarely
17:31comes to the attention of the public
17:33in the way that it did in 2022.
17:36Several leaks have been discovered
17:39in the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines
17:41from which gas is flowing into the Baltic Sea.
17:44The bombing of the Nord Stream pipelines,
17:47these attacks in particular,
17:49illustrated the vulnerability of marine infrastructure.
17:52Hundreds of thousands of tons of Russian gas
17:55were escaping from the pipelines.
17:57Gas which was meant to be destined for Europe.
18:00It is still not clear who was behind the blasts.
18:04NATO wants to be better prepared in the future.
18:07An exercise manoeuvre is underway
18:10off the Faroe Islands in the North Atlantic.
18:13Military forces from three countries
18:16are training how to protect pipelines and cables.
18:19The German ship Donau is leading the manoeuvre.
18:22The current traffic situation is that
18:25we still have an offshore vessel
18:27coming in towards Torshavn.
18:29The crew normally searches for mines.
18:32We are testing our equipment
18:35to see if we can do more than mine detection.
18:38As a contribution to NATO or other neighbouring countries.
18:41To simplify the process,
18:43we are using the equipment we have.
18:46We are using the equipment we have
18:48as a contribution to NATO or other neighbouring countries.
18:52To simply make the waters safer in this day and age.
18:55And we can, as you have seen.
18:57We have various toolboxes.
18:59Equipment, sonar systems, underwater drones, etc.
19:02that we could deploy to safeguard
19:04critical underwater infrastructure.
19:06It would certainly be a win-win situation.
19:11The training takes place on one of the other ships,
19:14the French Seifei.
19:15Here they are practising using an underwater drone.
19:26The drone searches the murky seabed,
19:29transmitting the images to the observation room in real time.
19:39One of the things is the training of the operators
19:42so that on the screen, on the sonar,
19:44they can do an analysis
19:49and get the difference between a normal rock
19:52or something more suspicious.
19:55In the future, the operators should, for example,
19:58be able to detect sabotaged cables
20:01or explosive devices on pipelines more quickly.
20:05While the crew continues to work on the bridge,
20:08a message suddenly arrives.
20:10A Russian ship has been spotted.
20:14A Russian ship has been spotted.
20:27It's interesting to have pictures from the Russian boats,
20:30even if they are civilian,
20:32so that we can report it to the authorities
20:35and to just get the maritime picture.
20:38So if one day the ship is, I don't know,
20:40targeted for anything,
20:43we can provide some info about it.
20:46Mistrust at sea is growing.
20:49But even though the Navy is improving its skills here,
20:52it does not yet have a specific mission
20:55to protect critical infrastructure.
20:58The legal situation in Germany is complicated,
21:01even when it comes to who is allowed to track
21:04and stop Russian ships and where.
21:06The sea is divided into various zones
21:09in which different authorities are responsible under German law.
21:13German powers begin here in the Exclusive Economic Zone,
21:17the so-called EEZ.
21:20The federal police are responsible here.
21:24Within the 12-mile zone, where powers are greater,
21:28it is the police forces of the respective federal states.
21:32In both zones,
21:33the Navy provides support when Russian spy ships appear.
21:37After all, the Navy is indispensable
21:40for protecting critical infrastructure at sea.
21:43And yet, they still do not have a legal mandate to do so.
21:52My wish is simply clarity, a clear mission,
21:55clear assignment of responsibilities,
21:58and, in particular, there is the speed factor.
22:00We need to be fast in these areas,
22:03so we need to have a clear remit and chain of command.
22:06No one should live in uncertainty
22:09as to whether they are allowed to act or not.
22:15After all, the challenges facing German security agencies
22:19are enormous.
22:22Unfortunately, you can't fence in underwater infrastructure,
22:26and you can't shield it in the same way
22:28that you can on land.
22:31And we shouldn't give credence to the belief
22:34that you can precisely monitor and protect
22:37every single meter of cable.
22:43Operators also fear possible sabotage above water
22:47in the large wind farms in the North and Baltic seas.
22:51In the future, the wind farms are expected
22:54to generate the equivalent of 300 nuclear power plants.
22:58This electricity is intended to make Europe
23:01independent from Russian gas,
23:04and that seems to be attracting Russia's attention.
23:07Wind farm operators are constantly spotting ships
23:10by their facilities, and they are nervous.
23:14When such ships have appeared in this kind of situation in the past,
23:18they have their tracking systems switched off.
23:21You cannot see them on the systems.
23:24Then, suddenly, there's visual contact.
23:26These situations create uncertainty,
23:29especially in the context of gas pipelines
23:32and the alleged accidents or acts of sabotage that we've seen.
23:37Private investors shy away from risks,
23:40including the risk of possible sabotage.
23:44The uncertainty factor alone
23:47could mean investors start hesitating.
23:50That could ultimately slow down the energy transition
23:52or, in the worst-case scenario,
23:55mean it didn't happen at all.
23:59Unknown to us at the time of that interview,
24:02a Russian ship had appeared in this wind farm,
24:05Arkhardis Ost-1, off the German Baltic Sea island
24:08of Rügen last year.
24:11It was the Gori Gletsa,
24:14the ship that had seemed suspicious to us in our research,
24:17the vessel that zigzagged through the submarine exercise area.
24:19We discover this from security sources.
24:22The ship only changed course
24:25when the German Federal Police called upon it to do so.
24:28Shortly afterwards, a photographer took this picture.
24:31There were also armed forces on board this research vessel.
24:35We ask the Russian government about the Gori Gletsa's journey
24:39and about the other alleged research vessels,
24:42but do not receive an answer.
24:46But our data analysis is bearing fruit.
24:49The more signals reveal routes
24:52that are supposed to remain secret.
24:55Since the beginning of the war in Ukraine,
24:58we have counted dozens of transits by research vessels
25:01through the Baltic Sea.
25:04We can also identify more than 60 particularly suspicious passages
25:07through the North Sea and Baltic Sea,
25:10zigzag courses and crawling routes, for example.
25:13We also find conspicuous movements
25:16in the 12-mile zones of NATO countries,
25:19very close to the coast.
25:22Nele Matsluck is a maritime law expert at Kiel University.
25:26She believes a more robust approach could be adopted,
25:29especially in the 12-mile zone.
25:32We could hinder their activities,
25:35ask them to leave the coastal waters,
25:38and, in my view, you must ask them to do that.
25:41Is it also possible to take action
25:44against the alleged research vessels further off the coast?
25:46The authorities currently have little power there.
25:49There are no appropriate laws.
25:52Yet this is where most of the especially striking journeys take place.
25:56Germany is lagging behind when it comes to clear regulation.
26:01I get the impression
26:04we haven't progressed as quickly as we should have.
26:07Other countries are already much further ahead.
26:10But I don't see any real movement
26:13towards creating new legal foundations.
26:16There is a lot of progress in parliament,
26:19but relatively little comes out of that.
26:22Political players involved in these discussions
26:25also continue to see security gaps.
26:28We have to learn to reorganize things.
26:31But when you try to get down to brass tacks,
26:35I just hope that everyone involved
26:38is prepared to make sacrifices in certain cases
26:41so that this protection is guaranteed.
26:44The structure with its many responsibilities,
26:47the federal system where everyone does their own thing,
26:50all that has proved its value.
26:53But today, almost 80 years after the Second World War,
26:57we have a completely different security situation.
27:02If we want to protect ourselves against despots,
27:05we need much simpler avenues.
27:08The various ministries responsible in Germany
27:11say that legal changes are being discussed.
27:14But when and if they will be implemented
27:17is completely open.
27:20While Germany is arguing about responsibilities,
27:23Russia is continuing its systematic espionage.
27:27The last Morse signal from the Sibiriakov
27:30was sent in June.
27:33Decoded, the signal reveals a series of numbers.
27:35That series of numbers told us its position,
27:38which was northwest of Denmark.
27:41Here, the Sibiriakov again appeared
27:44near a gas pipeline.
27:47Our analysis shows that once again
27:50it was crossing back and forth over it.
27:53This time, it is the Europipe,
27:56which runs from Berlin to Stuttgart.
27:59The Sibiriakov signal was sent
28:02This time, it is the Europipe,
28:05which runs from Norway to northern Germany
28:08and supplies millions of households with gas.
28:11The Sibiriakov continues its mission,
28:14making surveillance courses,
28:17spying on the seabed, completely unhindered.