The Polish Institute of International Affairs (PISM) has published a White Paper documenting Russia’s escalating hybrid campaign of sabotage and subversion against the member states of the Council of the Baltic Sea States (CBSS). The report, authored by Filip Bryjka, Anna Maria Dyner, and Aleksandra Kozioł, analyses a pattern of coordinated hostile activity that has intensified sharply since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Russia’s toolkit in the region combines acts of physical diversion and sabotage targeting critical infrastructure — including energy networks, ports, and undersea cables — with deliberate violations of airspace and maritime borders, systematic disruption of GNSS satellite signals affecting maritime and air navigation, and cognitive influence operations designed to heighten societal anxiety and test state response capacities. The report notes that CBSS member states have been the target of the vast majority of European sabotage and subversion incidents recorded since 2022.
PISM’s analysis identifies the offensive character of these operations as evidence of a deliberate intent to destabilise NATO and EU member states rather than isolated opportunistic acts. For the Baltic region, where offshore wind infrastructure, undersea power cables, and gas interconnectors are expanding rapidly, the implications extend directly to energy security. GNSS disruptions, already documented around the Finnish and Estonian coasts, directly affect vessel navigation in and around offshore wind construction zones.
The report calls for coordinated responses across CBSS states: closer inter-agency cooperation to ensure high situational awareness, a dedicated regional information exchange system, unambiguous public attribution of Russian responsibility for hostile acts, and a shared catalogue of best practices for monitoring and countering known Russian operational patterns. Only a full-spectrum, coherent response from all states in the region — alongside NATO and EU structures — can effectively influence Russia and reduce the risk of future incidents, the authors conclude.
