NATO troops to march into Russia as peacekeepers?

Sweden's recent obsessive search for a Russian submarine is an amusing story indeed. The Swedes could not see where the signal was coming from: it could be a Russian, a Dutch submarine or even divers. The performance has its director, though - NATO. Pravda.Ru interviewed the head of the Academy of Geopolitical Problems Konstantin Sivkov about the situation in the Stockholm Archipelago.

"As long as they have been looking for a strange object so persistently, it appears that there are serious reasons for that. Could it be our submarine indeed?"

"Technically, it could be anything. Technically, a Russian submarine may find itself both in the fjords of Sweden, and elsewhere in the world ocean. But practically, this is impossible. It goes about "Triton" submarine. This is a midget submarine designed for solving tasks in the vicinity of bases. To be used in remote areas, it should be transported on board a surface ship, as a rule, because its range and the time of autonomous work is not large.

"The duration of a typical anti-submarine search operation that NATO forces conduct makes up from three to five days. If they have not found anything there during this time, they are not likely to find anything then. The area of the possible location of the alleged submarine was small. Some reports said that it was discovered visually, other sources said that it was detected by radio-electronic equipment. The primary location of the submarine was indicated with high accuracy. If the sub was there indeed, it would be found within hours after the detection of an electronic signal.

Sweden has anti-submarine aircraft equipped with powerful sonar equipment and radio-acoustic buoys that can detect such a submarine. Therefore, if it was not found then it means that it was not there. Compare it with the recent detection of a state-of-the-art American submarine, Virginia tyoe, that was found in Russian territorial waters near Novaya Zemlya. Everything was very quickly established, proven and appropriate measures were taken.

All the talk about the Russian submarine in Swedish waters is based on NATO's intention to feverishly sculpt an enemy from Russia, to justify its existence. The attempt to create an enemy in the form of international terrorism has led to nothing.

No one believes that. Therefore, one should model a more real and more visible image of an enemy. The myth of existence of a Russian submarine in the area was intended to create an idea of Russia's highly aggressive behavior. This will allow the military to require additional funding, whereas political hawks will seek Sweden's entry into NATO."

"Are reconnaissance missions of submarines to territorial waters of other countries a common occurrence?"

"Of course, they are. The Americans do that regularly. Soviet and Russian submarines do that too, certainly. Yet, why would Russian submarines get into the territorial waters of neutral Sweden? There are more dangerous opponents."

"The Voice of Sweden said one could install special sensors in those fjords to record information and then use the fjords to shelter Russian submarines in an event of emergency. Could it be possible?"

Read more:
NATO troops to march into Russia as peacekeepers?