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Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

(www.cnn.com)
577 points mooreds | 6 comments | 18 Nov 24 14:31 UTC | HN request time: 1.433s | source | bottom
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staplung ◴[18 Nov 24 20:22 UTC] No.42176496[source]▶
It's worth mentioning that cable breakages happen quite often; globally about 200 times per year [1] and the article itself mentions that just last year, two other cables and a gas pipeline were taken out by an anchor. The Gulf of Finland is evidently quite shallow. From what I understand, cable repair ships are likely to use ROVs for parts of repair jobs but only when the water is shallow so hopefully they can figure out whether the damage looks like sabotage before they sever the cable to repair it. Of course, if you're a bad actor and want plausible deniability, maybe you'd make it look like anchor damage or, deliberately drag an anchor right over the cables.

Cable repairs are certainly annoying and for the operator of the cable, expensive. However, they are usually repaired relatively quickly. I'd be more worried if many more cables were severed at the same time. If you're only going to break one or two a year, you might as well not bother.

1: https://www.theverge.com/c/24070570/internet-cables-undersea...

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Etheryte ◴[18 Nov 24 22:38 UTC] No.42177868[source]▶
This is a misleading framing. The two cables last year were not taken out by an anchor as an accident, it was literally a ship putting down its anchor just before the cable and then dragging it over the cable. In other words, sabotage. There's no point in trying to color any of this with rose tinted glasses when it's clear who's done it and why.
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stoperaticless ◴[19 Nov 24 10:38 UTC] No.42181978[source]▶
Well, you never know 100%. There is a small (really small) chance it was an accident. Just like there is a small chance that Al Capone was innocent man.

(But really, it clearly has “Russia” written all over it)

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pelasaco ◴[19 Nov 24 11:03 UTC] No.42182151[source]▶
just to be honest, the Pipelines explosion, had "Russia" written all over it, except after investigation, and a possible culprit, i.e not Russia, then nobody wanted to discuss about it anymore. I think the hysteria is too high, people are thirsty for War, looks like..
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mciancia ◴[19 Nov 24 11:09 UTC] No.42182183[source]▶
> people are thirsty for War, looks like

Russians, yes

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vasco ◴[19 Nov 24 11:19 UTC] No.42182243[source]▶
I wish I lived in a world where it's so easy to know who is good and who is evil and to pinpoint them so well.
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peutetre ◴[19 Nov 24 11:36 UTC] No.42182338[source]▶
You do. Russia's invasion of Ukraine is not an ambiguous war. Russia is plainly in the wrong.
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1. vasco ◴[19 Nov 24 13:02 UTC] No.42182948[source]▶
I don't know what goes on to comment. I'm not there and I don't fool myself into thinking that I know geopolitics just because I read some articles. My comment was replying to someone who said the Russians are the war thirsty people of the world. It's a bit rich because, there's a bunch of other ongoing wars in the world and people aren't just "bad" or "good"
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2. Cthulhu_ ◴[19 Nov 24 14:29 UTC] No.42183799[source]▶
Objective facts though: Russia invaded Ukraine, in 2014 and 2022. There was no formal declaration of war. There were widespread and indiscriminate attacks on civilians.

Which parts of those are "good" in your opinion? Do you believe Russia's "denazification" claim?

There are no international laws that legitimized Russia's invasion of Ukraine. If Ukraine was in violation of something, there's procedures in place to declare war legitimately - but before that there's the nonviolent approach, which Russia skipped.

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3. vasco ◴[19 Nov 24 15:04 UTC] No.42184158[source]▶
No parts of the war are good - I didn't make any claims about the Russian war, I don't know what caused it or why it's going on, and I don't like wars. I don't believe most claims by either side, I doubt there's advantage in revealing the real reasons by either side - the articles we read are to craft an opinion either to support one side or the other and I don't think it's that simple - that's my whole point. I don't need to think a war is legitimate to have a reaction to someone saying there's one country with warmonger people and one country without. In general I think it's normal to side with the invaded party and I'm personally inclined to support that side - but it doesn't mean I tell myself I'm making some informed decision.
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4. kjkjadksj ◴[19 Nov 24 16:53 UTC] No.42185520{3}[source]▶
With this rigid logic you might as well not trust anything you can’t observe first hand yourself.
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5. peutetre ◴[19 Nov 24 20:31 UTC] No.42187790[source]▶
> I don't know what goes on to comment.

And yet you are commenting. Ignorance and a lack of curiosity are not compelling arguments.

Maybe it's time to grow up and start paying attention.

6. vasco ◴[20 Nov 24 13:04 UTC] No.42193582{4}[source]▶
Not really, but to declare a whole population as "very bad thing", yes I need to approximate first hand observation. I have no need to declare a whole population bad though.