The Wire - November 18, 2024 - PRIORITY

//The Wire// 2100Z November 18, 2024//
//PRIORITY//
//BLUF: TWO UNDERSEA CABLES REPORTEDLY CUT IN THE BALTIC. U.S. AUTHORIZES UKRAINIAN USE OF LONG-RANGE MISSILES IN RUSSIA. BRITISH AIRWAYS AIRCRAFT GROUNDED THROUGHOUT EUROPE DUE TO CYBER EVENT.//
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-International Events-
Baltic Sea: This morning Finnish news media reported that the C-LION1 undersea communications cable has been cut. This cable provides internet and data connections between Finland and Germany. No official cause for the severed connection has been provided yet.
Separately, the Telia Company (an internet provider throughout the region) reported that one of their undersea cables has also been cut and/or damaged. The Telia cable providing internet connection to Lithuania from Finland was reportedly taken offline Sunday morning, with two additional secondary and tertiary backup cables allowing for some connectivity to Lithuania, albeit with a reduced bandwidth.
AC: Though the context of the heightened international tensions must be considered, undersea communications cables are frequently damaged and/or cut by innocent mistakes such as ships dragging anchor, or even purely natural incidents such as underwater mudslides. However, with two separate cables being impacted, the likelihood of nefarious intent becomes substantial. Most fingers point to Russia anyway, as Russia has a long-standing military mission to sever communications cables in the event of war. The United States has a similar mission as well, so pointing fingers is unlikely to do any good, especially due to the nature of the incident not exactly allowing for independent analysis. The intentional cutting of cables (or even the damaging of cables that is assumed to be nefarious in nature) is usually considered to be a prelude to a war involving the United States and Russia. However, considering the very few solid details (and going out on a limb to a degree), it’s possible that this is Russia’s way of showing their displeasure of the United States escalating the war in Ukraine. The Pentagon grants Ukraine permission to use long-range munitions, and Putin cuts a cable or two to show the west that, for them, the war is not merely confined to the borders of Ukraine.
Europe: This afternoon British Airways reported a major cyber outage, resulting in a grounding of all of their aircraft throughout the continent. Early reports suggest this outage impacted pilots’ abilities to electronically file flight plans and/or load sheets. The cause of the IT outage has not yet been disclosed, and it is not clear as to if British Airways is the only airline to be affected, though this remains a developing situation.
-HomeFront-
Texas: Friday evening Southwest Flight 2494 was struck by small arms fire while preparing to depart Dallas Love Field Airport. Few details have been released following this incident, however at least one bullet struck the front of the aircraft near the cockpit. No injuries were reported. AC: It’s not clear as to if this was an intentional targeting effort, or the byproduct of a random shooting outside the airport perimeter that just so happened to strike an aircraft. As the layout of the facility provides clear line of sight to aircraft taxiing throughout the airport from multiple angles, a person near the perimeter of the airport could have engaged any number of aircraft. It’s also not clear as to if other airlines at the airport conducted inspections of their own aircraft after the incident.
Washington D.C – Over the weekend (as previously mentioned), the Biden regime has decided to allow the use of long-range munitions by Ukraine to strike targets deep inside Russia. Previously, Ukraine was allegedly prevented from doing so as a means to prevent the further escalation of the war, and to side-step Russia’s previous rhetoric on this exact issue. A few weeks ago, Putin altered Russia’s formalized nuclear stance to include conventional attacks by a third-party nation. In short, if NATO (a nuclear power) helps a non-nuclear, third-party nation (such as Ukraine) to conduct attacks on Russia, even with conventional munitions, Putin will consider this to be a “first-strike” under Russian defense doctrine, and the use of nuclear weapons will be authorized. AC: As serious as this sounds, being in a state where nuclear war is technically authorized, only time will tell if this extreme rhetoric is backed up with action.
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Analyst Comments: In Ukraine, the fatal dance continues as world powers seek to make moves before the Trump Presidency becomes formalized. The outgoing Biden regime probably seeks to do a few things. For one, escalating the war when the entire world knows peace is imminent makes the new administration’s job more difficult. Biden (but mostly his staffers), likely seeking to cause as much damage as possible before leaving office, would approve of such escalations just as a way to stick it to those who are taking their jobs. Though this level of pettiness seems to be a bit extreme even for the classic D.C. bureaucrat, for many of the personalities currently involved in the Ukrainian war, they may indeed do everything they can to take a scorched-earth stance, and try to stoke World War III just out of spite.
Another likely goal of the Biden regime is simply fraud. While the entire western world panics at the technical line for a nuclear war being crossed (at least according to Russia), one small detail may calm concerns…Ukraine might not actually have the munitions to conduct any long range attack with. Suddenly allowing Ukraine to use long-range munitions against Russia, when they don’t have any more long-range missiles, is a classing political move emblematic of the entire Pentagon intelligentsia. Ukraine gets to shuffle some more money around and pretend to have the capabilities to severely impact Russia, while Russia herself knows that Ukraine can’t do much even with these allegedly new permissions. While many may put a lot of weight on Ukraine previously being told “no” when it comes to the use of long-range munitions to strike Russia, the sharp reality of this increasingly-desperate war is that Ukraine has shown anything but restraint. Any munition that the United States gives them, gets used immediately (for the most part), as would be expected of any nation in a similar situation. As such, assuming that Ukraine has some large stockpile of ATACMS missiles that they haven’t used yet might not be entirely accurate. Additionally, even considering the “long-range” nature of the specific missiles in question, “long-range” does not mean “unlimited range”. Geography matters, and it’s doubtful as to if the “long-range” missiles given to Ukraine could actually strike Moscow, for instance. Ukraine has already fielded many munitions (such as drones) that have already been used to target Moscow directly, albeit with a very small payload. On the other hand, only a handful of missiles can cause a rapid escalation into a more kinetic war; one missile evading countermeasures and successfully striking a substantial target in Russia could draw a response that the world is not yet prepared for.
Russia is probably banking on what the whole world knows is happening…the west trying to funnel as much money as possible through Ukraine before an inauguration, and adopting a scorched earth policy to increase the hardships for the next wave of political leadership in the United States. Putin, though technically allowing himself to use nuclear weapons, probably won’t do so in this instance. He knows the war is largely over, and that an armistice (and the buffer zone he wanted) is only a couple of months away. Despite their rhetoric, Russia is not likely to launch nuclear weapons based on Ukraine striking a few targets inside Russia with a handful of ATACMS missiles.
None of this is particularly comforting for the American taxpayer, however. If the cultural norm is changing to allow for an outgoing regime to try to start WWIII so that the incoming regime has to deal with it…this is a very dangerous game that highlights that the apolitical decorum within Washington (however minimal) that has maintained some level of stability over the years is largely gone.
Analyst: S2A1
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