Secretary of State and National Security Adviser Marco Rubio warned that the war in Ukraine could spread to other countries through sabotage operations or accidental drone incursions. Multiple NATO states have blamed Russia for conducting sabotage operations.
“We see nothing good coming from [the Ukraine] war,” Rubio said. “We see a lot of downside to it, including the very real risk of escalation and spread of this thing… into another country because of a failed sabotage attack, because of drones that are hit with electronic warfare and they wander into a neighboring country.”
In July, Latvian President Edgars Rinkevics said intelligence agencies in several NATO states had identified attempted sabotage operations. “Information we are getting from Lithuanian, Latvian and other NATO states, from various agencies there, shows various attempts to do sabotage and to lower the security in our states,” he said.
Last month, Estonia blamed Russia for a fire at the Milrem Robotics facility in Tallinn. Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna said the fire was “an act of sabotage ordered by the special services of the Russian Federation.”
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov denied Tallinn’s allegation. He said Estonia’s allegations were “unfounded, ill-considered, absolutely not reflecting the reality, not containing any substantiation whatsoever,” adding that Russia “cannot take such statements seriously, and we won’t.”
Since July, Romania, Poland, and Finland have claimed that Russian drones violated their airspace. Ukraine also asserted that Russian electronic warfare redirected Ukrainian drones into Lithuanian airspace.
Moscow views NATO’s extensive support for Ukraine as amounting to the bloc waging war against Russia. So far, the incidents have not led to direct conflict between Russia and a member of the North Atlantic alliance. However, tensions in Europe are escalating. Last month, Moscow warned NATO that it was prepared to use nuclear weapons if the alliance attempted to isolate the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad.
