Submarines in Swedish Waters
Friday, February 27, 2026
I try to keep current on revelations in the spy world, but this one got by me, perhaps because it was more of a psychological operation (psyop) than a spy operation to collect secret information.
When Ronald Reagan became president in 1981, he took a more aggressive approach to relations with the Soviet Union, which eventually lead to its collapse a decade later. The 2009 book Reagan's Secret War: The Untold Story of His Fight to Save the World from Nuclear Disaster outlines this policy.
In trying to put maximum pressure on the Soviet Union, Reagan wanted to use airfields in Sweden in the event of a war. However, Sweden's left-of-center prime minister Olof Palme wanted to steer a neutral course between nato and the Soviet Union. Swedish popular opinion supported this approach, with only 6% perceiving the Soviet Union as a direct threat.
The October 1981 grounding soviet submarine S-363 in Swedish waters, popularly known as "Whiskey on the Rocks", negatively affected Swedish public opinion toward the Soviet Union, and it got more negative in the years following with repeated submarine sightings, though never any clear submarine identification.
The details above are well known — what is now becoming clear is the involvement of nato, and specifically the usa and the uk. First, it is no longer clear that the grounding of S-363 was an accident. Actions on the ship point to possible intentional mistakes made by crew members to cause the grounding, and perhaps the involvement of the United States in interfering the submarine's navigational instruments.
As far as the decade of other submarine incursions, often with periscopes being displayed much more visibly then normal, and Swedish defense attempts often aborted at the last minute, it is clear that these submarines wanted to be seen, and that someone in the Swedish navy didn't want the submarine identities to be revealed. Four Swedish studies have come up with few conclusions, citing with lack of cooperation and much evidence missing.
This paper by the International Peace Research Institute Oslo, this 2005 video and this 2020 German video all come to the same conclusion — that nato countries were behind most of these incidents, and the incidents supported nato's interest in moving Sweden away from the Soviet Union. This three-part blog series (1, 2, 3) by Ola Tunander has many more details, and his blog series about a specific intrusion (1, 2, 3) clearly points to a uk submarine.
The mechanics of this operation are complex. Secretary of Defense at the time Caspar Weinberger admitted that nato submarines were often sent to Sweden to test their defenses, but with the approval of the Swedish naval leadership. It is very possible the naval leadership didn't tell anyone, and once the tests were over and the submarines not identified, they would not need to tell anyone. If a submarine was ever caught, nato could say it was a test and we informed the Swedish naval leadership, and the naval leadership could say we wanted the test to be realistic. It is clear from reports that the Swedish naval leadership gave orders to help the submarines escape without detection.
With Sweden now a nato member, it is time for nato to reveal details of all the operations they performed in Swedish waters. It is very possible nato has already done this, but the embarrassment that Swedish naval leadership cooperated with this deception is too embarrassing for Sweden to share with the public.
RSS
Thursday, February 26, 2026
I have always been fascinated about how submarines work (video) and the history of their use. I have been fortunate to have visited the following submarines:
The uss Codd has the best set of videos.
Post a CommentWednesday, February 25, 2026
Last year I wrote about the falsities of plastics recycling. This new video talks more specifically about the politics of the plastics industry, and states, "they didn't really need it [recycling] to work; they needed people to believe that it was working." This report has many more details.
Post a CommentTuesday, February 24, 2026
I read several news articles a day, and sometimes I read the article's comments. Fifty days ago I read an article about Venezuela, and one of the comments to that article by dFreeThinker made an impact on me:
It's not everyday that someone takes the past few years and wraps it up into a nice package, but this poster has achieved it.
Post a CommentMonday, February 23, 2026
When the Euro currency was created by the European Union in 1999, it promised a single currency that could unify an economic zone to rival the United States. In my trips to Europe in the early 2000's, Europeans waxed at how their new currency would challenge the United States for dominance.
How things have changed.
While the European Union added countries, and then
lost the United Kingdom, the European economic zone never came to rival
the United States. In fact the gap between the United States and European economies has gotten only larger since 1999
(report,
report) — this
quote says it all:
I haven't heard "the EU will rival the USA" in a long time; it has been replaced with "we are happy we are not the USA", with various reasons for "happy." But stating what you are not is not a definition of what you are, and in the past few months the cracks in this world view are starting to show. The National Review article, "Europe Is Delusional", captures the current state of European thought. Its portrait of Europe is not kind:
I read this article in early December, and it pulled into focus things I had seen recently but not noticed as a pattern. This video explains the six causes of European stagnation, which the video calls suicide because it is entirely self-inflicted. The items are:
This video is a more financial approach, but comes to the same conclusions.
Europeans are starting to wake up to the problems. This video is from a German who moved to the United States and realized that life in the United States is much more pleasant than he expected. Germany's leader just called for people to work more hours, citing serious problems with the Germany economy. This article takes an historical view of what has brought about revolution in the past, and predicts Europe is ripe for change.
In my trip to Europe last month, I expressed my concerns about the future of Europe, and rather than getting the dismissive answers I have come to expect, I got a consistent and clear message — Europeans have become lazy, and Europe relies too much on the United States. Probably the most visible expression of European concern came from a visit to the Munich Security Conference by Marco Rubio last week (review). It was received much more favorably than last year's JD Vance's speech. What a difference a year can make! Let's hope next year has even more changes for Europe. If not, Europe will continue its decline, the power gap between the United States and Europe will expand, and Europe will be decreasingly relevant.