Sweden Scraps Plans For 13 Offshore Windfarms Over Russia Security Fears (theguardian.com) 50
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Sweden has vetoed plans for 13 offshore windfarms in the Baltic Sea, citing unacceptable security risks. The country's defence minister, Pal Jonson, said on Monday that the government had rejected plans for all but one of 14 windfarms planned along the east coast. The decision comes after the Swedish armed forces concluded last week that the projects would make it more difficult to defend Nato's newest member.
The proposed windfarms would have been located between Aland, the autonomous Finnish region between Sweden and Finland, and the Sound, the strait between southern Sweden and Denmark. The Russian exclave of Kaliningrad is only about 310 miles (500km) from Stockholm. Wind power could affect Sweden's defence capabilities across sensors and radars and make it harder to detect submarines and possible attacks from the air if war broke out, Jonson said. The only project to receive the green light to was Poseidon, which will include as many as 81 wind turbines to produce 5.5 terawatt hours a year off Stenungsund on Sweden's west coast. "Both ballistic robots and also cruise robots are a big problem if you have offshore wind power," Jonson said. "If you have a strong signal detection capability and a radar system that is important, we use the Patriot system for example, there would be negative consequences if there were offshore wind power in the way of the sensors."
The proposed windfarms would have been located between Aland, the autonomous Finnish region between Sweden and Finland, and the Sound, the strait between southern Sweden and Denmark. The Russian exclave of Kaliningrad is only about 310 miles (500km) from Stockholm. Wind power could affect Sweden's defence capabilities across sensors and radars and make it harder to detect submarines and possible attacks from the air if war broke out, Jonson said. The only project to receive the green light to was Poseidon, which will include as many as 81 wind turbines to produce 5.5 terawatt hours a year off Stenungsund on Sweden's west coast. "Both ballistic robots and also cruise robots are a big problem if you have offshore wind power," Jonson said. "If you have a strong signal detection capability and a radar system that is important, we use the Patriot system for example, there would be negative consequences if there were offshore wind power in the way of the sensors."
Yet another price (Score:5, Insightful)
When you have a belligerent around running its own economy into the ground and invading neighbours for a resource infusion... you have to waste money defending against that aggression.
If everybody would just stay in their own damn yard, we'd have so much more productivity to make people's lives better instead of spending it on a giant game of Risk on behalf of a handful of rich assholes.
Vatnik shill detected (Score:5, Informative)
Russia chose to fail while its counterpart China succeeded spectacularly. Russia is not EUROPEAN country, and a bit of territory does not make it one. Russia is eternal existential enemy to Western civilization of which it was never part.
NATO is a VOLUNTARY alliance of nations not wanting to be victims of eternal Russian imperialism. Of course as a shill you won't find it odd that most of the former Warsaw Pact joined NATO to prevent a repeat invasion.
Re:Vatnik shill detected (Score:4, Interesting)
Russia chose to fail while its counterpart China succeeded spectacularly.
It's not that simple.
Russia turned commie in 1917. By 1991, there was no longer any living memory of how markets worked. People had been born into corruption and cynicism. They were fed lies with their breastmilk. They knew nothing else.
China turned commie in 1949 and started opening up in 1978. Living people had been shopkeepers and factory managers who understood markets and supply & demand.
The level of corruption in China was much less and also different. In Russia, you pay a bribe to some bureaucrat to get your business license, and he steps out of the way so you can deal with the next official with his hand out. In China, they have the concept of guanxi ("connections"). You pay a bribe, and the recipient becomes your champion. He'll guide you through the process, easing things every step of the way. He'll even invite you to his home to meet his family. And, of course, he'll be available (for a fee) to help you with any other problems that arise.
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China is also a culture of "If you were too stupid to get scammed by me, it's your own damn fault".
I wonder how China would do with a better culture.
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When you have a belligerent around running its own economy into the ground and invading neighbours for a resource infusion...
you forgot about the decapitated babies in the oven?
Re:Don't Blame the Boogie Man (Score:4, Insightful)
No, I think I'll decline to blame the organizations Ukraine was looking to for peace and prosperity in the face of Russian aggression.
Putin is, after all, NATO's greatest salesman.
Re:The US would go bananas too (Score:4, Insightful)
Ukraine WAS NEUTRAL when Russia invaded it in 2014. And most of the population was OPPOSED to NATO membership It took half a year of being invaded by Russia for Ukraine to abandon its neutrality. Even after the 2014 invasion, Ukrainians and the west remained highly hesitant to do anything that might "provoke Russia". Even when small numbers of mere Javelins were supplied, they had to remain under lock-and-key and Ukraine wasn't allowed to touch them unless Russia invaded. Let alone foreign troops, let alone "some nukes". Had there actually been western troops, let alone "some nukes" on Ukraine, Russia surely wouldn't have invaded.
Ukraine is not Russia's plaything. It's tens of millions of people with their own views on their future. And that view is not Russian autocracy; it's Europe. Which Russia refuses to let them have.
While Russia continually rearmed, assassinated dissidents, sabotaged western elections, and on and on, the west continuously ignored the threat. There was basically no US military presence in eastern Europe at all before 2014. No heavy armour. US troops only in Germany, UK and Italy, at greatly reduced levels from the Cold War. Patriot Missile batteries only in Germany. No THAAD. No Aegis Ashore. The eastern front was effectively abandoned.
After 2014, the US "reacted", but only barely. Enhanced Forward Presence deployed about 1k troops to Poland, and there were a couple thousand rotating troops in eastern Europe. 80-90 Abrams and ~150 Bradley were deployed (to put these numbers into perspective, Russia had tens of thousands of tanks and armoured vehicles). Two Patriot batteries were deployed and one AEGIS Ashore system, and there were enhanced air and naval patrols (but nothing even resembling what Russia was doing before and after 2014). The reaction was grossly under-proportional to the emerging threat.
In each case, had NATO had a stronger presence, the invasions probably wouldn't have happened. The only thing that expansionist authoritarian dictators respect is strength. Weakness is always encouragement to take more.
Social saboteurs like you remind me (Score:5, Interesting)
what a tragedy failing to nuke Moscow before Stalin got nukes really was.
Blame it on Sweden (Score:3)
Re:Blame it on Sweden (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think Putin's dumb enough or desperate enough to invade a NATO country, but you can be damn sure he'd sabotage a wind farm or use it to make sabre-rattling more credible. Especially if it made him look 'strong' domestically.
Re: (Score:3)
Plinking at a wind farm at sea is exactly the kind of petty shit the Russians would enjoy. Sweden is being wise here.
Re:Blame it on Sweden (Score:4, Insightful)
you can be damn sure he'd sabotage a wind farm
That isn't their worry. Their worry is that the wind farm will interfere with their air defenses and detecting incoming threats.
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I doubt Putin would directly and overtly invade a NATO country. Instead, you'd have a bunch of "pro-Russian locals" in one particular region of the country who are "being oppressed" and "ask for help" from Russia, to which Russia "provides humanitarian aid", and all of the sudden the "separatists" have professional military training and armoured columns and air defense systems, which they "found in local arms depots", including systems that the host country never possessed.
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You can see this process at work right now in Moldova or Georgia. And of course, the Crimean operation was such a success, with such a feeble response from the west, that Putin just decided to take the whole country.
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If there is a war between NATO and Russia, then it is NATO that has started it and driven Russia to it. Russia isn't stupid enough to go to war by itself with NATO unless really provoked, Russia doesn't have the resources.
And don't count on a war between NATO and Russia using conventional weapons. If a war is started, it'll be the end of most of the world as the only thing Russia can do is launch all their nuclear missiles as it knows it can't win any conventional war with NATO. And NATO knows this, and is
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Sounds more like an excuse to me
The real threat is zero or near zero. Russia attacking a NATO member would trigger Article 5.
This is a political convenience
Re: (Score:2)
The interferences of the turbines create radar blind spots over water, and vibrations and simply sound under water, which affects sonar.
The sonar situation in the Baltic sea is: "complicated".
Different layers of different temperatured water, and different salt levels, not only horizontally but also vertically at river mouths makes it easy for submarines to sneak around.
Adding "extra background noise" makes it even more easy.
Oh for fucks sake (Score:1)
Confidence requires credible preparation. (Score:3)
That includes designing everything with military advantage in mind.
You're clearly too young to have experienced the early Cold War so you can have no idea regarding the permanent Russian threat, but while this may be incredibly difficult to understand there is more to maintaining secular democracy than wishful thinking.
Russia will never cease to be an enemy. It is not some modern nation temporarily afflicted with a bad administration, but I don't expect you to know that either since it's not an orthodox lef
Re: (Score:3)
Which pretty much justifies Russia's assumption that NATO is not really a "defensive alliance" and an independent Ukraine joining NATO really is a serious threat to their security. Along with this:
Utter nonsense. When the Soviet Union broke up, the west gave Russia a complete do-over, wiping the slate clean, with an invitation to join the community of nations as a full partner. But they went with corrupt oligarchs and decided to appoint a new Czar for life, who then apparently decided he wanted their old territories back. No one wanted Russia as an enemy, until they started down the path of rebuilding their old Russian empire again by violent means.
They had a chance at redemption, and they decided
What are ballistic robots? (Score:2)
Something ChatGPT just invented?
Re: (Score:2)
Oh man, but "ballistic robots" sounds like a cool sci-fi weapon system ;) You launch them, they arrive in half an hour, ride a heat shield through reentry, fire retrorockets, march off wielding heavy weapons in a coordinated assault, and immediately seize the objective that they were launched to take.
Sweden saw what happened to Germany and Finland. (Score:4, Insightful)
Ossis and other Kremlin shills ensured Germany would depend on Russian resource extraction so the usual pattern of former Commies monetizing their old connections would not just be confined to Russia.
It's worth reminding Russian history in that region gives every reason to be militarily prepared which includes reducing economic therefore social vulns. The Russo-Finnish war is still in living memory and Sweden knows Russia can easily finish returning to its natural (s)talinism Putin regrets losing.
War (Score:2)
Sure makes Peace difficult.
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No good commie bastards ;) (Score:2)
Problem is (Score:3, Informative)
The issue is that radar reflections from windmills create a massive blind spot behind them in radar coverage. This is the reason why we in Finland block building of windmills across a lot of East and North. In spite of locals really wanting to get access to massive amount of government subsidies, and being some of the relatively poorest regions of the country.
There have been several official reports issued on the subject, this being the latest iirc:
https://julkaisut.valtioneuvos... [valtioneuvosto.fi]
Issue with radars are only one page (172), but it's put last because the goal of the paper is to "advancing building of wind power", and that one just torpedoes the whole thing in large swathes of the nation by stating that "blind spot creation effects cannot be technologically mitigated".