Joint Expeditionary Force nations.

Ever since the Nord Stream pipelines were damaged, in September 2022, there has been a lot of talk about the need to protect Critical Undersea Infrastructure (UCI) including concern about the possibility of damaging or surreptitiously tapping into undersea cables.

Some US agency is likely to get this job. Frankly I don’t see this as a job for the Coast Guard since we have very little underwater surveillance capability, but I may be wrong. The Coast Guard would probably at least be asked to report suspicious activity that might be recognized by Maritime Domain Awareness systems and if there is damage to a pipeline, the Coast Guard would certainly be called in to deal with the pollution.

Still, it may be interesting to see what the Europeans are doing. Navy Lookout reports,

“On 28th November Defence Ministers from the Joint Expeditionary (JEF) nations agreed to activate a ‘Response Option’. This will take the form of a Royal Navy-led effort to bolster the security of undersea infrastructure and deter hybrid threats. Since the destruction of the NordStream pipeline in September 2022 and the attack on the Baltic Connector pipeline in October 2023, there has been increasing concern about underwater Russian activity. The Defence Secretary described this as “This historic and unprecedented agreement”. It has certainly been a long time since the UK conducted multi-lateral military activity in the European area that was not done under the auspices of NATO.”

Interestingly, the effort will include two Royal Navy River class Batch One Offshore Patrol Vessels, HMS Severn and HMS Tyne, that are the British equivalent of US Coast Guard Medium Endurance Cutters, except that they do not include flight decks. There was no mention of whether they might be equipped with Unmanned Undersea Vehicles.

Thanks to Lee for bringing this to my attention.