
When a fire broke out in Ikea in Vilnius in Lithuania this month, few passed any remarks until the Polish prime minister, Donald Tusk, suggested it could have been the work of a foreign saboteur.
Comment: Ikea??
Investigators have already alleged potential Russian involvement in an arson attack in east London, an inferno that destroyed the largest shopping mall in Poland, a sabotage attempt in Bavaria in Germany and antisemitic graffiti in Paris.
Comment: What's perhaps most telling about the above list is that the most significant fires and explosions, that were likely sabotage, have been against the US and Europe's energy and food supplies.
Are these leaders avoiding commenting on those much more significant incidents and details because their own governments have brazenly attacked the food supply chain in their war on farming, and because it's widely understood they conspired to cover up the West's destruction of Nord Stream?
Do they perhaps realise that to draw attention to the obvious and compelling connection between their agendas and the sabotage incidents might actually implicate themselves? (August 2023) Huge fire erupts at grain silos at French Atlantic port, follows explosions of silos in Turkey, Brazil, in last 2 weeks
While there is no evidence that any of these incidents across the continent are coordinated, security services believe they could be part of an attempt by Moscow to destabilise the west, which has backed Ukraine.
They point out that after the cold war, foreign intelligence operations consisted of spies and their handlers, but in the era of social media, vandals can be hired, leaving few connections to other attackers as pay-as-you-go saboteurs paid a few hundred euros or in cryptocurrency.
Such is the emerging concern that these hybrid attacks could be the work of Russia that the issue was raised at a summit of foreign and defence ministers in Brussels this week with Dutch, Estonian and Lithuanian security officials all warning of national vulnerabilities.
One minister, who asked not to be named said, they were deeply worried about "sabotage, physical sabotage, organised, financed and done by Russian proxies".
Last week, Tusk revealed Polish authorities had arrested nine people in connection with acts of sabotage allegedly committed on the orders of Russian services.
He said the crimes allegedly included "beatings, arson and attempted arson" with investigators looking into whether Russia was involved in the fire in a shopping centre in Warsaw, a claim the Russian embassy described as a conspiracy theory.
Comment: Considering the crashing economies in the West, these fires could just be self-sabotage in order to commit insurance fraud.
A spokesperson for Ikea said investigations were continuing into the source of the fire in Lithuania but it was among the examples, along with an attempted arson attack on a paint factory in Poland, that Tusk cited in his warning of potential foreign interference.
In April, a British man was accused of orchestrating an arson attack on two units linked to a Ukrainian businessman in an industrial estate in Leyton, east London, after allegedly being recruited by Russian intelligence. The Crown Prosecution Service claimed he was "engaged in conduct targeting businesses which were linked to Ukraine in order to benefit the Russian state".
On Tuesday, the Estonian defence minister, Hanno Pevkur, in Brussels for an EU defence summit, said the country had already been the victim of Russian sabotage.
"They have conducted similar operations in Estonia. They hired 10 people to attack the car of the interior minister and a journalist's car. This is normal behaviour of Russia. We are sorry to say but we need to understand that Russia is more and more aggressive towards European countries and also Nato countries," he said.
Comment: If this was true, surely they've provided the world with the evidence? As Russia is doing with regards to the West-Ukraine's connections to the terrorist attack at the Crocus concert hall?
He was referring to incidents in February when the windows of cars belonging to the interior minister, Lauri Läänemets, and a journalist were smashed.
Six people were arrested shortly afterwards, including Russian nationals and dual Russian-Estonian citizens, the prosecutor said.
In Germany, there are also suspicions of foreign intelligence-driven attacks in addition to a wave of cyber-attacks in 2023 by a hacker group linked to Russian intelligence.
Comment: Despite one of the most notorious hacker groups being Israeli-linked? And Germany, today, being Israel's #2 weapons supplier? Predatory Sparrow: The terrorist attacks of an Israel-linked hacker group
Last month, two German-Russian nationals were arrested on suspicion of plotting sabotage attacks including on a military base in Bavaria. The main suspect has been accused of plotting an explosion, arson and maintaining contact with Russian intelligence.
Comment: Apparently 'Russian-backed' saboteurs are easier to catch than other known European criminals who then go on stabbing attacks: (Dec 2023) 1 tourist dead after Paris knife attack, assailant was known by authorities for terrorist plans & radical Islam views
Investigators in France are considering whether graffiti painted on Paris's Holocaust memorial last week was ordered by Russian security services.
It has echoes of an attack last year when the Star of David was spray-painted on buildings in and around Paris, prompting fears of a recurrence of Nazi-era attempts to identify the homes of Jewish people. Authorities later said they believed the attack may have been a "demand" of an individual living abroad.
Comment: Despite faked hate crimes being surprisingly common amongst some minority groups:
The attacks, European officials fear, add to an already proliferating disinformation campaign. On Wednesday, several schools around Athens were evacuated after a bomb hoax. Police traced the stunt to a Russian server and said it was aimed at "disrupting public order".
EU countries are tracking these events. Lithuania's national crisis management centre (NKVC) has warned businesses including shopping centres and organisations supporting Ukraine to heighten their vigilance.
Vilmantas Vitkauskas, the head of the NKVC, told reporters two weeks ago: "The threat level is quite high. We urge the public to remain vigilant."
Comment: This fearmongering has echoes of lockdown; one could fall victim anytime at the hands of a hidden enemy.
On Monday, the Dutch national coordinator for security and counter-terrorism warned of the risk of subversive operations in the Netherlands including "espionage and pre-positioning for sabotage of vital infrastructure".
In Brussels on Tuesday, the Dutch defence minister, Kajsa Ollongren, said Russia was "trying to intimidate" Nato countries, making EU member states vulnerable.
"Yes, we are vulnerable. I think all of us are. We have vital infrastructure. We have seabed infrastructure, we have electricity supplies, water supplies, we're vulnerable to cyber-attacks. We are seeing now in several European countries that Russia is trying to destabilise us and also to intimidate us.
Comment: Europe's leadership don't need external help in destabilising their own countries.
"I think this has been a way that Russia and also the Soviet Union has worked throughout recent history, really; in the 75 years of Nato I think we've seen it often," she said.
Nato's secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, has also pointed the finger at Moscow. "We have seen several arrests across the alliance and different Nato allied countries of people who are accused of arson or sabotage. These are of course ongoing legal processes," he said. "But what I can say is that we have seen increased Russian intelligence activity across the alliance. Therefore we have increased our vigilance."
Comment: Whilst all countries are involved in intelligence operations, if there was any solid evidence that Russia was involved in any of this sabotage, they would surely have provided it. What's particularly notable is the timing, because these incidents have been on the rise for a few years now; the incidents that they fail to highlight, such as those against food and energy supplies; as well as the fact that a significant number of these incidents have happened over in the US.
As documented on Wikipedia, Russia, too, has suffered a surge of at least 150 suspicious fires and explosions at various locations - including energy infrastructure, military installations and shopping malls - since the start of its SMO in Ukraine; are we to believe that Russia has been attacking itself?
When it comes to self-sabotage, the difference between the West and Russia is that the West is demonstrably and knowingly destroying their own economies, Russia is not. For some in the West, destroying the food and energy supply chain is ideological, that's not the case in Russia. Hence Russia wouldn't attack itself, but factions in the West just might. And with the additional benefit of being able to blame Russia.
Note that it's Western governments that are deindustrialising their economies, and food supply chains, in pursuit of their fanatical, and deadly, green agenda: