Submarines in Swedish territorial waters 1980–2000:
Some clarifications to Dr. Krister Wahlbäck's observations
by Rolf Ekéus, Special Investigator
| Although I was able in July last year to present some short comments on a draft of the paper written by Ambassador Wahlbäck, I would like to expand on those comments here for two reasons. Firstly it was an early draft, which had been revised and expanded in many aspects, and secondly because I would like to give the readers a more complete picture of my views on Wahlbäck's article. One basic point, which Wahlbäck has obviously disregarded or not understood, is that the two public investigators[1] , which I have been tasked by the Swedish Government to carry out, are linked. One must therefore read the Government's two directives together. As Investigator I had to adhere to the directives' wordings. The directive for the investigation on submarines[2] states that my task was, inter alia
The Government stated explicitly that I should not deal with the issue of whether foreign submarine activities had occurred in Swedish territorial waters or not. That matter was already investigated. The assignment included a statement that the Government considered it of importance that a general survey from a security political point of view of the political and military acting during the years 1969 – 1989 would be carried out. The Government considered it convenient that also this assignment should be given to me. This directive[3] is rather short. My task was twofold,
One would for obvious reasons find the broader and in depth analysis of matters related to the security policy in the latter report, which actually contains some 8000 pages. The main emphasis in the first investigation is naturally on questions related to the submarine intrusions. The chapter on the security environment in that report consists of only ten pages. However, there are no differences in substance between the two reports as regards the description of security issues. When Wahlbäck is commenting on the ten pages on the security environment, which he calls "A perspective suggested" and "A perspective examined" he is trying to find points to criticise. It goes without saying that when you make a very concise description of the military-political changes in Europe after the Second World War, you must assume that the reader is knowledgeable enough to understand, that when one writes that the Soviet Union commenced a successive process of changing the doctrine based on the idea that a military conflict in Central Europe not necessarily had to escalate to the level of strategic nuclear war, that the earlier doctrine included massive use of tactical nuclear weapons. It is remarkable that Wahlbäck, as a former diplomat and historian in security policy matters, is obviously not aware of the plans within the Warsaw Pact (WP) to sea transport a part of the logistics needed for a sustained offensive in Central Europe, and that these transports were among the most important targets for the NATO naval forces in the Baltic. The planners within the WP staffs realised that NATO would in a war on the European Continent try to destroy not only the logistics depots etc. located close behind the front line, but also the vital but vulnerable land communications from the logistics bases further east through air and missile attacks. To be able to transport enough logistics for maintaining the needed high offensive pace the WP forces could not solely depend on land transports; a certain part of the logistics (ammunition, fuel, replacement vehicles, etc.) had to be sea transported. The ships which were to carry out those logistic transports (by Wahlbäck erroneously called "maintenance transports" or "troop transports") were to freight their cargoes from ports in the Bay of Finland, the Bay of Riga and probably also ports like Ventspiels and Liepaja, to ports on the coasts of Poland and the German Democratic Republic (GDR – East Germany). The use of the railway ferry line between Klaipeda and Mukran was probably also included in the plans. The fact that the WP planned for those sea transports was well known by Swedish intelligence and was confirmed by general Jaruzelski during my conversation with him in September last year. Her also said that the Warsaw Pact expected the transports to be attacked by NATO submarines. Swedish historians, who are well informed on these matters, like Wilhelm Agrell, have described the WP sea transports along the Baltic coast.[4] The NATO naval forces in the Baltic had the three main tasks, to deny the WP the use of the Baltic Approaches, to participate in the defence of Denmark by attacking possible attempted invasions and to impede the WP sea transports along the eastern coasts of the Baltic Sea. The NATO naval forces assigned for the Baltic consisted of comparatively small missile crafts, fighter-bombers (German Tornados) and submarines. The West German submarine force was divided into two flotillas, of which one was in times of peace based in Kiel. The shallow waters between the Danish Isles and the GDR, make it obvious that a base in the far end of the Bay of Kiel can not be of any use in times of war. The submarines as well as other naval assets have to be deployed somewhere else before the commencement of hostilities. It would of course have been possible to use some Danish ports as temporary bases for submarines, but the coastline is open and it is not easy to hide naval vessels in those ports. Moreover, the Danish waters are shallow and far from ideal for submarine operations. With these facts in mind it is quite obvious that planners in NATO staffs were looking at the Swedish archipelagos as possible temporary resorts from WP antisubmarine forces. There thus existed a clear motive for West German submarines to use the Swedish archipelagos in a war between NATO and the WP. In the context of motives I have to emphasise the difference between motives and confirmed intrusions into Swedish territorial waters of foreign submarines. Let me stress that – with the exception of U 137 – there are no intrusions where the violating country has been identified. There is nowhere in the Report any reference to a confirmed intrusion of a West German – or NATO for that matter – submarine (apart from the sub which reported that it had mistakenly crossed the territorial border outside Simrishamn in 1990). But, as said, the West German had motives for using the Swedish archipelagos in times of war. Whether they would actually do so, is of course, uncertain. An important factor would of course be Sweden's political situation, neutral or already belligerent. One could naturally assume that as a belligerent, probably after having attacked by WP forces, Sweden would have no objections to NATO requests for using Swedish territory for different purposes, and that the West Germans therefore had no reasons for incursions in times of peace. On the other hand, operations planned to be executed in a war situation need to be practiced in times of peace. If there were motives for NATO – in the first place West German – submarines to carry out clandestine operations in Swedish territorial waters as preparations for possible similar actions in a war against WP, there were probably stronger motives for the Soviet Union - having the largest fleet of submarines in the Baltic (the few Polish submarines did certainly not operate without consent from the Soviet Baltic Fleet) – to penetrate the Swedish archipelagos. A number of possible motives have over the years been suggested in public investigations, articles and books dealing with the security policy matters. For my part I have written in the Report my views on this. In his critical article Wahlbäck is trying to make the reader believe that I consider NATO and the Soviet Union being put "on equal footing as potential violators". This is a grave, I would even say intentional, misinterpretation. I have clearly stated (page 335) that "the motives behind the intrusions have been relatively evenly divided between East and West. - - - It is, however, inescapable albeit the policy of neutrality declared by Sweden, that Moscow during the planning process must have coldly calculated that Sweden in a major conflict with implications for the Baltic would rally round the Western states. The Soviet Union as the in numbers definitely strongest naval power in the Baltic, can hence consider herself having reasons for making incursions into Swedish territory. Those premises indicate that it is hardly possible to exclude the Soviet Union as a possible violating power, but that is has not been possible in one single case, with exception of the Gåsefjärden U 137 incident, to make a formal determination of nationality, among other things because underwater craft from West can not have been excluded during any of the confirmed or assumed submarine intrusions." If one reads this text carefully, one realises, that I considered the Soviet Union being the Baltic state, which was most likely to be "the culprit" for the intrusions. However, when you have not been able to identify the intruder, you must also take other states which might have motives, like certain member states of NATO, into consideration. The discussion on the nationality of the intruding submarines must be separated from the discussion on motives. As I have said both the Soviet Union and NATO had clear interests in the Swedish archipelagos in a war situation and thus motives for carrying out secret operations in times of peace. Let me also emphasise that I as an Investigator can not in my Report to the Government deliver any guesses; I have to present facts and assessments based on those facts. There is a clear difference between what one knows and what one believes. I should like in this context to comment on Wahlbäck's remarkable note that "submarine incursions in the Gulf of Bothnia can hardly be seen as motivated by a need to explore staging areas for attacking convoys in the Baltic Sea". I have not in any way in the Report indicated that the reasons for incursions in the Gulf of Bottnia would have been the same as for those taken place in the Baltic Sea. The comment by Carl Bildt, reported by Wahlbäck, "that West German submarines preparing to hide in Swedish territorial waters would hardly have sought out naval base areas close to the coast," is astonishing. I have not in any way indicated that West German submarines were behind the incidents in the naval bases at Hårsfjärden and Karlskrona. Neither have I said that it is only one nation responsible for the incursions. As to the number of incursions and the locations where they have taken place, Wahlbäck has been informed by the Secretariat that this, in accordance with the Government's assignment, was not part of my task. However, in order to be able to evaluate how the different incidents have been handled politically and militarily, I have analysed in depth a number of the more important or debated of the many submarine incidents, which occurred during the period studied. To give the reader an overview of the yearly number of indications on suspected unknown underwater activities, I have in the Report copied the figures presented by the Submarine Commission 1995, corrected for the new information provided after the printing of its Report[5] I have already in the first chapter stated, which Wahlbäck has noted, that the Report from the Submarine Commission was considered as a point of departure, and that my assignment was different from that of the Commission. The Commission stated that the number of confirmed intrusions was nine. In order not to be interpreted as formally endorsing the figure presented by the Submarine Commission I chose to write "less than ten". Hence there is no discrepancy in this respect between the two reports. As to the phrase on page 334 "In addition some thirty incidents are considered having such substance that the possibility of [a] violation [of the territory] in those cases must be taken seriously", it has been chosen to indicate that a number of indications of incursions have been registered, but eventually been assessed by the Supreme Commander not containing proof enough to be reported to the Government as a confirmed violation of the territory. I have intentionally avoided words like "possible intrusions", "probable intrusions", etc., which have in the past been used in the reporting, and always raised questions on how they should be interpreted. It is extremely difficult to establish clear dividing lines between "possible", "probable", etc. indications and those which probably are not originated from foreign underwater activities. However, the round figure of "some thirty" plus "less than ten" is not far from what has been stated by others. It is unclear what Wahlbäck is referring to when mentioning "much higher numbers of 'probable incidents'" presented by the 1995 Commission. As one can read in the statistics in my Report (pages 218 - 220), I have stated that between 1981 and 2000 64 indications on foreign underwater activities in Swedish territorial waters have, after careful evaluation by the concerned regional staff, been determined as "Underwater activity"[6] . But the fact that an indication is determined as "Underwater activity" does not mean that the Supreme Commander in his report to the Government judges the indication as a confirmed violation of the territory. The number of confirmed submarine intrusions is hence much lower. In the seminar referred to by Wahlbäck (page 25) the former Primer Minister Calrl Bildt stated that "even with very conservative assessments and with the [number of] confirmed or almost confirmed intrusions mentioned by the Submarine Commission, one will end up with an average number of several [submarine] operations each year during a relatively long period of time". The former Supreme Commander, General Bengt Gustafsson said in his address at the same seminar, that during the close to eight years he was in charge of the Swedish Armed Forces 16 confirmed intrusions occurred. However, he included some incursions which obviously were not reported to the Government as confirmed, but included in the "about 30". These figures corroborate rather well with the figures in the Report, approximately 40, during the period 1980 – 1990, or one or two each quarter. As Wahlbäck correctly notes there is an uncertainty as regards the number of indications and thus also regarding the number of confirmed violations. There is, no doubt, a certain number of unrecorded cases where an intruding submarine was not indicated. The number of undetected incursions my thus be higher. As said above the Report contains comprehensive descriptions of some major incidents as a background for the reader. Without these accounts it would be difficult to understand my evaluation and views on the actions taken by the Government and the military authorities. To summarise on a few pages the course of events during an incident, which in some cases lasted over a month, is not an easy task. The sources have been the notes in the diaries of the military units involved, copies of messages transmitted by various means of communication and other documents, as well as interviews with individuals, who participated in the events some 15 or 20 years ago. As Wahlbäck writes on page 24, the information I made public, that intelligence picked up by the Swedish Signal Intelligence Agency (FRA) on the morning of October 28, 1981 seemed to indicate that the Baltic Fleet carried out a Search And Rescue (SAR) operation east of Bornholm, became the news dominating the media coverage when the Report was presented. Wahlbäck presents some arguments why the information presented in the Report is unfounded. The fact that the Soviets, as far as I know, have never invoked this operation as a proof of innocence does not necessarily indicate that the intrusion of U 137 was deliberate. Secondly, there is one fact that links this operation to the grounded sub, and that is the radio communication between the Soviet ASW aircraft flying between Bornholm and the Baltic coast registered by FRA. One message informed the aircraft the "the latest known position of the submarine is 55º03'N, 15º46'E". This position differs exactly with one latitude degree from the position documented in the logbook of U 137 about one hour after it had run aground.[7] The Swedish Signal Intelligence Agency had not registered any radio signals from the grounded submarine before it was detected in the morning of October 28. When my secretariat was able to view the radar films, which had been saved, and found out that three NATO aircraft had been patrolling in the area, it was clear that the submarine had been able to correspond with her base, and that this communication had been intercepted by NATO signal intelligence. As to the puzzling movements of the Soviet naval ships and aircraft, I have in the Report stated that this "seemed to indicate a SAR operation", which is true. When the former Soviet military archives will be opened in the future, we might get a full picture of the Soviet submarine operations in the Baltic during the Cold War. Wahlbäck alleges that I have in the Report showed a "scant interest in deliberate destruction" of submerged military material. Everyone who reads the Report realises that this is not true. When deliberate destruction has been indicated during the incidents described in the Report this has been stated (see pages 165, 1666, 167 and 181). In addition to the statistic on reported indications, mentioned above, I have also reminded the reader, that the issue of deliberate destruction of military material has been dealt with by the Submarine Commission in its report. I should finally like once more to refer to the Government's directive. What Wahlbäck writes about lack of information concerning Swedish - Soviet exchanges on submarine-related issues between the publishing in April 1983 of the Submarine Defence Commission's report[8] and 1991, I can only state that no such official exchanges took place. Which discussions does Wahlbäck have in mind? Does he think of diplomatic cocktail conversations? As Wahlbäck and other critics are fully aware, one can not in an unclassified report include classified facts. It was agreed from the outset that the draft of my Report should be scrutinised by an independent examiner, who checked that no classified information was included. If such information mistakenly would have been included in the Report, it might have caused some problems for e.g. future intelligence collecting. When Wahlbäck insinuates that my assessments do not match the information provided by the Intelligence Directorate at the Supreme Commander's Headquarters, albeit he is quoting my statement that "nothing in this classified information would change the assessments of this Report", I am flabbergasted, to say the least. As an evidence for this Wahlbäck refers in his paper to a comment by Commodere Emil Svensson. It is certainly true that the Naval Analysis Group has never concluded that a NATO power has been the source of any intrusions. But there are in the thousands of reports on indications of submarine intrusions received by the Group some reports, which contain some details which seem to indicate a possibility, that the indication would have been caused by a NATO submarine. The final results of all the hundreds of thorough analyses carried out by the Group have, however, always been that enough evidence for an official statement on nationality was lacking. The comment made by Mr. Bildt on the description of Soviet midget submarines is incomprehensible. Bildt states, according to Wahlbäck, that my description "is erroneous in several key respects" albeit I had been given "a full report of the information available". There is no faulty information in the portion on Soviet midget submarines. It is clearly stated that I have been briefed by Intelligence Directorate and that the information on the Soviet midget submarines is highly classified. The text in the Report is therefore based only on open sources, I have even used Mr. Bildt's address at the meeting with the Royal Academy of War Sciences in 1990 as an open source. Maybe his description of the Soviet midgets subs was erroneous? To sum up: the two public investigations which I have been tasked by the Swedish Government to carry out, are linked. Matters related to security policy are presented and discussed in my report "Peace and Security – Swedish Security Policy 1969 – 1989". The chapter in my report on submarine intrusions dealing with security policy matters is short. I have in discussions, news articles and interviews tried to explain the questions on security policy more in depth. But I must emphasise that there are no differences in substance between the two Reports in this respect. The various critical comments made by Wahlbäck would be of little relevance after having studied my report on security policy. One must keep motives for intrusions apart from intrusions carried out. The Soviet Union as well as NATO had motives for using the Swedish archipelago in times of war. But this fact does not imply that they actually had carried out clandestine operations in Swedish territorial waters. With the exception of U 137 no evidence on the nationality of a submarine violating the Swedish territory has ever been presented. But one can suspect that the Soviet Baltic Fleet, being the in number largest fleet in the Baltic, was behind a number of the intrusions. Incursions by NATO submarines can, however, not be excluded. As Wahlbäck has been told several times, I have had to adhere to the wording in the Government's to directives. It was thus not my job to evaluate and judge the numerous indications on underwater activities during the period 1980 – 2000. Hence, I have not elaborated on the number of intrusions or where they have actually occurred. In intellectual and scientific debates one normally refers to sources, which can be checked. Wahlbäck has preferred to use – whit a few exceptions – anonymous sources. His motive for this is very dubious, "comments attributed to individuals tend to prejudge the reader's mind in one direction or the other, in particular when the issue at hand is emotionally charged". This approach diminishes considerably the value of Wahlbäck's article. In fact it underlines his apparent ambition to throw suspicion on my Report.
Notes[1] The investigation on how the submarine intrusions into Swedish territorial waters 1980 – 2000 were handled politically and militarily (SOU 2001:85) and The investigation on Sweden's security policy 1969 – 1989 (SOU 2002: 108). [2] Dir. 2000: 68, October 5th, 2000. [3] Dir. 2000: 63, October 5th, 2000. [4] Agrell: Bakom ubåtskrisen, p. 116, 118. [5] SOU 1995: 135. [6] Indications on underwater activities were reported in a scale going from (1) to (6). See page 218 in the Report. [7] The submarine ran aground at 18:57 GMT. [8] SOU 1983: 13. |
