“We have seen incidents of sabotage taking place across NATO countries over a period of the last couple of years, by which I mean derailment of trains, acts of arson, attacks on politicians’ property, plots to assassinate industry leaders, like publicly the head of Rheinmetall, but there were other plots as well,” Appathurai told a European Parliament committee meeting on hybrid warfare Tuesday morning.
According to Appathurai, the Russians recruit personnel for their plots online, using “criminal gangs or unwitting youth or migrants” to carry out the criminal acts.
“They are generally crudely done, but they are done with a purpose, which is to create disquiet to undermine support for Ukraine,” the NATO official added.
Western allies have been supporting Ukraine with weapons for years as it attempts to fend off Russian President Vladimir Putin’s ongoing full-scale invasion.
Appathurai told the members of the European Parliament that Russia’s strategic doctrine is to achieve victory through political victory, “using whatever tools you have,” including damage to infrastructure or political interference.
Appathurai said that Europe needs to get out of its “boiling frog” mentality and echoed NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, who said in a speech last December it’s time to shift to a “wartime mindset.”
“The secretary-general said in his first speech that we need a war mentality, including because there is a continuous and escalating campaign of destabilization against all of our countries. Up to and including sabotage,” Appathurai told POLITICO after the hearing.
Antoaneta Roussi contributed to this report.
