The day of our Navy commemorates the feat of Premuda of 10 June 1918. This year the celebrations will take place on 9 June in La Spezia where it has just ended Seafuture (convention of maritime technologies, unique in the Mediterranean basin because it was held inside a Naval Base), an appointment now of growing importance both for the Mediterranean and for Italy.
During the academic works of Seafuture we started from the confirmation that, over the centuries, human activities have exploited two domains, the land and the sea, and that since the twentieth century, thanks to technological change, the sky has been added first, then space, and more recently the cyber domain.
We live in an era characterized by enormous transformations of which at least three deserve particular importance and are the return of geopolitical competition, technological acceleration and climate change.
These three transformations are challenging many of the assumptions on which our strategies, policies, militaries and economies have been developed.
Notably, there is also renewed competition in the maritime domain. This is the reason why, for years now, we have been talking about "Fourth Battle for the Atlantic", but there is also growing apprehension at the competition in the (Eastern) Mediterranean, at the militarization of the South China Sea by People's China or at the Arctic and the Strait of Malacca and the Dardanelles Strait controlled by Turkish autarky.
Unfortunately, we cannot ignore what has been happening since the beginning of the aggression in Ukraine. On the one hand, there are intense clashes that mainly affect the land dimension, but, on the other, we cannot ignore the growth in the presence of naval assets - surface and underwater - which are the cornerstone of the operations of the Russian Navy.
What happened to the pipeline Nord Stream 2 (the dynamics and which of the conflicting parties are not yet clarified) must make us reflect on the safety and need to defend submarine cables, gas and oil pipelines.
Indirect, hybrid or unconventional attack has always played a central role in both Russian strategic thinking and military practices. The damage to the Kakhovka dam could also be included in this series, with due caution in attributing paternity. It is therefore important to also focus on the vulnerability of the seas and waters, and in particular, of theunderwater, in this geopolitical phase, which can be exploited by adversaries and competitors to undermine national well-being and security, or as a form of coercion to weaken our unity or our policies.
During the work in La Spezia, the Undersecretary of State for Defense Matteo Perego di Cremnago stressed how vital what is happening above and below the surface of the Mediterranean is for our country.
The invention of submarines, at the beginning of the twentieth century, radically changed the control and contention for the seas. Specifically, in the current geopolitical context, due to the return of strategic competition, technological acceleration and climate change, the world underwater is assuming, and will assume, growing importance:
- about 80% of world trade transits by sea and submarines are the most effective means of interrupting naval trade, as they are more difficult to spot;
- the seabed offers significant natural resources: in addition to gas and oil, which we already exploit, there are reserves of silver, gold, copper, manganese, cobalt and zinc;
- gas and oil are also transported by submarine gas and oil pipelines;
- the internet, and therefore modern communications, depend on submarine cables, on which about 10 trillion dollars move every day.
Talking about underwater, it is useful to remember that we know the Moon much better than the depths of the sea and this is the reason why, the underwater world still remains relatively sparsely populated, certainly less populated than the terrestrial and aerial domains.
Developments in robotics, automation, sensors and communications make the underwater world increasingly open to new human penetration, both civilian and military.
The use of unmanned, autonomous, semi-autonomous or automated platforms offer significant opportunities, including the ability to operate more continuously in some areas, and therefore carry out more monitoring. But this use can also represent a trap or a threat, when it is the work of malevolent actors or adversaries.
Developments in sensors allow for a better and deeper understanding, in all senses, of the underwater world, including the effects of climate change and to identify natural resources to be exploited. This increased submarine activity needs to be encouraged, supported, regulated and even monitored.
Finally, greater and more intense communications between surface, underwater and seabed platforms represent an important transformation for the world underwater.
The use of commercial underwater drones is now a fact: they can be a source of entertainment, they can have commercial purposes, but they can also be used for military purposes. However, these drones can be intercepted, hijacked or the information they collect maliciously extracted as and in the same way we are now painfully accustomed to various types of cyber attacks, from digital fraud to blocking entire computer systems.
Talking about underwater, one generally thinks of military threats posed by submarines and hybrid threats to cables and gas and oil pipelines. Unfortunately, these threats will not end and will probably grow in intensity and then new pitfalls could also emerge. Underwater communications, increasingly frequent and intense, will realistically be subjected to growing attacks to maliciously collect information but also both to deceive operators and even to hijack underwater systems, with or without personnel on board.
It is therefore evident that it appears more than necessary to equip ourselves for this future, from a regulatory point of view, from an operational and doctrinal point of view, and finally from a technological and industrial point of view.
In the aforementioned debate, opened with a speech by Undersecretary Perego of Cremnago “When Cyber Touches the Sea”, it was agreed that today we are witnessing an unprecedented connotation of the cybernetic dimension, we can define it as the "Cyber-Underwater". Rear Admiral Procaccini reiterated that the Navy has a rich and consolidated heritage of expertise in the underwater world, the result of a centuries-old experience gained by our crews and with means, often innovative in terms of conception and technology applied to the sea. The awareness of how challenging it is to counter submarine threats and of the potential risk that these threats represent for our national interests, imposes the urgency of implementing concrete actions to provide answers, through initiatives aimed at increasing the security of our strategic infrastructures.
To acquire and maintain technological sovereignty it will be necessary to develop the ability to immediately perceive, indeed anticipate, the guidelines of technological development, at the same time developing effective measures to exploit the opportunities on the military level, where scenarios begin to be defined in which the battlefield will be affected by hybrid threats, increased competition for access to natural resources (wherever they are), exploitation of the cyber, spatial and cognitive domains, intensification of the presence in theunderwater.
In conclusion, the underwater environment, the underwater domain, represents a great opportunity for humanity, but requires great responsibility and the will to find funds to feed this national operational capability. It is clear that our country too must protect and preserve the marine ecosystem: only in this way will we be able to exploit marine resources in a sustainable way and guarantee a lasting future for humanity in terms of security, energy independence, research and well-being.
Happy June 10th, happy Navy Day!
General Giuseppe Morabito
(Board member of the NATO Defense College Foundation)
Photo: Marina Military
