99% of intercontinental internet traffic passes through 1.48 million kilometres of submarine cables, a critical infrastructure that is now at the heart of global geopolitical tensions. Incidents in the Baltic Sea between 2023 and 2025, damage caused in the Red Sea by the Houthis, and the intensification of Russian and Chinese operations in grey areas reveal a major strategic vulnerability of Western economies. German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius stated this bluntly after two cables were severed in November 2024: "No one believes that these cables were cut accidentally."

This invisible but indispensable infrastructure carries nearly $10 trillion in financial transactions every day and is the backbone of civil and military communications. Yet it remains remarkably vulnerable: weak legal protection on the high seas, repair capacity limited to around 60 specialised vessels worldwide, and geographical concentration creating exploitable bottlenecks. Faced with these threats, NATO launched Operation Baltic Sentry in January 2025, while the European Union adopted its first Cable Security Action Plan in February 2025, belated responses to a hybrid war already underway.

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