{"id":74939,"date":"2026-07-02T10:42:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-02T10:42:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/74939\/"},"modified":"2026-07-02T10:42:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T10:42:11","slug":"russia-launched-drones-to-spy-on-britains-nuclear-sites-during-15-month-campaign","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/74939\/","title":{"rendered":"Russia \u2018launched drones to spy on Britain\u2019s nuclear sites\u2019 during 15-month campaign"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Kremlin orchestrated a major surveillance campaign on nuclear sites across Europe \u2013 including Britain \u2013 using drones<\/a> launched from one of Russia\u2019s shadow fleet <\/a>tankers, experts believe.<\/p>\n

The findings could bring to an end a two-year mystery that started when drones<\/a> were spotted flying over four sensitive US military bases in the UK.<\/a><\/p>\n

It was believed they had live operators, but no launch sites were found.<\/p>\n

Now experts at the International Institute for Strategic Studies<\/a> (IISS), a London-based think tank, have discovered that HAV Dolphin, a Russian-crewed cargo vessel, was docked near Hull at the time. Another vessel, the Seasons 1 tanker, was also in the North Sea near Essex.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The drones were first spotted flying over four sensitive US military bases in the UK (AFP\/Getty)<\/p>\n

Having tracked the HAV Dolphin\u2019s movements, they say it is \u201chighly likely\u201d that Putin waged a drone campaign in Nato airspace across Europe between August 2024 and February 2026.<\/p>\n

The concerted surveillance campaign targeted nuclear sites in the UK, France, Belgium and the Netherlands, the researchers said.<\/p>\n

And an analysis of 144 incidents in more than a dozen countries over an 18-month period concluded Russian intelligence had operated with \u201csubstantial impunity\u201d, according to the report, first published by The Times.<\/p>\n

It warns: \u201cThe unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) campaign operated with substantial impunity across European airspace – representing both a series of tactical successes for the Kremlin and a strategic failure of allied air defence.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Russian<\/p>\n

Russian President Vladimir Putin\u2019s Kremlin is thought \u2018highly likely\u2019 to be behind the drone campaign in Nato airspace across Europe (Reuters)<\/p>\n

In November 2024 drones were spotted over RAF Lakenheath and RAF Mildenhall, in Suffolk, RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire and RAF Feltwell, in Norfolk.<\/p>\n

At the time four B-52 bombers were based in RAF Fairford as part of an American task force.<\/p>\n

The drones were also heard buzzing above Lakenheath, where facilities were being built to house nuclear weapons.<\/p>\n

The US has had military bases in the UK for more than 70 years.<\/p>\n

The report\u2019s authors said that Moscow\u2019s success was because of the \u201cbasic strategic insight\u201d that \u201cEurope\u2019s air-defence architecture was designed to detect and defeat conventional air threats operating in a recognisable battlespace\u201d rather than drones.<\/p>\n

They said vessels could have acted as a \u201cnetwork relay system\u201d, with one or two deploying and recovering drones and a third providing intelligence to the drone and its operator.<\/p>\n

HAV Dolphin, which sails under the flag of Antigua and Barbuda, is currently thought to be off the coast of Portugal.<\/p>\n

Ministers recently announced new laws designed to crack down on Russian interference in the UK, <\/a>warning saboteurs that if they deliberately damage vital undersea internet cables around Britain, they will face jail.<\/p>\n

Miniser Baroness Lloyd said the UK\u2019s message to Putin<\/a> was simple: \u201cWe can see what you are doing and any interference will have serious consequences.\u201d<\/p>\n

This is a breaking news story, more follows … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Kremlin orchestrated a major surveillance campaign on nuclear sites across Europe \u2013 including Britain \u2013 using drones…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":74940,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2],"tags":[13,187,33996,252,33994,33995],"class_list":["post-74939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-britain","tag-britain","tag-campaign","tag-cargo-vessel","tag-europe","tag-international-institute-for-strategic-studies","tag-us-military-bases"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@UnitedKingdom\/116849970343157941","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74939"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74939\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/74940"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}