Sub-hunters’ licence to kill

Press, 27 May 1983, Page 11

Sub-hunters’ licence to kill

From

PATRICK FERGUSON

in Stockholm

The farcical end of yet another Scandinavian submarine hunt has Sweden looking anxiously at the quality of its armed forces and at the intentions of its giant neighbour across the Baltic, the Soviet Union. The Swedish Navy had to admit that a 12-day hunt around the east coast industrial port of Sundsvall for two suspected Soviet midget submarines had failed and another “probable” submarine sighted inside the Stockholm archipelago had also vanished.

This neutral country was gripped by an unusually martial wave of excitement as mines were detonated and depth charges dropped in an attempt to cripple the submarines.

Newspapers published graphic — though rather imaginary — artists’ impressions of mysterious tracked minisubs negotiating seabed minefields as stern-faced Swedish officers on the surface listened for their sonar echoes with fingers poised over the firing buttons. Prime Minister Olof Palme appealed for calm as the hunt went on and his Defence Minister, Anders Thunberg, emphasised that there was no real evidence that the submarines were there. However, Palme warned that Sweden was prepared “to prevent in every

way” further violations of its sovereignty. There is considerable anger as well as bewilderment about Russian naval activities in recent years. The most public intrusion was in October, 1981, when a “Whiskey” type submarine ran aground near the main Swedish base at Karlskrona. The Russians blamed navigational error. In 1982, the Navy listed 18 intrusions, one of which, near the Musko naval base in the Baltic, led to the establishment of a commission of inquiry. The commission, under the former Defence Minister Sven Andersson, reported last month that as many as six submarines “with a bottom-crawling capacity” had been involved in the Musko incident.

To back up the report the Navy showed video pictures of marks left on the seabed by the Russians. Even more embarrassing, the report also claimed that a minisub had made its way through the narrow channel into Stockholm’s harbour last September, coming within a mile of King Carl Gustav’s

palace. Palme’s protest to the Russians has been brusquely rejected — a formal note of complaint received only an arrogantly worded verbal reply denying the charges and virtually warning the Swedes to stop fussing. Clearly concerned about the growing friction with Moscow, Palme and his Ministers have sought to play down the Soviet response. Foreign Minister Lennart Bodstrom said the Kremlin had understood the strength of Swedish feeling about the affair. “We are not doing too much work trying to interpret the message,” he said. None the less, Ministers are reemphasising their determination to defend Swedish neutrality and sovereignty. “We must chase these submarines to show the credibility of our neutrality,” says a top member of the Government. “The most dangerous thing for us,” says Bodstrom, “is if one or both of the super-Powers or alliances begin to doubt the will of Sweden to remain neutral in time

of war. It could come to be regarded as necessary to attack Sweden if there were a war.” Under new regulations the Navy will be allowed to destroy intruding submarines without seeking Government permission first. The Defence Ministry is also concentrating on developing what it calls “incident weapons” with small warheads designed to cripple submarines and force them to surface. Defence officials are aware that anti-submarine warfare has been neglected over the last 10 years, though they deny that their technical capability has fallen behind N.A.T.O. or the Warsaw Pact. The Andersson Commission recommended that the equivalent of $35 million be spent on improving anti-submarine forces. Sweden is increasing the number of its American-supplied anti-submarine helicopters to 14 and surface ships are to receive better sonar equipment and weapons. The Air Force may also receive new reconnaissance planes with infra-red radar. The failures of the recent submarine hunts are also explained by the difficulty of operations in the Baltic, with its shallow, rocky bed, hundreds of islands, and varying salt levels, hindering sonar searches.