How to Exorcise Russia’s Ghost Fleet

Commentary by Benjamin Jensen

Published January 7, 2025

Recent revelations that Moscow's "ghost fleet" of oil tankers is loaded with spy gear and prone to undersea cable cutting indicate a pressing need to counter the Kremlin's sabotage campaign in a manner that further undermines Russia's wartime economy. For too long, the United States and Europe have turned a blind eye, relying on often late and feckless sanctions to counter Moscow's illicit economic lifeline. The new Trump administration must target this ghost fleet with more than sanctions as part of its larger plan to bring Moscow to the negotiating table.

Russia's Ghost Fleet Explained

Russia's ghost fleet has become a pivotal instrument in sustaining its oil exports in defiance of Western sanctions. By mid-2024, this clandestine armada was responsible for transporting over 70 percent of Russia's oil and its by-products, effectively undermining the imposed price cap. The fleet comprises more than 400 crude carriers and approximately 200 oil product carriers, representing about 20 percent of the world's crude vessel fleet and 7 percent of oil product tankers. The revenue generated through these covert operations is substantial. In the first half of 2024, Russia's oil and gas revenues surged by 41 percent, indicating the fleet's significant role in financing the Kremlin's endeavors.

Russia's ghost fleet employs a range of sophisticated tactics to evade detection and sanctions, enabling the continued export of oil and other sanctioned goods. These vessels frequently disable their Automatic Identification System (AIS) transponders to "go dark," making it difficult for maritime authorities to track their movements. Ship-to-ship transfers are another common practice, often conducted in remote locations such as the eastern Mediterranean or off the coast of West Africa, where regulatory oversight is limited. These operations are supported by a growing network of "flags of convenience," with vessels registered under jurisdictions with lax enforcement, such as Panama and Liberia, to mask their ownership. Additionally, Russia relies on aging tankers purchased from secondary markets, which are less likely to comply with stringent international standards, increasing environmental risks. These tactics highlight Russia's ability to exploit regulatory loopholes and the fragmented nature of global maritime governance, creating challenges for enforcement mechanisms.

From Smuggling Oil to Sabotage

In late December 2024, a series of undersea cable disruptions in the Baltic Sea raised significant security concerns. On December 25, the Estlink 2 power cable, a critical electricity link between Finland and Estonia, suffered damage, coinciding with the presence of the oil tanker Eagle S, suspected to be part of Russia's "shadow fleet." Finnish authorities detained the vessel, suspecting it of dragging its anchor to sever the cable, an act under investigation as aggravated vandalism and communication interference. This incident follows a pattern of similar disruptions, including the severing of two submarine telecommunication cables in mid-November 2024, which European officials suspect involved hybrid warfare tactics. The first incident involved the BCS East-West Interlink cable between Lithuania and Sweden, followed by the C-Lion1 cable connecting Finland and Germany.

Through its ghost fleet, Russia is demonstrating a new form of gray zone warfare in which it uses commercial vessels to conduct sensitive military missions and sustain its declining economy. By using older tankers, often with obscured ownership and prone to manipulating their electronic signatures, Russia has a crude, but effective variation of a "fleet in being." This fleet cannot win a decisive maritime battle, but it can smuggle oil and conduct sabotage, and in the process, coerce NATO member states and sustain Moscow's wartime economy.

Going on the Offensive Against the Ghost Fleet

Sanctions are not enough to counter this new threat. The United States needs to follow Sweden in increasingly detaining these vessels as part of larger investigations. This will likely require new naval task forces with large support from the U.S. Coast Guard and other law enforcement entities. Maritime interdiction doesn't have to exclusively involve attacking enemy ships. Often it involves legal investigations and impounding suspected vessels, all of which require resource commitments neither the Biden administration nor Europe have proven willing to provide to date. More importantly, it is not strictly a military function and involves coordinating multiple agencies and instruments of power to detect, track, and interdict illicit maritime traffic.

Second, the best way to counter smuggling and sabotage is through the gray zone. The new Trump team should consider covert action designed to counter, if not actively disrupt, Russia's ghost fleet. Leaders in the Kremlin need to worry about losing money and wonder where the next blow will come from before they sit down to negotiate. And the United States has a long history of prosecuting both covert and overt naval campaigns designed to pressure rivals. From piracy during the American Revolution and the mix of unconventional ground and naval battles during the Barbary pirates, to the 1980s tanker war, history illustrates multiple, creative options for countering the Russian ghost fleet without drawing the United States into a dangerous escalation spiral.

In all likelihood, President Trump will need to combine multiple instruments of power to decrease Russian maritime sabotage and the illicit oil trade. Just as sanctions alone have proven ineffective, covert action alone would be reckless. The best strategy will combine new law enforcement measures, existing sanctions, intelligence, and a mix of covert action and conventional military power. The key will be balancing the approach and integrating partners and allies to amplify the effect. And, these coercive measures should be coordinated with ongoing diplomatic efforts to end the war in Ukraine, thus providing the United States' new special envoy and Kyiv leverage in behind-the-scenes negotiations.

Benjamin Jensen is a senior fellow in the Futures Lab at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.

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