A level of Russian interference and operational activity on European soil this intense has never been recorded before. That, in a nutshell, is the assessment emerging from officials and analysts tracking Moscow’s active measures across the continent — a dossier that Formiche and Decode39 have followed for more than a decade.
It is also a dossier sitting on the desks of Italy’s prime minister’s office and relevant ministries, informed by intelligence work aimed at monitoring what is now openly described as “hybrid warfare”.
- These activities have become more intense and overt since Vladimir Putin ordered the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, particularly as Russia’s current difficulties intersect with uncertainty in the West over continued support for Kyiv — uncertainty amplified by propaganda campaigns designed to inject Kremlin narratives into European political debate and, through it, public opinion.
- The issue is as much the nature of these incidents as their number. Drone incursions and airspace violations, intelligence operations and sabotage, pressure against critical infrastructure and economic interests, cyber attacks and disinformation all vary in attribution and severity.
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They share a basic logic: applying pressure on Europe while remaining, whenever possible, below the threshold that would trigger a conventional military response. All this is happening as several EU countries, including Italy, approach a complicated electoral year.
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Operational pressure has been accompanied by political intimidation. Nikolai Patrushev, a Putin adviser and former secretary of Russia’s Security Council, said that if Poland intervened militarily against Russia, the Polish state would cease to exist within “two or three days”. The threat was conditional, but came amid a sequence of incidents that has further sharpened tensions between Moscow and Warsaw.
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The Italian picture adds a particularly sensitive dimension ... [Italian] officials at Palazzo Chigi [which is the seat of the Italian Government ] maintain a daily tally of hostile acts, retaliation and espionage linked to Russian actors. One detail is particularly telling: “Not all those that are stopped are made public.”
The intelligence dimension is also becoming more visible. An investigation by Il Riformista’s Massimiliano Coccia identifies several Russian diplomats in Rome as allegedly linked to the GRU, FSB and SVR.
Two military attachés named in the investigation, Ivan Petrovich Gorbachev and Mikhail Vasilyevich Astakhov, were expelled by Italy in July after AISI uncovered what the Foreign Ministry described as illegal activities on Italian territory.
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Attempts have also been made to spy on senior figures at some of Italy’s main state-controlled companies, with Italian security services intervening in time. The episode illustrates how increasingly difficult it has become to separate military security from economic security and the protection of strategic assets.
The DKC case provides another example: At the end of August, Putin ordered the temporary transfer of control over the Russian operations of the Italian group’s subsidiary, which manufactures systems for electrical and industrial infrastructure, to a Russian company. This move is being perceived in Rome as another form of pressure that could directly impact Italian economic interests.
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The Article 5 question. Against this background, the dossier becomes considerably more sensitive.
For several months, NATO circles have also been examining a much more serious scenario: a limited Russian action against vital Alliance interests or targets, potentially in one of its more vulnerable member states. Romania features among the scenarios under consideration, including through the Black Sea and Transnistrian axis.
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This does not mean an attack is considered imminent. There are no indications of an impending Russian operation against a NATO member. The purpose of contingency planning is instead to prepare for the possibility that Moscow may eventually seek to push the threshold further.
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