China and Russia could create economic chaos over submarine cables, warns expert
NEWNow you can listen to Fox News articles!
The US economy is threatened by adversaries like China targeting undersea cables with the power to “create economic chaos that destroys you at will,” a top US intelligence official warned on Sunday.
These cables carry 99% of the world’s data and support up to $10 trillion in daily financial transactions, according to reports.
Andrew Badger, chief strategy officer of Coalition Systems, a defense technology startup, spoke as President Donald Trump meets Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing for talks expected to focus on trade, artificial intelligence and Taiwan.
Taiwan, the epicenter of US-China tensions, has reported about 30 undersea cable incidents in recent years, including one in which Chinese vessels allegedly cut the cables and cut communications for months.
RUSSIA, CHINA’S INTERNATIONAL UNDERWATER CABLE ATTACK IS ‘NO CURRENT HEAD’ WARNS EU’S TOP DIPLOMAT
Two Taiwan Coast Guard personnel board a Togo-flagged cargo ship to inspect suspected damage to an undersea cable connecting Taiwan Island and Penghu Island in waters near Penghu, Taiwan, on Feb. 25, 2025. (Taiwan Coast Guard/Anadolu)
“America depends on a fragile network of undersea cables for modern life,” Badger, a former Pentagon official and author, told Fox News Digital before warning that America’s adversaries “want to turn the ocean into a battlefield.”
“The threat is asymmetric – China and Russia are devoting far more resources to attacking submarine infrastructure than the US or its allies are to defending it,” Badger said.
“They identified our greatest weakness, and we didn’t catch it. A concerted strike on America’s underwater infrastructure could fundamentally disrupt our way of life – the Internet, banks, energy markets and military communications all run through these wires. The cost in dollars is almost incalculable, and the real damage will be the chaos and political instability that will follow,” he said.
Badger’s comments come after Senate Republican Whip John Barrasso, R-Wyo., along with Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, DN.H., introduced the bipartisan Strategic Subsea Cables Act of 2026 in April.
This law is intended to strengthen the security and resilience of critical subsea infrastructure.
TAIWAN COAST GUARD ARRESTS CHINESE VESSEL SUSPECTED OF UNDERSEA CUTTING
The Chinese bulk carrier Yi Peng 3 docked in the Kattegat Sea near Granaa, Denmark, on Nov. 20, 2024. The Danish navy said it was hiding a ship in the Baltic Sea amid an investigation into the destruction of undersea telephone cables by Finland and Sweden. (Mikkel Berg Pedersen/Ritzau Scanpix/AFP)
“Undersea cables are important for a variety of reasons. They carry 99% of the internet around the world. They also support $10 trillion in financial transactions every day,” Barrasso said in a statement.
In April, China’s Ministry of Natural Resources confirmed the successful launch of a deep-sea “electro-hydrostatic actuator,” a device capable of cutting underwater cables covered at a depth of 3,500 meters, according to reports.
Similar suspicious disturbances have been reported in Europe and elsewhere, raising concerns about the operation of a “grey zone” designed to check Western responses while remaining below the threshold of open conflict.
“This is hybrid warfare in its purest form, designed to weaken the enemy below a declared war zone,” Badger said, noting that events such as anchors dragging at sea can provide plausible deniability.
HORMUZ CHAOS ATTACKS WARNING: CHINA CAN BLOW TAIWAN WITHOUT A SHOT
A separate photo shows Chinese President Xi Jinping, left, and President Donald Trump, right. (Vincent Thian/POOL/AFP via Getty Images; Salwan Georges/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“The cables give Beijing and Moscow the power to cause devastating economic chaos almost at will,” Badger warned. “This gives both countries greater leverage over the US”
China may also target American submarine cables as a deterrent to US involvement in Taiwan, according to Badger.
“Beijing can simultaneously target the cables to the US, not to win the war, but to break the will of the American public to intervene in Taiwan,” he said.
China claims Taiwan as its territory, and the US – Taiwan’s biggest unofficial ally – provides weapons under a law that requires it to help the island defend itself.
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS PROGRAM
The Taiwan Strait is also an important conduit for vital resources for the intelligence revolution.
Anniki Mikelsaar of the Oxford Internet Institute said the growing use of AI means “increasing energy demands for submarine cables. Not all recent incidents of cable damage can be attributed to foreign adversaries: the ICPC estimates that 150 to 200 cable breaks occur annually worldwide, most of them accidents,” he said.
