Intelligence officials warn that Vladimir Putin’s extensive spy network is covertly establishing a web of so-called “Trojan Horse” properties intended to cause disruption across Europe.
According to these warnings, the Kremlin’s operatives are taking advantage of legal grey areas within NATO, conducting a form of hybrid warfare that includes cyberattacks while preserving plausible deniability.
In 2024, a Brit proxy spy launched a devastating arson attack on a Ukrainian aid centre in London
Russian operatives have also been suspected of setting a major fire at a shopping mall in Warsaw.
Across at least a dozen countries, Russian agents are discreetly purchasing property near key military and civilian facilities, converting ordinary buildings into potential bases for surveillance, drone operations, and covert attacks.
Current and former intelligence officials told The Telegraph that some of these sites may already be prepared, possibly stocked with weapons, explosives, or sleeper operatives awaiting instructions.
Since the invasion of Ukraine, sabotage activities linked to Moscow have escalated, including arson incidents in London and Vilnius, parcel bomb schemes, assassination plots, and attempts to derail trains.
Insiders worry these incidents could be trial runs meant to test and unsettle Western resolve.
Rather than relying on overt military action, the Kremlin is accused of preparing deniable operations designed to disrupt transport, energy, and communications infrastructure.
Such actions can be carried out while remaining below the threshold that would trigger **NATO’s Article 5 collective defense clause.
“A sabotage campaign is less likely to generate consensus around Article 5,” one intelligence official told The Telegraph, noting that plausible deniability complicates allied unity.
The new head of MI6, Blaise Metreweli, has warned that Britain is operating “in the space between peace and war,” with Russia probing for vulnerabilities short of open conflict.
Meanwhile, Volodymyr Zelensky has gone further, arguing that Vladimir Putin and his inner circle have effectively already launched World War III against the West.
“Russia wants to impose a different way of life on the world and change the lives people have chosen,” he said.
Moscow is also believed to be deploying intelligence vessels and so-called shadow fleet ships to position sensors and remotely triggered explosives near undersea cables in British waters.
Authorities have raised concerns over suspicious property purchases near the Faslane Trident submarine base and RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus.
Separately, Russian fertilizer tycoon Vladislav Baumgertner, reportedly estranged from Putin, was recently found dead after disappearing from his luxury home near the air base.
Investigations have also examined acquisitions near MI6 headquarters in Vauxhall and the U.S. Embassy in Nine Elms.
European governments are being urged to follow the example of Finland, which in July imposed an almost blanket ban on property purchases by Russians and Belarusians.
The Kremlin has launched a winter terror campaign across Ukrainian energy hubs
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has accused Vladimir Putin of effectively triggering World War III.
At the same time, Zelensky has made clear he opposes paying the price for a ceasefire agreement demanded by Moscow.
Among the conditions being pushed is the withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from strategically important territory that Russia has failed to seize despite suffering heavy losses.
Zelensky argued that giving up land would fracture Ukrainian society and would not create any reliable deterrent to stop Putin from renewing the war after rebuilding military strength.
“I see this differently,” Zelensky told the BBC.
“I don’t view it simply as territory. I see it as abandonment — weakening our positions and abandoning hundreds of thousands of our people who live there.
That is how I see it. And I am certain this ‘withdrawal’ would divide our society.”
Zelensky’s warning comes as Putin stated that developing Russia’s nuclear triad “remains an absolute priority.”
Moscow has published alarming footage showing nuclear-capable ballistic missiles.
In a stark address marking Russia’s annual Defender of the Fatherland Day, Vladimir Putin said the nation’s strength comes from unity in pursuit of shared objectives.
He emphasized that further development of the nuclear triad — which he described as a key guarantee of Russia’s security and global strategic balance — remains an absolute priority.
Only four countries are currently known to possess a full nuclear triad: the United States, Russia, India, and China.
The United Kingdom, for instance, never fielded a complete triad despite becoming the world’s third nuclear power in 1952.