Further potential for unrest US Cyber Command suspends operations against Russia - a threat to Europe?
The new US Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, has instructed Cyber Command to cease all operations against Russia. This decision not only raises security policy questions for the USA, but also for Europe.
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- The Trump administration has instructed the US Cyber Command to cease all digital attacks and defense measures against Russia.
- Without the support of the USA, European countries and Ukraine in particular are increasingly exposed to Russian cyber attacks.
- While Russia is no longer considered a threat, the US government is shifting its focus to the fight against Mexican drug cartels.
The US Cyber Command has been a key player in the digital arms race for years. It conducts both defensive and offensive cyber operations, particularly against Russia. Most recently, these measures have included attacks on Russian infrastructure and preventive digital defense strategies.
Now the new US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has given the order to freeze all activities related to Russia - indefinitely. This is reported by the US portal The Record.
The order explicitly concerns the military cyber command, but not the National Security Agency (NSA), which may continue to conduct intelligence operations against Russia. Nevertheless, this step represents a significant U-turn and signals a geopolitical realignment of the USA under Donald Trump, as has already been made clear by several other decisions.
Europe gets caught in the digital crossfire
The impact of this change of course is immense. European countries, especially those on NATO's eastern flank, rely heavily on the digital capabilities of the USA in the area of cyber security. Ukraine in particular could now find itself in an extremely precarious situation, which the US government is unlikely to care about after the recent meeting between Donald Trump and Volodimir Zelensky, or is even deliberately seeking to do so.
Russian hacker groups, some of which act on behalf of the state, have targeted European authorities, banks and critical infrastructures in recent years. Without the digital protective power of the USA, these attacks could now increase in intensity. In addition to Ukraine, NATO members such as Poland, Germany and the UK are particularly likely to be targeted, as they have been in an ongoing cyber conflict with Moscow for years.
The US government's decision naturally also raises the question of whether Trump no longer sees Russia as a threat. Official representatives of his administration have recently expressed increased concern about cyberattacks from China and Iran, while Russia has remained conspicuously unmentioned. The new prioritization could therefore be interpreted as a signal to the Kremlin that the US is willing to normalize relations - at the expense of Europe's cyber security.
Fight against cartels as a pretext?
Another noteworthy aspect of Hegseth's directive is the reorientation of Cyber Command. The unit is to focus more on the fight against Mexican drug cartels. Eight of these cartels have been classified as terrorist organizations by the US government, paving the way for military operations. Whether this reorientation is appropriate to the geopolitical realities is another question.
European security experts are warning of the consequences of this decision. While the USA withdraws its digital shield over Europe, Russia could use the resulting gap to expand its cyber offensives. It remains to be seen whether Europe will be able to defend itself independently against the increasing threats from Russia. What is clear, however, is that the USA's departure from its previous cyber security strategy is creating a new reality - one in which Europe is increasingly on its own.
