Drone team: Russia's plan to arm Iran

T he Kremlin planned to provide Iran with unjammable drones, plus training in how to use them, according to leaked documents seen exclusively by The Economist. Meanwhile there are nearly 20,000 merchant seamen stranded in the Gulf . And a tribute to Craig Venter , dark horse of the Human Genome Project. Runtime: 27 mins.

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Jason Palmer: The Economist. Hello and welcome to The Intelligence from The Economist. I’m Jason Palmer.

Rosie Blau: And I’m Rosie Blore.

Jason Palmer: Today on the show we learn the thousands of merchant seamen stuck in the Gulf and pay tribute to Craig Venter.

Rosie Blau: But first... There are many reasons why America’s war on Iran has been failing. One is the effectiveness of Iranian drones. Now, a confidential document obtained exclusively by The Economist from a trusted source reveals new information, exposing Russia’s proposed arming of Iran against American forces.

Shashank Joshi: The Economist has seen leaked Russian intelligence documents that outline a new level of support that the Kremlin is prepared to give Iran, which would have involved killing Americans and repelling an American amphibious invasion of Iran.

Rosie Blau: Shashank Joshi is our defence editor.

Shashank Joshi: The documents that we’ve seen describe a proposal from Russia to provide Iran with 5,000 short-range fibre-optic drones, which are the kind used in Ukraine to very good effect, as well as an unknown number of longer-range satellite-guided drones, and training to use both kinds. Until now, we knew Vladimir Putin’s government had provided intelligence that had helped Iran target American forces in the Middle East, but we didn’t know it had also proposed sending relatively innovative weapons in big enough numbers that could have really inflicted considerable casualties on America and on allied forces had there been some kind of land operation.

Rosie Blau: You say that this is a proposal, do we know if it’s actually been put into play?

Shashank Joshi: We don’t. And here I should be really clear. This document is a 10 page proposal prepared by the GRU, that’s Russia’s military intelligence service, for presentation to Iran. We can’t authenticate it ourselves. We don’t have direct evidence to confirm it was passed to the Iranians, whether any of these drones actually reached Iran, or if the promised training programme begun. But we have seen some indications fibre optic drones have been used by Hezbollah, which is the Iran-backed militia in Lebanon. The document is undated. It was probably drafted, we think, within the first six weeks of this war, when Russia thought there was a very real chance of Donald Trump attempting a ground operation, perhaps to send ground troops to seize Hog Island, that oil terminal that we’ve talked on the show before. We have been able to examine the 10 pages, but we don’t know whether this was an active plan that was actually implemented.

Rosie Blau: We knew, didn’t we, that Russia was giving Iran some kind of support. So exactly how surprising is this?

Shashank Joshi: It’s not shocking, but it is significant. We know that Russia had provided a limited amount of support, intelligence, for example. We know there’s a defence industrial relationship between these countries. You know, we’ve talked Iranian design Shaheed drones and their transfer to Russia and the way that Russia has improved upon them in the course of the war in Ukraine. We discussed that, I think, just a month ago, didn’t we, Rosie? And there’s a good working relationship. Between the IRGC, the Revolutionary Guards in Iran, and the GRU in Russia. That goes back a long way. Russia intervened in Syria. It was operating on the ground in proximity to Iranian proxies. There was that relationship. Then there was a relationship over Ukraine. And so this, to me... Fits with evidence that is emerging across the region of closer military cooperation between the two sides. But it would still be, I think, an escalation. It would still be something that the Russians would have to be careful with because they know it could result in a pretty sharp reaction from the American government.

Rosie Blau: Explain to me why the fibre optic drones are such a game changer, how they would actually shift the dynamics of the war.

Shashank Joshi: Well, if you take a step back, let’s think the drones used in Ukraine. Whether that’s for reconnaissance, whether that’s the strike missions, most of these are controlled by sending radio signals to the drone. Some of them are controlled by sending satellite signals as well. But the point fibre optic drones is that you can have a long tethered cable along which you channel that data. And so the advantage is they’re extremely accurate, they can fly a long way, you know, 40 kilometres, And, most importantly of all, these are essentially unjamable because there’s no radio signal to jam. Everything’s going down this big fibre optic cable. And that idea of a tethered missile isn’t new. The Egyptians used Soviet-made wire-guided anti-tank missiles called SAGAs in the Yom Kippur War in 1973. They inflicted very heavy losses on Israel. So wire-Guided munitions go back to the Second World War, I think, perhaps even a little bit before that. But the fibre optic element is new. It has been extremely successful in Ukraine. The most skillful Ukrainian operators can weave these things even through a dense forest to get to the other side. And there’s been this mad rush by both Russia and Ukraine to get the fibre optic spools they need to make these things. So they’ve tried to get them in China, they’ve run out of supplies. This is a really, really capable kind of weapon and so that’s why it’s so significant.

Rosie Blau: And you also talked another kind of drones, the long range satellite guided drones.

Shashank Joshi: So these are drones equipped with Starlink terminals and some of our listeners may have Starlink Terminals to give them internet at . This is the company owned by SpaceX, whose CEO is Elon Musk, and it provides internet using a very big constellation of satellites in low Earth orbit. Russia and Ukraine have used Starlink. Russia had been using drones equipped with Starlink terminals to attack Ukrainian air defences and logistics hubs in other sites, and it was pretty effective. What happened? Earlier this year was that Elon Musk denied Russia’s armed forces access to Starlink by effectively blocking all the terminals active in Ukraine, because the terminals know where they are, of course, except for those on a so-called whitelist that is approved by Ukraine’s government. So that was very restrictive, but it was a way of blocking Russia from using these things. The Russian proposal suggests that some of these drones could be diverted and used in Middle East, which would have fewer restrictions. There’s no geofencing, as they call it. And the document speculates that Starlink connectivity would eventually be cut off in due course, but that it could still inflict what they call disorder on American forces in the interim.

Rosie Blau: And what the plan for Russians to train Iranians how to use these weapons?

Shashank Joshi: Well, these things are not always immediately easy to use, right? And in fact, at the beginning of the war in Ukraine, the White House said that Iran had sent trainers to Crimea to help Russia operate Iranian designed drones. So this would kind of be full circle. And what the document proposes is recruiting drone operators from among an estimated 10,000 or so Iranian students studying in Russian universities. It says that other communities that could be tapped are people from the Tajik ethnic group, and they speak both Russian and a version of Persian, which is the Iranian language, as well as the Alawite minority from Syria. And you may recall that among the Alaws in Syria, there was a great deal of support for the Al-Stid Assad regime, and therefore that was particularly a strong link to the Russian military in Syria. And the document says all these people could be screened for loyalty, for religious extremism. Document was written at a time when the main threat facing Iran was an amphibious assault, an American amphibius assault or an airborne assault perhaps, to open the Strait of Hormuz, Sea’s Hog Island, and it notes that American landing craft would be particularly vulnerable to drone attack because of their slow speed. In fact, there’s a diagram that illustrates how Russian trained Iranian drone operators could attack a landing flotilla by launching swarms of five or six drones from hidden positions some 15 to 30 kilometres away. And although we now hear the American government saying the offensive phase of the war is over, it seems relatively unlikely we will see a major ground operation. The prospect of this very, very clearly was a source of concern to Russian officials earlier in the conflict.

Rosie Blau: Shashank, we’re talking this almost as though it’s just the tech. It’s how war is waged. But doesn’t it also represent a shift in the geopolitics as well?

Shashank Joshi: We’ve been debating for years now, the strength, depth, significance of what some people call the crink, right? China, Russia, Iran, North Korea. You can call it many different things. And there’s been a debate how serious this is. Russia hasn’t given Iran all that much help, right, it hasn’t helped Iran to substantially rebuild its air defences since they were smashed by Israel last year. And Russia has many pressing military needs of its own. But I think what this shows is that many of the most significant transfers that we may see between these countries will be not in terms of big defence platforms or in the realm of ships, submarines, planes. It will be in the realms of lessons they have learned from their respective conflicts, Russia in Ukraine, Iran in the Middle East, North Korea from its involvement in Kursk in Russia. And those lessons... Will flow between them. There are learning communities that exist in these countries. And some of that may be around, for example, Russia telling Iran how it has learned to make faster, quieter, more effective Shaheed drones that originally came from Iran. Some of that maybe equally this transfer of fibre optic drones. Some of it may be from China passing on to Russia what it’s learned submarines. That I think is going to be a real challenge to the West in the coming years. And this I think is a window into what that cooperation might look like on the ground in the moment on a really, really serious matter of war and peace.

Rosie Blau: Terrifying stuff. Shashank, thank you very much.

Shashank Joshi: Thanks, Rosie.

Josh Spencer: Captain Khan and his crew have been stranded in the strait of Hormuz for almost nine weeks now. Where am I? Oi oi oi! Missiles regularly fly above their heads, and sometimes they crash down around them. One of them actually hit a fuel tanker just a few metres away from them, which caught fire and exploded. On another occasion, debris from a missile overhead actually sunk a ship just in front of them.

Jason Palmer: Joshua Spencer is our Asian news editor.

Josh Spencer: Captain Khan and his crew have actually tried to get through the Strait of Hormuz three times, but the Iranians have turned them back every time. He’s just one of around 20,000 seafarers who’ve been stuck in the Gulf and remain so as the war in Iran drags on.

Jason Palmer: And what more do we know those 20,000 seafarers?

Josh Spencer: One person described seafarers to me as the ultimate key workers. They’re people who crew the ships that carry 85% of all traded goods by volume, so everything from clothes, fertiliser, food, energy, all the things that we need to keep living. These sailors are responsible for carrying around the world. Most of them actually come from Asia, where I’m based, mostly from lower income Asian countries such as the Philippines, India, Bangladesh. But they’re increasingly exposed to wars and conflicts, things that they have no part in and they’re unprepared for.

Jason Palmer: And so for those seafarers stuck in the Gulf, what is life like on board nine weeks into this?

Josh Spencer: Pretty awful. I think the first big thing to mention is the physical harm and danger. At least 10 seafarers have actually been killed so far. One crew member I spoke to actually witnessed a missile hit his ship just a few metres away from him, killing someone else that was on board. So they are really on the front lines of this war. But what

Jason Palmer: when they’re not directly in the firing line and just subsisting.

Josh Spencer: It varies a lot, right? Some of the ships that are in the Gulf, the owners of those ships have signed up to an agreement that guarantees their workers double pay, and also a right to be repatriated from the region. And for some of these crews, actually, they’re kind of happy to be getting the higher pay and having a sort of slightly reduced workload. Not everyone is right in the firing line. Some of them describe being bored, playing basketball or volleyball on deck and so on. But for most of them, really, there is an increasing hardship and difficulty. Even for the people who were covered by the agreement that I mentioned earlier, they’re facing shortages of food, of fresh water. A captain of a ship that I spoke to told me that he has to pay $50 for a tonne of water now, where he used to pay $2 before the war started. So his crew have started rationing it when they shower or when they’re preparing food. But really the biggest hardship across all of them is a mental strain and the uncertainty. They never know what’s going to happen when they wake up. They’re reading the news headlines just like the rest of us are. And kind of completely hostage to events and even actually leaving the Gulf is a risk in itself because a lot of these seafarers are working contract to contract. So if they leave the Gulf, they actually don’t know where the job is coming from. So there’s no good options for them.

Jason Palmer: But I would imagine, nevertheless, that a lot of those sailors would like to get out of the Gulf. Is there a plan to get them out en masse?

Josh Spencer: There have been some suggestions. Donald Trump announced a plan last week to guide stranded vessels out of the straits called Project Freedom, although details were relatively light. Later in the week though, the president then said he was going to pause this plan as he tried to negotiate with Iran over a permanent end to the war. So at the moment that plan hasn’t really taken force properly. And actually, even if some sort of deal to reopen Hormuz is struck, it’s not going to be a sudden journey out for the seafarers. That’s partly because. Legally, they can’t abandon their ships, so they can just leave them there without finding a replacement. And as you can imagine, not many seafarers are volunteering or sticking up their hands to be going into a war zone and relieving them off the ship. Then even if seafarers do manage to get to dry land, say the Gulf countries in the Middle East, difficult to get on flights, which are really expensive and there’s not many of them, and also it’s hard to get visas to enter Gulf countries. So all of this sort of means that even if there is a reopening of the strait, it’s not going to be an immediate quick fix for seafarer. One person in the industry that I spoke to said it could take six months for any sort of normality to return for them.

Jason Palmer: And even the normality we’ve talked on the show before is not such an easy life on board.

Josh Spencer: Yes, it’s not easy. It’s a very dangerous and difficult job and it always has been. There’s been famous films seafarers being attacked by pirates off Somalia. That remains a risk for them, particularly off the Horn of Africa and the Gulf of Guinea. And then there’s been several recent hardships and disruptions to their lives even before the war in Iran. So the biggest one was the pandemic, which was really, really tough for seafarer. One crew member that I spoke to actually spent 20 months aboard his ship without seeing his family without going . During Covid and he sort of had this feeling that he’d sacrificed his life and his social life and family life for the benefit of the world economy, for the benefits of people like us that want our food and our energy to eat our homes. There’s also been other issues such as unscrupulous owners have been abandoning ships more often than they And then you’ve got other conflicts. So it’s not just in the Gulf where the seafarers are threatened. You’ve also got the Houthis firing off missiles in the Red Sea, which has killed several sailors in recent months. And then, you also have the Ukraine-Russia war. Some Russian missiles have actually hit seafarer in the Black Sea as well. So this is the sort of latest in a series of hardships.

Jason Palmer: And is it the responsibility of the sort of governments of all of these sailors to look after their welfare?

Josh Spencer: The governments definitely have a role to play, and I think that they know that seafarers are quite an important political and economic force in their countries. They’re not just earning money for themselves, they’re actually remitting and sending money back and adding quite a big slice of the country’s GDP. So take the Philippines, which actually has 590,000 seafarer, which is the most of any country. They send $7 billion a year back to the Philippines. Protecting seafarers’ rights has become a kind of political issue in some countries, and there’s even been a political party in the Philippines set up called ANCLA, or ANCA Party.

Jason Palmer: So you add to a difficult and dangerous job what is now quickly becoming almost a humanitarian situation in the Gulf.

Josh Spencer: Yes, exactly. I think governments in Asia are aware of this. India’s government, for example, is doing a lot to try and repatriate seafarers. Ministers are making public statements this and being very clear that they’re doing everything they can to get their stranded sailors back . But really, I think it’s not just governments in Asia that should be worried the knock-on effects of this war on seafarer. I think it is governments all around the world, because even before this war, there was actually a shortage of qualified seafarors. As the Iran war kind of makes this an even less appetising job to pick up, this is going to make it even more difficult for the world to ship its goods, to ship fuel, to shift clothes, to ship gadgets all around and for us to continue trading as we have.

Jason Palmer: Josh, thanks very much for joining us.

Josh Spencer: Thank you, Jason.

Geoff Carr: I have never seen Francis Crick in a modest mood, thus James Watson described his collaborator in the unravelling of DNA’s structure in the opening words of his book on that quest, The Double Helix.

Jason Palmer: Jeffrey Carr is a senior editor at The Economist, and this week is standing in for Anne Rowe, our obituaries editor.

Geoff Carr: Substitute Craig Venter into this sentence, and you have the measure of a man who, though not Craig’s equal as a scientist, was in his own opinion only a rung or two below him on the ladder of scientific merit. But he also felt that his worth was never fully recognised, because he was never quite a member of the club. That, perhaps, is what you get for growing up on the wrong side of the tracks or, in his case, of the runways at San Francisco Airport. A beach bum slacker at high school, he was drafted into the Navy as a hospital corpsman during the Vietnam War. Only after a Damascene insight while attempting to drown himself off the coast of Da Nang to escape that conflict’s horrors did he realise his vocation. If you want immortality, do something meaningful with your life. Illegitimi non carbarundum. The bastards tried. His PhD got him into the National Institutes of Health as a researcher at the Outer Fringes of the Genome Project, which had started under Watson’s watchful eye in 1990. The year he published a neat idea for speeding the project up by tagging where genes set on chromosomes. So neat that the National Institutes of Health wanted to patent the result, until, after a public storm during which Watson excoriated both Dr. Venter’s technology and the whole idea of patenting human genes, they didn’t. After this, he realised that the only institutions in which he could comfortably operate in future would be those he created himself, so create them he did. First, the Institute for Genomic Research, where to the chagrin of the powers that then were, he worked out a way to speed things up even more by reimagining the process of DNA sequencing that lay at the genome project’s heart. Then Solera Genomics, a commercial outfit which sought to use that idea to race and beat the official human genome project to the winning post. And then, after the genome was done and dusted, and Solera no longer had need of his services, or he of its, the, honestly named, J. Craig Venter Institute. At Solera’s high point, he was a centi-millionaire. The real draw, though, was not riches, but recognition. From the wider world he got that in spades, feature articles galore, including in The Economist and his picture on the covers of Time and Business Week, all proudly displayed on the walls of the J. Craig Venter Institute. But no Nobel Prize, whose fellow scientists are too frequently among the illegitimi for that to happen. Salston, knighted for his services, accused him of wanting to establish a monopoly over the human genome, and said he had gone morally wrong. This was rich considering that it was only by adopting his methods that the official project was able to catch up with Dr. Venter’s private one, and thus arrive at a politically-brokered tie in the resulting race. Dr. Collins, with whom he shared the glory in June 2000, when President Bill Clinton announced that tie in the East Room of the White House, was more measured. But he did observe of his rival. We’ll never find ourselves going out for a beer on Friday nights just for the heck of it. We’re wired in a different way. At bottom, in the mines of the Salsons and Collinss of this world, that wiring had led to Dr. Venter to sell his soul to the devils of commerce. He, by contrast, regarded Slaire’s creation pragmatically, as the only means available to achieve his desired end. As to riches, the easiest way to make a small fortune was to start off with a large one. And a good way to affect that transition was to have an expensive hobby. Which he did. Yachts. Two of them. Though not at the same time. He called both sorcerer. As his second wife Claire Fraser, herself no mean microbiologist, put it, we’d be rich if it wasn’t for that boat. More science followed. The first synthetic bacterial genome, a stripped-down minimal genome that is the smallest a microbe can get away with and remain alive, and numerous though ultimately unprofitable excursions into the elusive field of synthetic biology, in which living organisms will be rebuilt, the better to serve human needs. Ironically, considering his epiphany in the South China Sea. His last big idea was life-extension, the real sort, not the reputational. First, in 2013, he helped found Human Longevity, a firm that proposed to extend human lifespans by understanding and subverting the biological processes of ageing. That lasted five years before he parted company with it, either, depending on who you talk to, by storming out, or being fired. Then, this January, he had another go with the ventricle diploid genomics, after the paired chromosomes of human cells, in which he felt the secrets of longevity lay. However, though he himself was prodded, poked and scanned to the nth degree during his time at human longevity, and said such attention to detail had saved him from undetected prostate cancer, in the end it was to no avail. Still, he has indeed done something meaningful with his life. And the bastards had certainly not ground him down.

Jason Palmer: Jeffrey Carr on Craig Venter, who died aged 79. And that’s all for this episode of The Intelligence. The show’s editors are Chris Impey and Jad Gill. Our deputy editor is Sarah Lawrynuik and our sound designer is Will Rowe. Our senior producers are Henrietta McFarlane and Ali Zajon-Baptiste. Our senior creative producer is William Warren and our senior development producer is Rory Galloway. Our producer is Anne Hanna and our assistant producer is Ganal Patel. With extra production help this week from Emily Elias and Eleanor Sly. We’ll all see you back here tomorrow for the Weekend Intelligence. This week we’re back on the topic of civil defence. Back in February we reported from Lithuania, where civilian society is gearing up to defend itself from a potential attack from neighbouring Russia. My colleague Tim Judah recently returned from a reporting trip in Ukraine. Having seen what happens when a nation had to react to an invasion, he got to wondering what his native Britain has in the way of plans. What he found was hardly reassuring.

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