Why the Royal Navy Is Watching Russian Ships More Closely Than Ever
In early August 2026, the Royal Navy announced it was spending more time than ever tracking Russian ships near UK waters. In July alone, the Navy spent 21 days following Russian vessels — a 25% increase from July 2025 (The Guardian; Royal Navy). That 25% rise holds across the first seven months of 2026 as a whole, compared with the same period in 2025.
During July, the Navy focused on following two Russian warships — Neustrashimy and Admiral Grigorovich — which were escorting a group of tankers known as the "shadow fleet." These are old, often uninsured ships that Russia uses to sell oil outside the rules Western countries have set up to limit its income. Those rules, called a price cap, only let Russian oil be sold below a certain price. The Royal Navy sent patrol ships HMS Tyne, HMS Mersey, and HMS Severn, along with helicopters and submarine-hunting aircraft. On 20 July, HMS Tyne watched one of the Russian warships conduct a live-firing exercise outside British and French waters (The Guardian).
Separately, another British warship, HMS Somerset, spent four months in the North Atlantic working with NATO to hunt submarines, supported by helicopters. Somerset's commanding officer, Cmdr Matt Millyard, said the deployment "demonstrates exactly what the Royal Navy exists to do: protect the UK and allies from wherever interests are threatened" (The Guardian).
The Ministry of Defence's annual report, covering the year to March 2026, recorded 116 times the Royal Navy was sent out to follow 61 Russian warships and 28 cargo ships near UK waters. That is a 30% increase in Russian naval activity over the previous two years. The MoD also judged that by sending warships to protect its oil tankers, Russia is stretching its navy thin — using ships meant for combat to guard cargo instead (The Guardian).
Sanctions are economic restrictions that countries use to pressure another government — in this case, Western nations have restricted Russian oil sales to push back against the war in Ukraine. Vladimir Putin has been accused of using the shadow fleet to get around these sanctions and fund the war. The UK has sanctioned more than 500 ships linked to the shadow fleet. In June 2026, Royal Marines seized the tanker Smyrtos — the first time British troops directly boarded a shadow fleet vessel (The Guardian).
Russia's oil and gas revenues fell by 24% in 2025, according to figures cited alongside the MoD report. It is hard to tell from the available data whether that drop comes mainly from sanctions, the price cap, or wider changes in energy markets. But falling oil income combined with the cost of sending warships to escort tankers points to a growing resource squeeze on Russia's navy.
This is not a new trend. Russian ships have been showing up near UK waters more and more over the past year. In November 2025, the Royal Navy carried out two interceptions in two weeks, including tracking a Russian spy ship called Yantar spotted near undersea cables off Scotland (Royal Navy; The Guardian). In December 2025, the Navy tracked a Russian submarine through UK waters over three days (Royal Navy). In January 2026, Royal Navy vessels monitored Russian ships passing through the English Channel before handing over to another force (Royal Navy). The pattern goes back even further: in September 2024, a Canadian patrol ship handed off monitoring duties to the Royal Navy as Russian vessels approached the Dover Strait (Royal Navy).
The broader picture is a slow-building standoff between NATO navies and Russian ships and submarines, driven by two things: enforcing sanctions on Russian oil, and protecting critical undersea infrastructure like internet and power cables on the seabed. The shadow fleet escorts make things more complicated because they pull Russian warships into the same busy sea lanes where NATO already patrols. Think of it like a neighborhood watch that now has to follow not just unfamiliar cars, but cars being escorted by armed guards — it takes more attention and more resources.
For NATO planners, the evidence keeps stacking up. The 116 Navy deployments through March 2026, the 25% increase in the first half of the year, and the intercepts of submarines, spy ships, and warships all paint a picture of a growing challenge across the Dover Strait, the North Sea, the North Atlantic, and waters near Scottish cable infrastructure. The Royal Navy's August announcement treats this not as a single event but as a new normal — one that demands ships, aircraft, and crews on constant watch, with no sign of it easing anytime soon.
