INTREP360 INTELLIGENCE REPORT

01.06.2026

January ^6th, 2026

Greetings! It is not quite – yet! – in “Sink the Bismarck!” territory but the transatlantic chase of a rusty old shadow fleet oil tanker that began in the Caribbean is getting more interesting by the day. Especially since Moscow appears to have dispatched a Russian nuclear-powered submarine to prevent the U.S. Coast guard from seizing it.

Initially, we dismissed this as a nothing burger story. Now we are wondering if we got it wrong. It could be that this is just a battle of wills – Pentagon versus the Kremlin – or, perhaps, there is something more to this story.

AI image created by Grok.

To dig deeper, we are detouring from our normal format today to focus on what has shades of the film, “The Hunt for Red October.”

Initially, we cheekily compared it to the buffoonery of the “Smokey and the Bandit” movie. Now we are wondering, what cargo may – operative word “may” – be on board this creaky tanker that purportedly has a Russian sub sailing to intercept it.

It isn’t a shipment of Coors.

Let’s get started!

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This particular seafaring saga began on December 20^th when the U.S. Coast Guard attempted to board an oil tanker named Bella 1 as it was sailing in the Caribbean Sea toward Venezuela. At the time, according to U.S. officials, it was flying a Guyana flag.

Photo credit: Hakon Rimmereid/Reuters. Bella 1. 2025.

Over the course of the next day, the Bella 1 refused boarding & began fleeing in a northeasterly direction away from Venezuela. Initially, it simply looked like a slow sea version of a high-speed car chase. Essentially, the kind Mark sometimes sees when he is in Pasadena & driving the Santa Monica Freeway.

Eye-catching, but that’s it.

Except, this time, it was akin to a driver stopping, getting out, and changing the car’s license plates & registration.

Sometime, as New Year’s Eve approached, the crew of the Bella 1 painted a Russian flag on the side of the oil tanker. It also was revealed that the fleeing oil tanker had been hastily renamed & reregistered.

Now its name is the Marinera & Sochi – a Russian port on the Black Sea – is listed as its home port.

That’s convenient. Even the Bandit – played by the late Burt Reynolds – didn’t think of that plot twist in the movie to evade Sheriff Buford T. Justice.

But it is also highly revealing. Someone in Moscow likely doesn’t want Washington to discover the true nature of the ship & potentially what cargo it was transporting – if not smuggling – to Venezuela.

As Mark observed on X today, everyone – at a surface level – appears to be overreacting. The U.S. Coast Guard is chasing a purportedly empty old oil tanker. The Russians now appear to be sending a nuclear-powered submarine to intercept it.

Why is everyone overreacting?

And just what could be on the freshly named Marinera?

To begin piecing that together, it is important to track where the Bella 1 – now the Marinera – started its voyage toward Venezuela.

Its passage reportedly began on August 19^th in Iran & then made its way through the Suez Canal into the Mediterranean Sea before passing the Straits of Gibraltar & out into the Atlantic Ocean. According to reporting in The New York Times, the tanker – then operating as the Bella 1, transmitted its last location signal as it neared Venezuela.

As we noted in our January 2^nd INTREP360 Intelligence Report, Tehran uses Venezuela to stage operations conducted across Latin America by the Quds Force Unit 840. This force, according to Jason Brodsky, is used to plot & conduct terrorist attacks overseas.

It is possible – obviously not certain – that the oil tanker could have been transporting arms & munitions to be used in Latin America by Iran or supplied or sold on the black market to narco-traffickers operating in Venezuela.

Obviously, as well, the cargo – if it exists – could have been intended for use by the Nicolás Maduro regime itself.

What’s also not clear – again if the cargo exists – is who sent it. Just Iran? Or was Russia transporting weapons – possibly, for example, S-400 surface-to-air missile defense systems – to Venezuela?

Or potentially a little bit of all of the above?

Plus, if the reports are accurate, what is in the Marinera that would necessitate Russian President Vladimir Putin sending a nuclear-powered submarine to escort it to a safe port?

For now, regardless of where Putin’s submarine is headed, the U.S. Navy is tracking it. As OSTINTdefender notes, a U.S. Navy P-8A “Poseidon” Maritime Patrol & Surveillance Aircraft operating from RAF Mildenhall is operating in the region.

Initial reports were that the P8-A was monitoring the Marinera. Could be. But its primary object of interest is the Russian sub.

This bears watching.

President Donald Trump – increasingly – is expressing frustration with Putin over the lack of progress in the Ukraine peace talks. Likewise, Russia irate with Trump for intervening in Venezuela – a longtime Putin ally – and capturing Maduro.

It’s not clear what this is.

It could just be a battle of egos between Trump & Putin. Or it could be something much bigger that Putin is intent on hiding from Trump.

It’s just a rusty oil tanker. Or is it?

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Jon & Mark

Follow Jon on X at @JESweet2022 or on Bluesky at @JonSweet.bsky.social.

Follow Mark on X at @MCTothSTL or on Bluesky at @MarkToth.bsky.social.