The aim of this study is to critically investigate how and why the Swedish media narrative surrounding the so called submarine incidents, a string of unexplained foreign submarine intrusions in Swedish waters throughout the 1980’s, has changed between 1983 and 2001. Articles from four major Swedish print news media representing a broad political spectrum are analysed. Framing theory and qualitative text analysis is used to understand how the narrative has changed. Realism is used to explain why these changes have occurred. The end results show that there were significant changes in the media narrative between 1983 and 2001. Media unanimously took the dominant military and political view in 1983 that these incidents were orchestrated by the Soviet Union. In 2001 the narrative was more critical of these views, with a much greater openness to alternative explanations. These changes are explained by the altered geopolitical, security and foreign policy conditions prevalent in the Scandinavian and Baltic regions as a result of the fall of the Soviet Union, as well as by new information suggesting NATO involvement behind these incidents.