“How America took out the Nord Stream pipeline”

The only anchor in reality appears to be Biden suggesting that they knew how to take it out which seems like a pretty weak place to build a large story.

What I find particularly odd is that this entire thing appears to be based on a single, unnamed source "with direct knowledge of the operational planning".

Why is that weird? Assuming this is true, there would be rather many people with such knowledge. One of them may feel the need to talk. Would you expect such a source to be named?

Also, I find it a lot easier to imagine why the US would want to do this, than why Russia or Germany would want to do this.

Or, since the pipelines are well known and not difficult to reach, basically everyone with access to explosives, a boat a divers with explosives skills. None of which is particularly hard to come by.

I'd bet my last dollar that at least four nations had "blow up Nord Stream to force continued conflict" contingency plans.

Who did it? Germany, Russia, USA, Ukraine, or a curve ball from the one of the Nordic or Baltic states? We'll probably never know, and none of those answers would surprise me.

Without sources, everything is specilation at best, consiracy theory BS or propaganda at worst. Personally, I don't even believe half of what is reported with connection to the war in Ukraine.

Besides motive, this article doesn't provide anything new. And that the US had at least motive is established fact since basically the day of the explosion.

I disagree - there is no credible motive here for Russia and, in fact, the outcome was directly opposed to every outcome they are, or were trying, to achieve.

Not only do I, as a US citizen, believe that the US perpetrated this act but further: I believe it is an overtly hostile action against EU citizens and, particularly, Germans, who will suffer the most economically.

EU states are now buying US natural gas like we always wanted them to. How much pain and suffering were we willing to inflict to make that happen ?

Seeing as Russia was already using gas supplies as a political tool, it doesn't seem too far fetched.

In the scenario where America did it, I think there is a strong argument to be made that it was in the long-term interests of EU citizens, despite causing them some short-term discomfort. They never should have started this pipeline project in the first place, buying energy from Russia made the EU weak. Breaking that relationship permanently will make the EU stronger.

You have no idea what's going on.

Also, are you arguing that having less choice in market supply is good better for EU?

The level of detail about the operation is basically, some divers from the US Navy attached bombs to the pipeline during a military drill that were detonated with magical sonobouy signals according to some professor who said that might work.

Another red flag: The vast majority of the article was about a political narrative, which really is focused around hurting Russia, and not who is benefited by the destruction of the pipeline. The US government does not own our energy industry and is often at odds with the gas and oil industry here, and this article assumes a level of integration that does not exist in the US political system.

Besides, things are going on pretty okay. Electricity prices are stabilizing and Europe will eventually become greener as well. No matter who did it, blowing up the pipeline was a good thing.

To give you one credible motive for Russian involvement: Russia cut off Europe of Gas supplies to get leverage on the Ukraine conflict, but this largely failed as European countries pooled their gas reserves and vowed to move away from Russian gas. As Russia could see that this market was lost the explosions were a last punch to send gas prices higher before the European winter and protect Gazprom from lawsuits. The mild weather killed that first motive, let's see about the other.

The article itself said that Norway would benefit from the destruction of the pipe line.

I can see the US doing it as they've been vocal opponents to nordstream since its inception, I can see Ukraine wanting to do it although I doubt they'd have the resources, might also have been some other rogue European faction wanting out from under Putin's thumb.

That's why there were several explosions: Everyone was blowing it up at the same time, unbeknownst of each other's plans.

Source with this degree of knowledge would have no issue providing lots of things that could be confirmed through other means. Documents, names, precise dates and times. Who was in charge of this on Norwegian side? On CIA side.. when and where did they meat etc etc etc

I read the first half of the article, and skimmed the second. It doesn't claim to be sourced from anywhere, and the only paragraph that discusses sources and fact checking is when they point out the White House says the entire article is a work of fiction. It doesn't present any evidence that it happened (other than that the US has a big swimming pool that the navy trains in), and summarizes itself by saying that it was a perfect plan (presumably meaning it left behind no evidence), except that they actually did it.

What am I missing?

Weekly snapshot: Russian fossil fuel exports 16 to 22 January 2023:

* The week of 16 to 22 January 2023, the EU was the largest importer of Russian fossil fuels.

* The EU imported pipeline gas, oil products and LNG, as well as crude oil via pipeline or rail.

* The top five EU importer countries last week were the Netherlands, Slovakia, Germany, Belgium and Italy. [1]

[1] https://energyandcleanair.org/weekly-snapshot-russian-fossil...

Permanently shutting it down significantly constrains options for anyone who might seize power in Russia next.

There are too many players with varying interests at different levels to just go off of someone's reputation and an unnamed source. Perhaps Biden or some other head of state needs to come along and blow up this thread so that moderators and commenters alike have to find other outlets for the water they're carrying.

Destroying the pipelines removed the potential reward for an internal rival to replace him.

This does not make the article more credible, in fact, it detaches the beneficiary one more degree from the actor.

While I am extraordinarily distrustful of news reports using anonymous sources you do have to consider the author here. Ultimately we are deciding if we trust him and, for me personally, he lends a lot of credibility.

The other side of this is, duh, of course America blew up the pipeline. I said at the time that we were the most likely culprit.

There's a very small subset of groups who have the capability to do this and even fewer who have the motivation. It forces Germany/EU to stop buying NG from Russia and start buying LNG from the US (among others) with exceptionally minimal political risk to the US.

The US will just continue to deny that we did it, this article will get no traction in mainstream media. If incontrovertible proof ever did surface the media will just bury the story and if anyone involved is forced to comment they will just spin it as a good and necessary and just thing that they did to help Ukraine with a dose of natural gas bad because of climate change and all will be forgiven.

Then the explosions happened, which prevented gas from being transported through the pipelines - except for one Nordstream 2 pipeline, which actually would require Germany to budge for it to be operational. Russia even stated that they'd be happy to send gas through the remaining pipeline as soon as Germany backtracked.

Whether or not you think Russia did it, the explosion had the effect of turning something the Russians had been trying and failing to convince other countries of into a reality.

The third paragraph in the article.

But he does often rely on sources who remain anonymous: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seymour_Hersh#Use_of_anonymous...

I did find it interesting in that Wikipedia article to read that The New Yorker's editor insists on knowing the identify of all of the anonymous sources that Hersh has used when his reporting is published in that magazine. That suggests to me that while Hersh can probably be generally trusted, his work is of a higher quality when it's published in an outlet like The New Yorker, as the editor-in-chief and other staff submit it to a more rigorous internal discussion. That's in comparison to probably no internal review or discussion by Substack.

In September it was already clear that a weak polar vortex would make for a frosty winter in the northern hemisphere. It was just luck (for Europe) that it hit North America and not Europe. During summer in Germany every week more people were drumming up (literally) demands to open Nord Stream 2.

There was no way of being sure a German government wouldn't flip under pressure once people were freezing and showing up with torches at the Reichstag.

But one September night someone went in and shot the hostages...

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seymour_Hersh#Criticism_and_co...

That even that inconsistent Bin Laden story purportedly relied on two distinct sources, and yet his Nord Stream story purportedly relies on only a single anonymous source, should be a significant red flag here. I have no reason to doubt that Hersh heard the quotes in his Nord Stream story from at least someone in government, but that source's motivations and truthfulness were not independently verified even, by his own admission, by Hersh. And that's just... not credible reporting.

Although if Biden took part in such a conspiracy, someone in one of the American intelligence agencies would've probably leaked it out.

Is this satire or what? His reputation is "as a nutcase" nowadays.

Most reputable editors, when given a secret-sources story, either reject it outright, or say "OK, tell me their names and let me talk to them."

If you're Hersh, maybe you get away with saying, "trust me."

It's the perfect crime

Putin's rivals make Putin look soft. If they do take power, they will end the conflict quickly and definitively.

If he denied the US killed bin Laden he would be unreliable. He never denied the US killed bin Laden. You saying he said that is what is unreliable.

He said that some of the White House and Pentagon assertions about bin Laden, which the New York Times did not question in the days after (but did question, to some extent, later on) were not accurate. Particularly that no one high up in the Pakistani Army, government or intelligence knew Bin Laden was in Abbottabad. Hersh asserted that was incorrect, as were some other things.

since by his own admission, [what you said], that is credible reporting.

it might not be a credible source or story

They have successfully annoyed just about ever regional player, as well as the US and every other major power at times, and yet mange to thread the needle of staying friendly with the US and Iran at the same time. The way they played out the Saudi sanctions on them was a masterpiece, and they are the biggest gas exporter in the world.

No evidence they are involved of course, but there are plenty of extremely competent militaries in the Middle East.

You give a link but it is nowhere in that link. I watched an interview where Hersh talked about how the US killed bin Laden. Hersh has always said this.

Hersh did do reporting that countered parts of the US government story about bin Laden. Namely the idea no high Pakistani army/intelligence/government official knew where bin Laden was in Pakistan. As well as some other things.

The conspiracy theory is believing bin Laden sat in a big compound in Abbottabad with no one important in the Pakistani government knowing this. I guess the US government feels it needs to state this for some diplomatic reason, but it is ludicrous.

He's also, especially recently, made some very bold claims that so far have not turned out to be correct, whether because the truth just hasn't been revealed yet, or because Hersh was wrong or misled by his sources.

It's also worth noting that Hersh - as with any journalist - is only as good as his sources. If people choose to leak juicy secrets to him (not implausible!) he may end up publishing accurate stories that reveal nefarious conspiracies (which has happened). If people choose to give him lies and misinformation, he may end up publishing conspiracy theories instead. And as he keeps publishing, the odds that this will happen (if it hasn't already) keep increasing.

So I absolutely wouldn't write off any claim Hersh makes, but I wouldn't blindly believe it either. And here he is relying, by his own admission, almost entirely on a single anonymous source, giving details that can't really be independently confirmed.

Was Hersh told by someone that the US took out the pipeline? Probably! Does that mean the US did so? I'm not sure I'd seriously update my priors based on this.

Again, there's a huge weasel word right there in the only sourcing for the whole article. That just... yikes. Maybe it's a typo. Maybe it's something an editor could have cleaned up. But maybe it's also the sort of thing Hersh's editors simply threw out as unpublishable, which is why it's an uneditted substack blog.

Indeed, Nordstream hadn't been running gas for about a month at the time of the explosions. (Indeed, Nordstream 2 also never ran gas). That is critically useful information for assessing who had motive to blow up the pipeline, yet everyone speculating on the matter seems to assume that it was being used at the time of explosion.

Since Nordstream was destroyed amidst public pressure from US energy companies who wanted to takeover the European energy market, the US has become the world's leading exporter of liquid natural gas, Europeans are paying record natural gas prices, and US energy companies are reporting record profits. Again, the relationship between these things should surprise nobody.

1: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/02/08/bidens-bi...

I am not really qualified to judge on the verity of the article, but the statement that's there is no strong "integration" between the US government and the gas and oil industry (and other ones for that matter) is absurd. The US fought wars over access to cheap oil (Gulf war 1) has put extremely lucrative deals for their own oil companies into place after forcing regime change (gulf war 2), has highest officials transition to highest jobs in industry (Cheney), has shown multiple times that it will use intelligence apperatus for industry advantages (the spying scandal in Germany, airbus vs boring contracts...). Many (most) US military operations over the last 30 years can be directly attributed to economic motivations.

Later on in 2013, he changed his claim, such that he admitted some of the story is true, that is, that the terrorist leader was killed, after he encountered pushback.

Source: https://dailycaller.com/2013/09/27/hersh-slams-us-media-clai...

Its amazing fanfic.

I suggest that the ethics code says don't report facts as facts that you haven't verified as facts, but if you say "I could not verified this and I heard it from one source" you are within the code. "Sources in the Administration" often report things to reporters, and most of what they say can't be verified, it can only be echoed by more than one person. And if a reporter has a relationship with one leaker who has been reliable, you're claiming they can't use that, and I'm claiming they can and do. Sure, verify what you can, but being an honest reporter is what is required, not certain fact patterns.

Yes, in a deep dive publication like the New Yorker, they will often kill certain facts or an entire story if it cannot be corroborated, but that doesn't define journalism.

Meanwhile, the US controversially transferred SEALS to Germany earlier in October 2022[1].

USNS William McLean left a German port 5 September 2022[3] (there are also port call records) and headed to meet the USS Arlington on 10 Sept 2022[2] to transfer cargo.

USS Arlington loitered around docking in Lithuania and only reaching the straight near Denmark on 22 Sept.[2]

USS Arlington then meets the exact same USNS William McLean for another cargo transfer 20 days later and just 6 days after leaving port.

Where USNS William McLean went after I don't know. I know it docked somewhere close as there's an entry for 26 Sept 2022, but I don't feel like paying to know the exact location.

If you were conducting a SEAL operation on the high seas, a San Antonio-class ship would be a perfect launch vessel. A cargo exchange would be the perfect cover to swap ships. Delayed bomb detonation isn't dangerous and could explain why only 3 of 4 pipelines were impacted (aka, something went wrong with one).

I'm not saying it 100% happened (and is somewhat at odds with the anonymous source in this story), but to me, it seems like the US had the motive, means, and opportunity.

[0] https://www.navy.mil/Press-Office/News-Stories/Article/31497...

[1] https://www.stripes.com/theaters/europe/2022-10-20/seals-gre...

[2] http://www.uscarriers.net/lpd24history.htm

[3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3pp-ehkS2o

There's nothing simpler and better for your case than typing the quote where he said the thing you say he said. Otherwise, you're actively spreading misinformation on social media, and intentionally using rhetorical games to obscure the lack of evidence you're offering to support it. That's conscious spreading of misinformation.

You take this statement he made and translate it to "his claim that the US never killed Osama bin Laden". The original quote you print is much clearer. I certainly don't translate his quote to what you translated it to.

Speaking of changed claims, both the White House and New York Times walked back claims they made in 2011 about bin Laden. So Hersh's claim of "a lie" and "not true", if you want to call it that, is true by their own admissions.

Incidentally the disputed issues are did anyone high up in the Pakistani government know bin Laden was there, how did the US learn he was there (connected to the first point), was the firefight killing bin Laden a kind of John Wayne/Audie Murphy production or was it more pedestrian etc.

If it's not pedantic that Hersh telling the interviewer "not one word of it is true" was hyperbole, when at least one word of the White House story was true, then you have a point on that statement. But it still does not automatically translate as you said. The original statement is more clearly what he said.

Would you be willing to explain how a strictly historical truth, that is, a direct quote from the individual in question, is misinformation?

It was funny how suddenly all the journalists started to report from Kentucky or Alabama instead of Fifth avenue. As the media it is your job to explain how the world works.

Fortunately, EU managed to store up plenty of gas and the winter was mild, so russian blackmail has failed.

Worth noting that both the White House and the New York Times walked back inconsistent claims they made in the days after bin Laden's death. So the White House and Times were self-admittedly inconsistent about it. If Hersh is inconsistent it is in that light.

Hersh pokes holes in different points of the official narrative. Particularly the idea no one high up in the Pakistani government knew bin Laden was in the compound. Contradicting the White House, but very convincing to me and others.

However, to be fair to you, Hersh goes into a great deal of detail about the initial intelligence, the raid etc. Was any part of that wrong or inconsistent? It's hard to know. He didn't just make a few statements but went into a lot of detail. So there could theoretically be inconsistencies in Hersh's reporting about it too, since he covered so much ground. It is hard to know though. You just take what the White House said, what Hersh says, what the Pakistani press says and try to figure out what actually happened.

Until you can defend yourselves, you are.

we can also choose to ignore the american material movements in the area at more or less the exact time. Coincidence im sure, after all, the good old uncle sam is an ally to europe and would NEVER do anything against citizens of other countries

Something that wasn't made clear in the article is that US energy companies have been massive beneficiaries of the Nordstream destruction. The US is now the world's leading exporter of liquid natural gas. That wouldn't have happened if the pipeline(s) were still operational.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baltic_Pipe

Putin was still trying to energy blackmail Europe back then. It is hard to see the explosions as anything else but a threat that the Baltic Pipe could also be blown up -- and the Nord Stream pipes weren't very useful to Russia at that point so it wouldn't cost much to lose them.

Coincidentally, the Russian sphere is one of the groups mad about the UN involvement in Bosnia and Serbia

https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/russian-gas-europe-v...

So Ukraine is "essentially supporting genocide of Ukrainian civilians"?

I mean, par for the course for modern journalism, I suppose.

Hooray for global warming?

The guy is obviously picks up lobby chatter, and lets his imagination to run.

My Lai was never a giant secret, he was just the first to bring it to the wider audience.

This is not a conspiracy theory. It is very carefully and lucidly written, with so many details, each of which can be refuted. How does he know about all the meetings between the CIA, Sullivan, etc. Why does no one refute individual facts?

I think he did have a source who provided all this. If the source lied, tough. Investigative journalism is always a gamble. If mainstream media worked, they'd try to press the government on the myriads of claims presented in Hersh's article. Perhaps this would lead somewhere. But the days when mainstream opposed the U.S. government like in the case of Abu Ghraib are over.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osama_bin_Laden%27s_compound_i...

I do have a problem with people who change their claims and then deny that they changed their claims, like Seymour Hersh did, with respect to Osama bin Laden and stating that not a single word from the White House was true. That's disingenuous and it makes his credibility questionable, especially if he's going to rely on anonymous sources for his claims.

To address your claim that perhaps he was being hyperbolic in his statement: fine, but at least admit to that. He hasn't. He denied that he said it in the first place, which is a lie.

> This article was amended on 1 October 2013. The original text stated that Hersh sold a story about the My Lai massacre to the New York Times for $5,000 when in fact it was the Times of London. Hersh has pointed out that he was in no way suggesting that Osama bin Laden was not killed in Pakistan, as reported, upon the president's authority: he was saying that it was in the aftermath that the lying began. Finally, the interview took place in the month of July, 2013.

Note that from this footnote that Seymour Hersh does not admit that he misspoke. He claims that he never suggested that Osama bin Laden was not killed. This is plainly a straight lie, given his claim that the White House's statement did not contain one word that was true.

If he wants to state that he misspoke in this interview: fine, then he should do it. But to state that he didn't make this claim is itself misinformation.

Edit: You're accusing me of bad faith. Can you please explain how my argument is deceptive or a lie? If anything, Seymour Hersh has acted in bad faith in this ordeal, lying about his own statements. And people should be suspect of him for that.

But I'm biased as well, my desire to believe is strong, only that I'm in team "'t was an inside job" so my bias is in clear opposition of these claims (but in limited to speculation, I find "Russia jumped from excuse to excuse to keep the pipelines closed anyways, so the only immediate winners of the explosions were people in Moscow who felt threatened by some real or imagined "make money not war" faction" logically compelling, but that's all there is, I guess, strongly, but can't claim to know)

This was leaked at the time that it is now to send a message to the Germans.

When your entire argument is "this one sentence when taken literally with no context can be considered crazy," I don't think you're arguing in good faith.

Heck leveling Kiev will do that too. Could be done in a day.

Who can invade EU, Russia after their showing in Ukraine? China from half the world away?

EU militaries have multiple times the budget of the RU army.

We don't need 11 carriers to defend ourselves.

But a broken clock is right twice a day and a bad journalist can break two big stories in a career of publishing lies.

Meanwhile, all the rhetoric of Russia “saving” a brotherly nation goes flying out the window.

No, one cannot easily imagine long-term neutral countries interfering in a foreign war like this.

Makes a lot of sense to connect the dots given that it's a covert activity.

Often planning is done by senior members, who get out of the military more frequently (especially recently) and the younger people who are operational stay quiet.

The people who were on the operation, aren't going to talk right now, because they are still operating and aren't ready to spill the beans and write a book/movie script.

Of course it will.

>ground troops from neighbors, EU, and possibly NATO

They are not suicidal, I don't think.

>Russia “saving” a brotherly nation goes flying out the window

Yes. That is the reason war will continue the way it is now: very slowly, and stupid.

Edit: reddit spacing

I would be surprised if anyone outside the US media sphere even gives that implausible happenstance a serious consideration.

Or you could take a breath and realize that Nordstream 2 was not yet complete. It was an ongoing, non-operational project. In that context, “bringing it to an end” could easily mean not completing it. In fact, that’s the far more reasonable interpretation—-the literal physical destruction interpretation is only made by someone who wants to believe that.

I'm afraid something as drastic as the annihilation of Kiev will lead to actions that are beyond the usual risk assessment levels. Countries will be compelled to act, (repeated...) threats of nukes be damned. Europe will not tolerate another Nazi Germany on its borders, period.

Put another way, a massive, discontinuous step in escalation will inevitably lead to a similar step from the other side. There is no world in which Germany and Poland go "OK then" and withdraw all aid.

"Makes a lot of sense" is hardly the standard for legitimate journalism though. Did it happen or not? How do you know? Does your source know that it happened or just that it was planned? Do you make that clear? Hersh really does not.

The fact is, Hersh has gotten deeper and deeper into the conspiracy-theory weeds over the past few decades, with his most recent work tending towards outright disinformation -- from suggesting al-Qa'ida wasn't behind the 9/11 attacks, to whitewashing Syrian chemical attacks (and Ted Postol makes a cameo appearance in this piece as well), to denying Russian involvement in the Skripal poisoning, to being one of the motive forces behind the Seth Rich conspiracy theories. Increasingly it seems that he doesn't even care about the credibility of his "sources."

My knowledge on this is very, very sketchy, but my understanding is the there is still a large amount of Russian gas transiting the Ukraine pipelines, Europe needs the gas so they buy it, Ukraine needs the transit money to defend against Russia so they keep the operation running. and Russia needs the gas money to attack Ukraine so they keep the operation running.

Honestly if true it is one of the weirdest situations I have ever heard about in the middle of a war.

I deliberately used an RT link because it is probably full of Russian propaganda and yet says basically the same thing as other articles. I originally learned about it via the Perun youtube channel(the best place to start if you want actual information not propaganda) but am unable to find the episode where it is mentioned.

https://www.rt.com/business/570805-russia-ukraine-eu-gas-tra...

[1]: Whereas analysis based on what Russia was actually doing was largely correct before the war. This is why there was such a large chasm between what the US was saying then- based on their ability to hack Kadryov's phones and hear what was being said at those levels, along with their satellites to observe what the actual Russian army was doing- and what the French and Germans were saying based largely on 'that would be a dumb thing for Putin to do'.

https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/infographics/eu-gas-suppl...

https://www.bbc.com/news/58888451

They had more air defense than Germany, France, and the UK combined, though the systems were not quite as capable individually.

They had nearly as many active duty military as Germany, France, and the UK combined, and a huge number of reservists with experience fighting in the War in Donbass against Russian military and paramilitary forces with tanks and artillery, as opposed to jihadists with no real heavy weapons of any kind.

Their airforce was mostly comparable in size to any one of the above, though again not as capable qualitatively.

And they had a hell of a lot more artillery and artillery shells than Germany, France, and the UK combined. By a massive margin, although again not quite as capable individually. Nearly all of the NATO-standard artillery ammunition that has been provided to Ukraine has come from US stockpiles, because at the rate Ukraine consumes artillery ammo Germany, France, and the UK would be collectively tapped out in about 10 days. Not to mention HIMARS ammunition.

The Russians were also rather handicapped by the reckless, arrogant stupidity of their plan and extreme secrecy resulting in soldiers selling their fuel rations for alcohol, because until a day or two beforehand they thought was all a bunch of western lies because that's what the government was saying publicly. With the result that a bunch of vehicles ran out of fuel halfway to Kyiv. Had the invasion been done according to doctrine rather than as what they expected to be an immediate victory as the Ukrainians laid down their arms, awed by their superior military power, the story may still have turned out very different.

Anyway, Ukraine had, by a very significant margin, the largest military in Europe excluding Russia, and certainly the most experienced in fighting "real" wars. Take this into consideration when boasting about how easily the rest of Europe would be able to handle a Russian invasion.

Why do so many people act as if it's so unlikely that Russia did it? They had the least to lose, their relations with the west were already ruined at that point and such an incident couldn't make them any worse.

What would be their motive? Before the explosion, Russia had illegally shut down the pipeline. Now that the pipeline has exploded, they have plausible deniability and they can say it's not their fault the gas isn't flowing. Because of that, they won't have to pay additional fines when the economic relations with the west are restored.

And don't forget that one pipe of NS2 was left intact and, unlike NS1, there was no contractual obligation to pump gas through it.

If so, do you trust it to be accurate?

But either he’s being fed this by someone with an agenda or he shares that agenda.

Conspiracy thinking ironically always includes blind credulity, just of other things.

You condensed an entire book/section of a book that Hersh wrote into one sentence and then attacked it as if it were the argument he presented. It's not. It's something he said offhand in an interview about the book, and which he immediately clarified was not meant in the way people were taking it.

You're taking the worst possible interpretation of what he said and arguing he clearly meant that. Hence, not arguing in good faith.

It's much easier to make a strong claim, and to repeat it, than it is to read through articles and debunk those claims. Frequently, as soon as you've done it, there are several more of these strong claims made, and the discussion becomes impossible.

I think it's rooted in the desire to "win".

I know I get a little excited when I see a comment I've made get upvoted.

I think about it when I'm writing and I've found it affects what I write and my phrasing.

I think this is an unintended consequence of self-moderated discussions - it seems to devolve into a zero-sum game.

It is now known that Putin's decision to invade was due to bad intel from his intelligence services that reported that Ukraine would not be able to mount significant resistance. In that light it was reasonably self-interest-pursuant.

Acting on incorrect information is not the same as being irrational.

It's like no one had ever heard of encrypted digital signals.

This part made me question a lot more.

Exactly!

Ukraine's military barely held on against 90k professional soldiers and 140k mobilised. It would not stand a single chance against 3 million soldiers and a fully militarized Russian economy. Russia hasn't even called up a tenth of its trained reserves.

https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/22/22-293/242292/2022...

There is no scenario in which Russia could successfully invade an appreciable part of the EU, even without taking into account European nukes.

Personally I’d call the groups committing literal genocide the butchers, not the groups taking action to stop it. To each their own opinion.

Thank you so much for this, makes me start the day in such a better mood!!!

How can you view the East River if you're facing West?

I have not engaged in deception in the statements I've made in this thread a single time. However, it is important to point out that Seymour Hersh has indeed engaged in bad faith in his statements about Osama bin Laden, by refusing to acknowledge that he either originally misspoke, or he changed his claim about the White House's statement. In either case, he is being deceptive in his statements as I've demonstrated above, exactly what it means to argue in bad faith.

It's about a documentary which made some waves, accusing the involved politicians of outright lies and exaggerations as justification for military action, which in turn then lead to the things they fabricated.

It was called 'Es begann mit einer Lüge/It started with a lie'

https://programm.ard.de/?sendung=281116097670119

https://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/umstrittene-ard-dokum...

You aren't arguing in good faith. You aren't trying to be fair, open, and honest. Like your repeated claim that Hersh saying he in no way was suggesting that bin Laden was not killed in Pakistan is him refusing to acknowledge he misspoke. Or your constant ignoring of anything Hersh has said on the matter besides the one sentence you object to. Neither of those things are fair, or honest about his argument.

And yeah, that is true. But when the wife was in fact murdered, then the odds that the known abusive husband did it are very high.

Maybe it was a reasonable interpretation that he didn't mean blowing up the pipeline, before the pipeline was blown up.

Now we have to rely on the US and there is nothing worse than relying on the US. Europe just showed once again it failed to learn anything from the Suez crisis. The US should never be trusted. They are not a reliable and only care about themselves.

Europe has been mismanaging its relationship with the BRIC since the end of the Cold War. We are too dependent on NATO. Not that there is much to expect from the EU. Every addition since 1995 has only weakened it.

This is not an indictment of the US, it's just an assessment based on my own and other's extensive experiences with large, hierarchical organizations.

Honestly Europe would be far more peaceful now without NATO. The US has mostly been a destabilising force for the past three decades.

It doesn't say it outright, but if the hastily re-programmed explosives were triggered by a sonar buoy after three months in sea water as the article says, then it would not be surprising at all if some of them failed to go off.

Precisely that the article implicitly gives very plausible answers to good questions like yours, is why I think it's credible.

Also Norway can replace a lot of the Russian gas supplies.

That's expected as there's no longer the pipelines everyone is discussing in this comment section.

Italy has a much more capable armoured force than Ukraine did at the time.

You are comparing T64s, vehicles designed in 1951 to modern vehicles? How do you think they are performing when it comes to firing on the move, engaging at night, accuracy, survivability?

Tanks newer than T64 have been long retired to reserve in Europe. There are many IFVs today capable of putting holes in T64s' in service today.

> The Russians were also rather handicapped by the reckless, arrogant stupidity of their plan

Such disrespect! Russia is an exemplary conservative society with traditional values!

Europe is 27 countries, not 3. Its's half a billion people. Europe combined has more operational vehicles than Russia does. Has a larger standing army than Russia does. A much better air force, and relies on it for air defence, not on ground-based missiles.

I never said 'easilly' but imagining that Russia can occupy half a billion people is downright crazy

Thus you cannot easily imagine any of the Baltic states, Finland or Sweden doing the deed.

Norway is conceivable-- but they're not really all that active in the Baltic sea, Ukraine is conceivable-- but it isn't actually super easy to do what was done. Blowing up the pipeline would have been easy, but there were several bombs, and they were, as I understand it, quite big, and this would be removal of resources from things closer to the fighting.

Norway is difficult for political reasons though-- would they really screw over their neighbouring countries in the EU?

Thus all these countries are all unlikely choices.

In addition the bad-trigger scenario would imply that the explosives and triggering mechanism remained in place on the remaining pipe, which would require the US to rush there to remove them or trigger the missing one to avoid terrible diplomatic consequences if the unexploded device were to be discovered.

I am an investigative reporter who covers crime, and my sources often insist on anonymity. There are ways to mitigate the possibility of being lied to.

All of my sources know that we have a deal: I promise to do everything that I reasonably can to keep their identity secret, and they promise me the truth. If a source lies to me or intentionally misleads me, my agreement to keep their identity secret no longer stands.

There’s more to it than that, but that’s the gist, and it has worked well for years. I have never burned a source, and as far as I know, I have never published an investigative story that is wrong about anything material.

Gazprom would have to abide by it once relations are normalised, or find other countries unwilling to trust it when signing future contracts.

That's not how it works. The onus is on the journalist and the editors to ensure that any source they're relying on is credible, in a position to know what they're claiming, and not playing you. That's why most will insist on dual-sourcing any particularly sensational claims unless they really trust the source.

In the past journalists have been fired for relying on non-credible sources, most recently James LaPorta, so this is no small thing.

If Sy Hersh is not verifying anything about the source he's relying on, he's just being a transcriber not a journalist.

That strains credibility quite extraordinarily.

(Yes, that’s legally Manhattan still. And a reasonable walk from the UN.)

If you publish all at once, others can go and verify the details. The source is protected.

If you verify pre-publication, e.g., go to the diving school in Florida and ask too many questions, you (and the source) will be under surveillance in no time.

I'm sure the Italians are very capable but they've never demonstrated holding off a tank force 8x their size.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2022/03/31/ukraines-be...

Whether the Russians can occupy successfully isn't the point, they can do a ton of damage in a short amount of time, not to mention the torture and rape.

Second, those terrible diplomatic consequences probably happened, behind the scenes (and weren't that terrible, because no one really wants to denounce the US in the middle of the Ukraine war). I'll remind you that both Sweden and Denmark claimed nothing other than sabotage could be concluded, and closed down their investigations and classified the heck out of the details. Feel free to make freedom of information requests to them, so that you can get those "national security interest" refusals.

Odds are that the US didn't directly admit anything to them, but strongly suggested they shouldn't look too closely or be too specific in their statements, and that those states were quick to comply. And probably cleaned up well enough that there was nothing left for the Russians to find, in the case that they should run their own investigation (although, Russia can't run a real investigation to save their ass, they're too used to have their conclusions dictated to them, so I wouldn't worry if I was the USG).

And the rest is all putting the cart in front of the horse. Would it look any different if Russia (or anyone else) were the culprit? No, it wouldn't (since otherwise the fact it's classified itself leaks information). Maybe the investigation just yielded nothing conclusive? Which given the location and event (big explosion and lots of gas output making sure everything gets nicely distributed elsewhere) wouldn't be that surprising?

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2015/05/seymour-hershs-u...

https://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2015/05/the-new-yorker-...

You're suggesting that when Russia cut off the gas, and Germany didn't immediately capitulate, that's evidence the leverage was worthless? It wasn't even winter yet.

Also, blowing up your pipeline just as a competitor comes on line? Whatever you think of Hersh's article, it's undeniable that Norway made a lot of money on the sabotage. Even if Russia had stayed firm and sent no gas through the pipeline, the fact that they could have alone would have kept prices lower.

Third, you're suggesting that Sweden/Denmark would have kept it secret if they found evidence of Russian meddling? They absolutely would not. In fact, if there was even evidence exculpating the US, without implicating anyone else, they would have blasted it to the heavens.

NATO-aligned think tanks have gotten better at this - something I view as a good thing, despite that I am not a fan of them, and I don't think they did it willingly. But with the rise of Bellingcat, they're now routinely publishing embarrassing material on Russia that they would have LOVED to keep secret as a bargaining chip, in earlier decades.

In fact, if there was a Russian team that blew up the pipeline, they would have left a trail a mile wide in public data and the countless leaked databases (another huge one just a few days ago, from Roskomnadzor). Bellingcat, or anyone interested, could have given you their damn cell phone numbers, if it was a Russian op. Yet they have instead remained utterly uninterested in the question of how the pipelines were sabotaged.

There are plenty of powerful people trying to discredit reporters who tell who tell the truth, so we should also be skeptical of attacks on Hersh.

Putin's concern would be the home front.

> known abusive husband

Not sure what you’re referring to here. If you’re analogizing what Biden said with domestic abuse, that’s just ridiculous. It’s more akin to telling the wife they’re going to need to divorce if she doesn’t stop threatening the children. If you’re saying the US in general has a history of doing things that could be compared to domestic abuse, sure, but so could all parties involved, particularly Russia. So we’re back at square one.

Recent reports suggest the US and certain European nations sabotaged peace talks between Ukraine and Russia. Are those nations supporting the genocide of Ukrainian civilians?

But it's not a comparison, it's just an example of the same statistical dishonesty.

When the pipeline was in fact blown up, of course we're going to look at vaguely worded threats in another light.

The only nukes Germany has are those that America charitably allows Germany to borrow. If Germany grew up like UK and France and bought/made their own toys, then maybe Germany would find itself to have more autonomy.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_sharing

It's not entirely fiction such as, "And then Biden sacrificed a peahen, waved his magic wand, and spoke the incantation and the pipeline exploded!" The events, organizations, equipment, and strategy described in the document is all real-life stuff!

Assuming this is an blog from Sy Hersh and it's not made up by Sy Hersh and it's not made up by the person Sy Hersh interviewed (all of which might be possible and can't be easily claimed to be unlikely (or likely)):

The US still doesn't need to send a message now and it's still not profitable for them for the article to go public now.

More likely is that both Sy Hersh and the informant didn't want to risk it before. E.g. due to fear of personal consequences or due to fear of causing political consequences in ways they don't want to cause.

Wrt. the the normal citizens in the EU the US doesn't need to send a message, nor would it be received. Wrt. politicians messages already have been send clear enough.

>Now that the pipeline has exploded, they have plausible deniability and they can say it's not their fault the gas isn't flowing.

How the hell thinking they have nothing to lose and also worried about a contract at the same time sound or consistent?

Russia doesn’t lose all leverage the moment they shut off the pipeline. They still have the leverage from being able to turn the pipeline back on, which impacts competitors and customers by giving the option.

Blowing up the pipeline takes that option off the table for the foreseeable future, and with the advantage that it doesn’t cause immediate dangerous supply shocks to Allies since it was already off.

Win/win for the Allies (though if public, Western Europe gov’ts would have no choice but to be pissed in public), not great for Russia who has their last leverage knocked off the table.

I personally don’t have an opinion on if the US did or did not do it, and I doubt we’d know for at least several decades.

But the US has done lots weirder stuff with far less concrete potential benefits before. hell, nearly anything the CIA had been caught doing in the 60’s or 70’s has far less plausible justification!

The credibility of the author should never be taken for granted, especially with stories of this sensitive nature. The veracity also depends on an anonymous source, which will likely never be revealed nor verified or verifiable.

I think the danger here is that many people will take the author’s credibility for granted and will be influenced to take some action based on their belief.

I guess that’s okay, but it feels like people ought to come to the conclusion that this is nothing more than an interesting theory, then move on.

I was stating my opinion that the comparison was of low intellectual quality, not taking offense.

> When the pipeline was in fact blown up, of course we're going to look at vaguely worded threats in another light.

Except it’s only vaguely worded if you’re approaching it from the bias of wanting to think it was a threat of blowing it up. Approaching it a different way, they’re just the words a person would use if they were talking about ending the project, not literally blowing it up.

If Biden were going to be so aggressive as to threaten to blow up an infrastructure project of a close ally, why specifically limit it to Nordstream 2? “We’re going to lose our ever-loving minds here, but only for phase 2 of the project”.

Maybe you aren't being intentionally deceptive, I can't say. But as I pointed out you are not being fair and honest about Hersh's argument, which is more nuanced than the one sentence.

As for the reason why Hersh did this, I cannot say, a person's intention is a black box. But this kind of behavior amounts to some amount of dishonesty. It's not much more complicated than that.

https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-business-europe-ru...

Come on now. I get the desire for people to believe their own government could just never possibly engage in this kind of skullduggery (at least, not until they're comfortably removed from the incident in question by many decades and can safely file it under "well we don't do that kind of thing anymore"), but the idea that the Russians were the only ones with motive?!

I'm not sure what would make it so high risk. The truth could easily be castigated and maligned as "conspiracy theory," a dismissal that most people in the Western countries will readily accept. The only people with the resources to investigate and find hard evidence would either be in on it (Western/NATO allies) or easily written off as pushing lies and propaganda (the Russians).

My personal belief is that we will never know who actually performed the acts of sabotage. But taking some Biden soundbites, mixing it with some public information and some hand-waving doesn't produce any actual evidence about who actually did it.

Did they though? Looking at the gas futures chart it's not obvious to me at all. The prices suddenly spiked much higher when NS1 was suddenly shutdown. After the explosion they actually went down slightly. They did profit, but just from the actions from the Russian side (which were earlier in time).

As for whatever you mean with competitor coming online. Towards Germany the flows from Norway didn't change that much after the invasion, Europipe II from Norway to Germany was already maxed out since January 2021 pretty much.

No, they just don't have the means to escalate this any further (without using nukes).

(just kidding :p)

Also, petro states like Norway caused global warming and ultimately history will find them culpable for mass death.

They were like that because of cleaning up after some skirmish. To be identified, and buried.

These pictures were used to present it like that was common. Which wasn't the case.

The military intervention created the circumstances which made that common.

Is saying he misspoke. His words were interpreted in a way he did not intend them to be.

Addressing only the quote itself is unfair, as again that does not represent his actual argument.

I'm done with this.

Umm, the US has made a terrific return on investment. EU supplies have shifted dramatically away from Russia to Norway and the United States following the end of Nordstream.

For someone who is not American, this statement is amusing. The US govt and US military are fully in bed with the US energy industry, when it comes to actions outside America.

US still occupies the Syrian oil fields btw. No one talks about US territory grabbing there - it never even makes the news.

I had been assuming that the working theory amongst the “America definitely blowed up the pipeline” crowd was that this would have been a scheme cooked up amongst the NATO allies. Because, the alternative, that America did that against the will of Germany is just utter insanity. The idea that they would risk turning the entirety of Europe against them with such an act of brazen hostility is just…I can’t even.

Also, given the climate now, if there was even a shred of evidence or any hint that Putin did this, US media and intelligence officials would be blaring that from every rooftop and every talking head would be "Russia this", and "Russia that". I think the relative silence speaks very clearly.

The most likely theory is still just that, a theory.

With great credibility comes great responsibility. Many people will read this and other stories as fact. It’s been an issue since the dawn of man, but with the reach a single voice has today, it has far more impact.

I had read a comment on HN once that said a course on critical thinking ought to be mandatory in school. I agree with that more and more.

I also think an author with this degree of influence ought to include a disclaimer reminding people to think critically about what is the truth and what could be the truth. A warning before using these words in anger would be the right thing to do.

I'm sure if they did, that was with the sole purpose of ensuring maximum factual accuracy, and no other purpose whatsoever.

He could also have a source who fabricated the entire story.

Even if he did have a source or sources, the level of detail is astonishing. The source or sources would have needed to be omnipresent across multiple agencies and government offices. That alone seems improbable.

The importance of this story is at Bay of Tonkin or WMD levels. At that level, credibility is not sufficient without sufficient evidence.

It would certainly be an extreme, and strange escalation of their previous attempts to use gas supplies as a retaliatory device. But, IMO, it’s less far-fetched than what you’re suggesting.

During the Vietnam War (1955-1975) Stoltenberg (born 1959) was -4 to 16 years old..

Hersh possibly confused Jens with his father Thorvald Stoltenberg. Who travelled to North-Vietnam in 1970 to negotiate between them and USA, and who was commended for his negotiating skills by the am. intel community in a declassified rapport from 1980.

Links/sources follow:

«Thorvald Stoltenberg and Reiulf Steen visited Hanoi in 1970.»

https://vietnamkrigen-wordpress-com.translate.goog/2010/02/2...

«In a new biography of Thorvald Stoltenberg, it is described how Norway brokered peace between the parties in the Vietnam War at the end of the 1960s.»

https://www-vg-no.translate.goog/nyheter/innenriks/i/Pk947/n...

«Defense Minister Thorvald Stoltenberg was praised for his negotiating skills in a so far classified CIA report from 1980.«

https://www-nettavisen-no.translate.goog/nyheter/cia-vurdert...

See my other comment for quotes and sources.

See my other comment for quotes and sources.

No, but corroboration doesn't require multiple sources.

For example, sources often provide copies of official records that corroborate their story. That can be enough, particularly when the authenticity of the records can be independently verified.

Second point - agreed. If for no other reason than there is little to no incentive for any of the players to share any evidence or info they may have found that would support or disprove any of the scenarios.

For Russia, if they could prove the US did it, it would strengthens the image of the US as a powerful world player with their foot on Russia's neck. If someone else did it, it would make them look even weaker.

For Western European allies, it would make it really obvious how much influence the US has on them, especially since their own fate continues to depend on the US - and it's large natural gas supplies. Even if they wanted to cut off the US, Russia is even worse for them, and they can't stand on their own two feet against either Russia or the US right now (militarily or economically). If someone other than the US did it, it would make their key infrastructure look even more fragile and vulnerable.

For the US, if they did it, it would expose the extent they are playing dirty (hurting the 'clean hands' narrative) and lose them good will with most of the public. If they found someone else doing it, it would reduce their apparent 'dirty tricks' power folks need to worry about, which is a major deterrent to enemies and allies doing dirty tricks.

It has a range of roughly 20 miles necessitating carrying it near the location. That "giant assault ship" is exactly what you use to carry one of these. It also explains how you haul a few hundred pounds of explosives down a hundred meters for planting.

https://twitter.com/MarkAmesExiled/status/162420098079862374...