Blowing holes in Seymour Hersh’s pipe dream | Hacker News Reader

Blowing holes in Seymour Hersh’s pipe dream

oalexanderdk.substack.com

165 pointsr721384 comments

Dupe: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34743078

I've read both this paper and the original Seymour Hersh article.

I found the abundance of details a bit weird, to be honest, but not enough to discount the credibility of the thesis.

On the other hand, this paper is poorly constructed, mostly using straw man techniques and sleight of hands to discredit the original paper.

I think it's doing the opposite of what it is trying to achieve, adding free publicity on top.

Some details in Hershs story were weird and made be cautious, but here is some more info that put some of that into new light:

"It looks for all the world like somebody organised two totally separate operations, involving two separately triggered pipeline attacks, and that Hersh’s source only knows about one of them."

https://www.eugyppius.com/p/nord-stream-update-in-lengthy-in...

I find that write-up dubious.

> The fear, however, was that the bombs wouldn’t work if they stayed in the water too long. This is actually what happened with two of the bombs.

Seriously? The world's largest military hasn't developed explosive devices that are sufficiently waterproof?

> There were still active explosives on the sea bed as the pipes were leaking their gas, which explains why partially complicit Denmark and Sweden closed the whole area and denied all access, until they themselves had removed everything.

This is just silly, and ignores Occam's Razor in order to fit a fact into a pre-determined narrative.

Bubbles reduce the density of water, thus potentially reducing buoyancy (in research based around oil rigs and the like, it was found that a large enough leak pushed enough water upwards to compensate, but this wasn't a large leak). Aerated water is a known drowning hazard for workers in water treatment plants for this reason, now add enough gas into the ocean beneath a boat, see what happens.

The leakage of residual gas in the pipeline into the water column posed a maritime hazard but sure, it was to remove the faulty bombs, that's why. They could have at least had the decency to mention and then explain away the buoyancy issue, at least insult my intelligence to my face.

>> The fear, however, was that the bombs wouldn’t work if they stayed in the water too long. This is actually what happened with two of the bombs.

> Seriously? The world's largest military hasn't developed explosive devices that are sufficiently waterproof?

The OP might be referring to the triggering mechanism running out of battery and thus unable to receive the triggering signal, rather than to water exposure.

Perhaps, but again I'd posit that the world's most advanced military wouldn't mind slapping on a few more batteries, just to be sure.

Or a drone submarine or some crap like that. The problem with this story is that there are so many ways any capable not-even-super-power could do something like this. There’s also all the 4D chess about Putin keeping his oligarchs trapped since they can’t sell the nation’s largest commodity. Or that’s what insert country with special forces wants you to think.

It’s possible Hersh is 100% correct but without anyone else corroborating him we’re just left with speculation.

Right. The most plausible explanation, given the number of Russian petrochemical executives critical of Putin who have died under suspicious circumstances, is that Putin wanted to greatly reduce the incentive of petrochemical oligarchs to stage a coup in order to re-open the pipeline.

Putin has shown he's very wary of the petrochemical oligarchs. If removing Putin from power doesn't open Nord Stream back up, then that's one less incentive for the petrochemical oligarchs to move on Putin, at least in the short term.

Presumably, Putin also wanted to make threats against the new Norway-Poland Baltic Pipe in a way that kept plausible deniability. He wanted to show he could destroy that pipeline, but without committing an act of war against a Nato member, so instead he blew up an unused pipeline owned by Russia.

This is my theory too. Putin blowing up the pipeline serves a number of purposes:

- removes options from a potential opposition within Russia

- reminds nations around the Baltic that Russia has undetectable underwater assets

- serves to potentially split NATO members (Hersh's story is obviously part of that)

> - serves to potentially split NATO members (Hersh's story is obviously part of that)

this is the big one. I can't see a reason why the US even the UK would blow the pipelines, esp. when they already have a very strong NATO rallying cry, and Putin turning off the gas already means N. American Oil & Gas will be making big money.

Like, you're already winning, why risk a disaster and blowback? Meanwhile Putin has shown, consistently, that he's capable and willing to play dirty like that, and can actively spite the Baltics and Scandinavia.

You repeat “the worlds most advanced military “ like it makes them infallible.

I didn't repeat it :)

First time I said:

"World's largest military"

Second time was "most advanced".

I'm not saying they're infallible, but they're not exactly the Keystone cops, either.

Ok, fair enough!

I don't know about you, but I find these "pro-West" side to be quite specious in their arguments. What idiot really believes that Russia of all people would want to kill their own golden goose ?

The argument these geniuses are implicitly making is that either Russians (or more euphemistically "Putin") is a raging lunatic, or that their readers so utterly dim-witted that they'll believe any shit that they'll spin.

OTOH, US/UK... has a very long history of false-flags and extremely sophisticated psychological warfare, esp. given the international dominance of the English language.

There’s a very straightforward and plausible rationale for Russia (specifically, Putin) to do it: coup-proofing by forced commitment to not turning the oil back on, like breaking your own steering wheel in a game of chicken and throwing it out the window. There are presumably elites in Russia who would like to see the war end and go back to business-as-usual so they can get their assets and incomes back, and blowing up the pipeline signals to them “that’s not happening. Total commitment is the only option, so don’t even bother trying to replace the current leadership.”

Is this definitely what happened? Of course not, we don’t know who did it. But it is a perfectly coherent and plausible claim, and so your hyperbolic statements about “what idiot really believes…” etc. only serve to demonstrate that you haven’t bothered learning about anyone’s position other than yours, and thus that you yourself probably shouldn’t be listened to.

That is the strongest case, but I'm still confused by the seemingly conflicting claim that Putin is susceptible to a coup but only if there's a pipeline. Don't Russian elites have nearly as much to lose from this war continuing with or without a pipeline?

What exactly would the pipeline change in the these elites calculus, willingness or ability to stage a successful coup?

The pipeline repair cost estimates are much lower than the cost of an ongoing war plus oil embargoes. That is, a coup now benefits these elites roughly as much as it would have with a pipeline.

The remaining pipelines for Western Europe go through Belarus and Ukraine.

https://www.naturalgasintel.com/ukraine-warns-of-gazprom-pre...

https://coffeeordie.com/russia-relies-on-ukrainian-pipelines

The Russia - Ukraine - Slovakia / Poland route is not reliable.

https://www.eurasiareview.com/04022023-russia-energy-profile...

> In May 2022, Ukraine suspended operations at the Sokhranivka measuring station and the Novopskov compressor station, which are part of the Soyuz and Brotherhood pipeline system, because of interference by Russian forces.

https://www.offshore-technology.com/news/ukraine-cease-russi...

> In a press statement, the firm said: “Moreover, the interference of the occupying forces in technical processes and changes in the modes of operation of GTS facilities, including unauthorised gas offtakes from the gas transit flows, endangered the stability and safety of the entire Ukrainian gas transportation system.”

---

From a layperson trying to channel Russian leadership, removing Nord stream would mean that the only way for Western Europe to get natural gas is through stability in Ukraine and an easing of tensions between Ukraine and Russia. Russian leadership obviously has their preferred way of accomplishing this.

My crystal ball also says that even after the war ends in the favor of Ukraine, that gas pipeline will not be available because of the tensions and the... lets call it "unreliable partnership" that exists ( https://www.naturalgasintel.com/ukraine-warns-of-gazprom-pre... )

Note that the gas pipeline through Belarus to Poland has also been turned off. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yamal–Europe_pipeline

> On 26 April 2022, Gazprom announced it would stop delivering natural gas to Poland via the Yamal–Europe pipeline, as well as to Bulgaria, as both countries had rejected Russia's demand that payments for gas be made in Russian rubles - a demand allegedly constituting breach of contract.

Without the Nord Stream, Yamal, Soyuz/Brotherhood; Southern Europe (Greece, Romania, Italy) are being tempted with gas supplies from Russia by way of Turkey. Russia is additionally trying to tempt Turkey into being its energy hub ( https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/turkeysource/turkey-ca... ) with promises of cheap gas, free money (transit fees for the pipeline), and a dependence on Russia for that part of the economy.

Why would you interpret that motive as "only" if there's a pipeline?

Think of a car seat belt: does it make you immune to dying in a car crash? No. It does however reduce the probability you will. So might removing a bunch of spikes glued to your steering wheel.

Similarly, what do you think a coup is? A coup is when guns get pulled in board rooms and people have to try and remove blood and bodies from the carpet. It's safe to say "the elites" don't plan one idly, and you know, if the stunning rate of Russian executives turning up having committed suicide off balcony's[1] is any indication, one real good way not be one of them is to rat out the people coming to you proposing a coup. Particularly if they're not able to promise big money in return.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suspicious_deaths_of_Russian_b...

The most likely coup scenario right now in Russia is that the head of the Wagner Group deposes Putin from the right.

> There’s a very straightforward and plausible rationale for Russia (specifically, Putin) to do it: coup-proofing by forced commitment to not turning the oil back on, like breaking your own steering wheel in a game of chicken and throwing it out the window.

And there is an even more straightforward debunking of that version:

a) these pipelines have nothing to do with oil, they pipe gas

b) these pipelines are only a fraction of all the gas transportation infrastructure: there is a huge pipeline in Ukraine that dwarfs NS1/2 combined (and Ukraine happily accepts Russian money as a transportation fee, they've even raised it recently), there is a pipeline in Belarus, there is Yamal, and there is TurkStream.

I'm really surprised to hear people talking about the US, UK, Russia, etc but not talking about Ukraine.

This is actually a very good point. As much as I love sticking it to the US, it's hard not to notice how much Ukraine benefitted from this.

The whole goal of NS1/2 was to avoid dealing with Ukraine, but now there is little threat to their gas transportation system and Russia has to pay extra to Ukraine for pumping gas to Europe (and they even raised the fee recently).

Still, I doubt Ukraine could have done it alone, but I expect it would make a perfect scapegoat if things get too dangerous for the real mastermind.

The pipeline is not completely destroyed. It could be repaired.

Putin attacked the Ukraine and used Energy Dependence as a weapon against Europe. Russia bought energy companies. Russia influenced energy politics and politics in general in these countries. Russia reduced the storage and flow of natural gas before the invasion and prepared it to be used as a political instrument in this war, which is not just a war against the Ukraine, but a war against the West (US, EU, NATO, ...).

Energy is one of Russias main weapons against Europe in its expansion politics towards the west.

One would be naive to underestimate the will and evil of Putin to use his weapons, to influence European politics - for example by inducing fear in the population because of energy supply shortages. There is plenty further escalation possible. Putin thought that the Ukraine would fall easily into his hands, Controlling the Energy supplies then would be his many insurance. Now he is in a lengthy war against the Ukraine and he needs to instrument more pressure, like creating fear and panic in the western europe population, which could force western politics to make compromises. Russia still has the gas&oil, it has other pipelines and enough existing or future customers. In a conflict the value of this goes up. Temporarily blowing up a pipeline is only increasing this value.

Let me add: the blown-up pipelines were three of four newly built. One of the four is not damaged. The damage to the other three pipelines was only in a small area. The pipelines are repairable. The pipeline was mainly a project of Russia and Germany, meant to supply natural gas to German markets (and beyond). The pipelines were not in use, yet. There was zero chance that the pipelines would go in use in the next decade, given the political situation.

> The pipelines are repairable

That is really doubtful, especially at this point when they've been full of seawater for so long.

> The pipelines were not in use, yet.

NS1 was operational for years, and NS2 was technically too: all the equipment was running and the pipe was pressurized - just turn the tap on.

> There was zero chance that the pipelines would go in use in the next decade, given the political situation.

I don't think that's fair. Political situation can change easily. Lap journalists could just dust off the ol' narrative of "Ukraine is full of nazis", which was prevalent in pro-western media before the war gone hot and all of this suddenly became "Russian propaganda"

> That is really doubtful, especially at this point when they've been full of seawater for so long.

They have coating inside. This prevents corrosion for some time. Earlier this year there were reports of a cost estimate of $500 million and a time duration of one year for a repair.

One of the pipelines hasn't been damaged, but maybe needs some equipment replaced -> pumps.

> NS1 was operational for years

"Was". It wasn't delivering natural gas when the explosion happened. Russia had stopped the gas transport already. Various reasons were given - technical problems and the sanctions against Russia.

There was never any natural gas delivered via NS2. NS1 was stopped end of August 2022.

If Russia ever wants to sell natural gas (again) via these pipelines , then it should stop their brutal war on the Ukraine NOW.

> I don't think that's fair.

It is. There is zero chance that Germany will take any gas delivered via these pipelines without a full political change in Russia.

> Earlier this year there were reports of a cost estimate of $500 million and a time duration of one year for a repair.

So basically like building the pipe part anew.

> There was never any natural gas delivered via NS2

Technically there was. It was pressurized. Meaning it was full of gas delivered up to the tap on the German side.

> If Russia ever wants to sell natural gas (again) via these pipelines

Gosh, I really hope not. I also hope it stops pumping gas through Ukraine and doesn't waste time on Turkish gas hub. Dealing with Europe who acts like this is some kind of privilege is a waste, IMO.

> It is. There is zero chance that Germany will take any gas delivered via these pipelines

You are being categorical at the expense of being realistic. It's been gorging on gas from these pipelines like crazy, while filling the reserves. And it still uses Russian gas via various "latvian blend" like schemes, as Russia continues to pay a huge-ass fee to Ukraine for using old soviet huge-ass pipeline. This implies a huge-ass demand on the other side of that pipe. (It's actually quite fun to observe reiteration of history as the whole anti-NS1/2 deal is so hugely similar to anti-Ukrainian pipeline back in the Soviet era)

> So basically like building the pipe part anew.

No, the cost of the Northstream 2 alone was roughly $11 billion. Much of the pipeline could be used, the explosion was only in a small region.

> Technically there was. It was pressurized. Meaning it was full of gas delivered up to the tap on the German side.

It was filled, but nothing was delivered into Germany. There was also no permission given to do that.

> Dealing with Europe who acts like this is some kind of privilege is a waste, IMO.

Russia has all the responsibility. They attacked the Ukraine. It's their choice. It has nothing to do with a 'privilege'.

> You are being categorical at the expense of being realistic.

Realistically Russia has removed themselves from being someone who we want to trade with for at least a decade. They are not a partner and they are not reliable.

Russia started a war against not only the Ukraine, but also against the rest of Europe and they used the energy dependency as a weapon. Russia was preparing for the war for some time.

> No, the cost of the Northstream 2 alone was roughly $11 billion. Much of the pipeline could be used, the explosion was only in a small region.

Yes. You are citing the cost of the whole project, with all the infrastructure, pumping equipment, pipelaying ships, etc. The pipe is only one component.

Besides, it doesn't matter if it's "a small region". As soon as the pipe gets full of water, it's basically dead in the water (pun intended). Lookup how these pipes get built. The sections are connected and hermetically sealed above the water, and then lowered so that no water gets in.

You seem to be imagining that pumping out a few countries length of seawater is some kind of an easy task, but it's actually cheaper to disassemble and rebuild the whole thing.

> It was filled, but nothing was delivered into Germany. There was also no permission given to do that.

That's just rhetorics. If you turn off the water tap at your home, that doesn't mean the water is no longer delivered. It's still there, practically at your home. Not sure what "permissions" you are referring to.

> Russia has all the responsibility. They attacked the Ukraine. It's their choice. It has nothing to do with a 'privilege'.

I am not talking about Ukraine. I am talking about weird European attitude like it's some kind of privilege to supply them like everyone around owes them something. If they don't want Russian gas, then that's just businesses.

> Realistically Russia has removed themselves from being someone who we want to trade with for at least a decade. They are not a partner and they are not reliable. > Russia started a war against not only the Ukraine, but also against the rest of Europe and they used the energy dependency as a weapon.

Well that's just propaganda bullshit.

First of all you've said it yourself that it's a matter of politics. European leaders themselves decided to use the energy in political context and saying that Russia "uses energy as a weapon" when their politics had bitten them in their collective ass is plain stupid.

And secondly it was Europe who decided to engage into economic war with Russia and that was the cause of all the disruptions - that's anything but being "reliable" on their part. Russia merely didn't do anything to appease the stubborn princess who decided to shot herself in the leg. I mean, c'mon, there was a moment when Europe actually expected to receive gas, but not pay for it due to sanctions - how idiotic is that? This exactly the kind of weird attitude I was talking about above.

And given the confessions of former German chancellor, former French president, former and current Ukraine presidents making statements like "prepared for war" is super rich. We all saw how "well prepared" Russia was - both in combat and in the amount of frozen assets.

I just don't get what the European leaders were expecting. Probably fell victims to the same attitude and totally forgot that when you ruin business relations they actually get ruined and no one owes them anything.

> As soon as the pipe gets full of water, it's basically dead in the water (pun intended). Lookup how these pipes get built. The sections are connected and hermetically sealed above the water, and then lowered so that no water gets in.

No, Nord Stream 1 pipeline was filled with water during construction.

Anyway, Russian news agency TASS reported about a possibility of a pipeline repair: https://tass.com/economy/1555677

> If you turn off the water tap at your home, that doesn't mean the water is no longer delivered. It's still there, practically at your home. Not sure what "permissions" you are referring to.

It wasn't open. There was no gas delivered and sold to Germany. "permissions" means that the German authorities would have to allow the Nord Stream AG to deliver natural gas over Nord Stream 2 into the German market. Such a permission was never given.

> I am not talking about Ukraine.

I was talking about Russia. Russia has removed themselves from the European market because of their war against the Ukraine.

> I mean, c'mon, there was a moment when Europe actually expected to receive gas, but not pay for it due to sanctions - how idiotic is that?

There was no such moment.

> I just don't get what the European leaders were expecting

European leaders were expecting that Russia would be a peaceful neighbour. One which one wants to have trade with.

> ruin business relations

Right, Russia ruined its business relations to the west. A customer can choose where to buy from. Europe chose to reduce and minimize economic relations with Russia.

Sure, selling into a foreign market is a privilege. Russia lost that privilege. Given that the trust for Russia is currently zero, it will take many years to repair that - which will be much more complicated than repairing the pipelines.

> No, Nord Stream 1 pipeline was filled with water during construction.

Not exactly, at least not like that: https://www.nord-stream.com/download/document/74/?language=r...

> Anyway, Russian news agency TASS reported about a possibility of a pipeline repair: https://tass.com/economy/1555677

Did you even read the article? "Maybe, possibly, requiring money and time". How does this counter my point that underwater pipes will have to be rebuilt? Are you sure you are not confusing the underwater component of the pipeline with the whole pipeline itself, with all the related infrastructure, compressing stations and so on and so forth?

> It wasn't open. There was no gas delivered and sold to Germany. "permissions" means that the German authorities would have to allow the Nord Stream AG to deliver natural gas over Nord Stream 2 into the German market. Such a permission was never given.

We are going in circles. NS2 was delivering gas up to Greifswald. The fact that Greifswald wasn't delivering it further is not a property of NS2.

> I was talking about Russia. Russia has removed themselves from the European market because of their war against the Ukraine.

"Russia has removed themselves from the European market", yeah, right. This was purely a decision of several (not all, mind you) European states. Followed by "heeeeelp, evil Russia wants to freeze us to death!". All while acting like any interaction with it is some kind of privilege. Pathetic.

> There was no such moment.

Well that is just denialism. Europe expected to freeze the payments as soon as they hit the accounts, along with other assets. The whole shenanigans with paying "with roubles" was exactly about this whole deal. Yeah "technically" they would pay, but Russia would never receive the funds and they would remain circling through European economy by remaining in European banks. This was exactly "such a moment".

> European leaders were expecting that Russia would be a peaceful neighbour. One which one wants to have trade with.

Well if that's your tune, then back at you, I can refer you to Putin's Munich speech in 2007. In any case, you are engaging in demagogy and digressing. Point is, European leaders started an economic war against Russia and suddenly it hit them too. So that's why we are hearing narratives like "Russia using energy dependency as a weapon" - this is basically an attempt to hide incompetence.

> A customer can choose where to buy from. Europe chose to reduce and minimize economic relations with Russia.

Sure, that's just business. And it is you who says that it is Europe's own choice. So tell me, how come the customer making their own choice is whining that "Russia uses energy as a weapon"?

> Sure, selling into a foreign market is a privilege. Russia lost that privilege.

No, normally that's just business relations. It's only "a privilege" with Europe, just like basically any other interaction with it. Which is just another iteration of the same lesson learned time and time again over centuries of interacting with that chauvinistic culture.

> Given that the trust for Russia is currently zero, it will take many years to repair that

Fat chance. This will be Turkey's business from now on. Dealing with Europe directly is worthless pain. And in any case, someone on the other end of the Ukrainian pipeline is still buying a shit load of Russian gas, mixing it and distributing it to the rest of the Europe under the guise of non-Russian gas ("Latvian blend" like schemes). So as long as the funds keep flowing, all this is just a cheap self-appeasing talk.

> What idiot really believes that Russia of all people would want to kill their own golden goose ?

Putin killed his own golden goose by invading Ukraine. Starting this war has been a disaster for Russia's economic future. Putin either doesn't care about that, or drastically miscalculated. Blowing up the pipeline would be consistent with either mindset.

Blowing up the pipeline is not consistent with either mindset.

Putin very likely miscalculated his "special operation", that does not mean he is completely crazy or stupid.

> Starting this war has been a disaster for Russia's economic future.

Or maybe not. I feel like a lot of this comes from misjudging sale of crude resources as "economic future" and a wishful thinking that us Russians are just brainless dummies, incapable of anything else.

I've seen the same rhetorics back in 2014 when the first sanctions kicked in, and that lead to automatic protectionist policy and economic growth - new projects, new businesses, new supply chains.

One has to realize that current globalized supply chains weren't benefiting Russia at all

But that's just my 2 cents.

This is no doubts this sabotage was conducted as a "special operation", and the nature of those is usually to remain secret for a long time.

I think Occam's razor is helpful in this case.

And I honestly don't care either way. But, I find the media treatment to be interesting. Most of the big ones don't want to touch it with a ten foot pole.

Why?

They don't hesitate to publish news about UFOs, I don't see why they should be more careful about a Russian pipeline sabotage...

I'm not sure if the alternative to Hersh being wrong is that Russia did it

Be specific. Which of the arguments in this do you find "poorly constructed"?

Literally every paragraph. Let’s start with this completely unsubstantiated and incoherent section:

> The US Air Force officials reportedly proposed “dropping bombs with delayed fuses that could be set off remotely”. One could write an entire post on the reasons why sounds entirely made up by someone with no real grasp of what that suggestion would actually technically entail.

During the supposed initial planning of this operation, from the way it is described by Hersh and his source, it appears that the CIA and entire interagency group were unaware of the fact that the Nord Stream pipelines were in fact pipelines.

I don't think you've picked up the argument being made there, which is that, being a pipeline, the Norwegian Navy wasn't constrained to one particular spot to disable it: it runs seven hundred and fifty miles under the Baltic Sea. The author of this post is saying Hersh doesn't know what a pipeline, not that the USG doesn't.

Try another paragraph. Let's interrogate it. For instance: why is the Norwegian Navy allocating a minesweeper, a large ship that is certainly tracked by the Russian military, to serve as a diving platform for a bunch of EC-UBA divers? Why wouldn't they use a civilian ship instead?

Instead of getting lost in minutia, can you explain why Biden, Nuland, Blinken and the rest of the neocon and lib imperialist gang would go on record about getting rid of NS1 and NS2 and then deny they had anything to do with it?

It's not "minutia". These are the details of the story Hersh chose to tell.

It's not a minor question! Implicating the Norwegian Navy drastically increases the number of people that need to keep this secret. Using a warship drastically increases the scrutiny applied to the ship.

I'm a bit confused, do you have some personal relationship to the author? Or why do you get personally offended when people question (not attack) the author of this particular substack?

NATO had plenty of big navy drills around the area last year. Who would complain about NATO ships in the area? Russia? Why do you even get hung up on that point?

https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/news_196240.htm?selectedL...

tptacek, you still haven't explained how Biden, Nuland, Sullivan and Blinken are all on video saying that NS pipelines will be destroyed. Why are you so heavily invested in this and why are you defending this insane criminal cabal that is pushing us into WW3?

You're response to the question of logical consistency in the Hersh story is "who cares about consistency, I don't like Biden or the US so it must be true, anyone who disagrees is 'heavily vested in an insane criminal cabal'". Why are you so heavily invested? Answer the question

These people are on record for threatening the pipeline. They had the motive and the means. So why should we disbelieve their threats? Sy Hersh is the most trusted living investigative reporter today. I'll take his word over some OSINTbro shill any day of the week. And to claim that Russians destroyed their own pipeline is ludicrous. Once they start cutting our undersea cables and destroying our pipelines, I guess they'll claim we're doing it to ourselves. Same "logic".

You're entire system of reasoning comes down to choosing what to believe based on how much you like the person saying it. And when you don't like the person saying it you can't even say their name without inserting a stupid insult like "criminal cabal" and "OSINTbro shill". You systematically sidestep all questions on matters of fact in favor of naked tribal social reasoning. Even in this discourse you opted to reason about the motivation semantics of the GP, speculating outloud that they are "invested" in defending a certain position, rather than directly addressing the arguments they made for that position. Your follow up comment is based 100% in elaborating on which sources you think are more reputable and 0% in analysis of what these sources are actually claiming.

Did you just get here from Twitter?

I don't care if its Hersh or otherwise, if someone says 1+1=3 then what they are saying doesn't add up. Debunking the Hersh story isn't a claim about Russia doing it to themselves, nor even a rejection of the hypothesis that the US did it. It merely refutes the Hersh story as evidence one way or the other.

Hersh's report adds up more than "Russia did it" nonsense that's coming out of CIA-approved sources.

It doesn't do that at all if it's false in all its particulars. You need to separate the idea that the US is behind this sabotage from the idea that Hersh is a kook. Both things can be true at the same time!

What are the chances that Hersh made up the whole thing? What are the chances that his source is just completely faking him out and he doesn’t know better? If Putin had threatened to “end” some US internet cable to Norway, would anyone be doubting the nature of that threat if the cable suddenly blew up?

The chances that somebody made this whole story up are very high, a near certainty.

Even after I point out your "reasoning" system and its flaws, you come right out the gate with "CIA approved sources". Are you even capable of anything other than bashing the source?

Thank you for calling out the OSINTbros! They're insufferable and until now, I didn't know what to call them. Much appreciated.

Biden is literally on video promising that these pipelines would be destroyed, so there is that.

Not sure you'd be downvoted for a clear and definite fact?

> Why wouldn't they use a civilian ship instead?

US navel divers on a civilian ship is the USA going to WW3 with Russia.

They know the real story will come out, perhaps within a day of the incident.

Could they have trained Norwegian divers to use US tech off a civilian ship, maybe, that is a lot of added complexity and Russia 100% knows the US did this already.

This is about the real story being leaked, USA and Russia need the Norwegian Navy in it. Just like the USA needs the Ukraine to drive their tanks.

This part is a no brainer.

No, it's not a no brainer: it's US divers either way, according to Hersh. See? None of this makes sense.

> it runs seven hundred and fifty miles under the Baltic Sea.

That's not a realistic measurement. Did you mean the length? The deepest part of the Baltic Sea is 459 meters deep. The ocean's deepest point is roughly 7 miles deep.

The length, is the point.

Same. I was hoping for something compelling to refute. This piece is trash and it’s a sad comment on the state of critical thinking (and liberal simping for empire) that it even garnered this much traction on HN.

> liberal simping for empire

To me, there are few issues more overlooked than this stuff. Structurally there's no mainstream constituency that'd critique it or even point it out, of course, but still. Crazy under the radar but right out in the open at the same time.

Agreed. It's glaringly obvious and yet libs make such a concerted effort to not acknowledge it. You can see them squirm as soon as you try to present them with the evidence they very intentionally ignore or even the blatant inconsistencies of their reasoning. The "Goodness" of the state has become bound up with their very identities-- not that different than the MAGA crowd's cult of personality.

Even if the Hersh thesis is completely made up, he still makes more sense than what this guy does.

For one thing. The most plausible reason he can't find the plane dropping the buoy he privides himself.

-It's a small device. -Better to use a boat. -Better to use a non military boat.

Yeah? Maybe that is what they did?

It's not impossible the source filled in a few gaps in his story? Or was mistaken? Or Hersh himself might have?

I don't want to go full conspiracy mode myself here but one thing is for sure. And that is that not finding proof of a covert operation can only mean one of two things. Either that it didn't take place or that it indeed was covert.

And why could the source not have said Stoltenberg worked with the Americans since the Vietnam war as a figure of speech?

Hersh article is not enough to base an opinion on imo. But it's not precisely worse off after this guys rather hollow arguments.

Howrver the analysis is not a bad start.

It's not what they did, according to Hersh! It's not a minor gap in the story! Hersh claims the Norwegian Navy allocated an Alta-class minesweeper to the task of operating as a diving platform for American divers. You can't say "well, maybe that's not what happened then!" and act like the story is intact. If major details in the story are false, that's a big deal!

You can absolutely still believe the US blew up the pipelines, the same way you could have before Hersh's goofy story ran. But you can't claim to believe Hersh's story while systematically dismantling all of his claims. The story itself is either true or it isn't.

I feel like a lot of people are defending this story because they've independently and axiomatically derived US culpability for the pipeline sabotage. I don't have anything to say about whether the US sabotaged the Nord Stream pipeline. But Seymour M. Hersh has, ever since 2006, been a nutbag, and this story he's telling makes no sense. That's a much more interesting thing to discuss than our rooting interests in geopolitics!

If you think he's right about the particulars, and this analysis is wrong about those particulars, say why! That's an interesting discussion to have!

> independently and axiomatically derived culpability

> ever since 2006, been a nutbag

I really needed to know if tptacek was somehow mixing in some ad homimem attacks to discredit the author.

Two things I found interesting that I didn't know and found fascinating is that western countries would give the US in modern age jurisdiction over their territory. I get how it happens in Japan or Germany that were occupied due to their role in WWII.

It's also worth noting that part of the reason why Iran had a revolution was especially due to the fact that there was no jurisdiction over crimes Americans did.

But why would a western nation sign such a thing in 2022?

I think we can also agree that if they had any hint of Russia doing it(which is an absurd theory to begin with given that they ARE the tap), it would have been blowing into extraordinary proportions. They fact that the story quietly died is a quite telling by itself.

Let's also remember for a moment that both NS1 and 2 were actually built on request of the Germans.

Let's also not forget that there had been an incident with an explosive laden drone in 2015 near the pipeline. Previous discussion from HN

https://www.pipeline-journal.net/news/explosive-laden-drone-...

https://twitter.com/KimDotcom/status/1579608838118191105 Gazprom just released these photos of a NATO Seafox drone that was found right next to Nord Stream 1 in 2015.

Nato Seafox Drone https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seafox_drone#/media/File:Seafo...

Nordstream sections that were attacked were at a depth of 80-110metres. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Nord_Stream_pipeline_sabo....

In May 2021 the worlds first wireless underwater drone was available for sale which operates at depths of upto 100mtres. https://www.hydromea.com/exray-wireless-underwater-drone

Maybe these could be used to monitor the pipeline in a semi autonomous fashion in future?

To play some devils advocate, is it possible for either Hersh or the supposed source changed some of the more superfluous details to obfuscate exactly what they know and who could have leaked it? Not trying to root for anyone or be an America-bad type here. Just having a hard time believing that the specific delivery vehicle used is anything more than a pedantic detail for future historians.

Yes. I agree. I'm just not sure some faulty details makes all of it untrue.

However it's hard to be sure because it works both ways. I.e. veryfieng some details don't make the whole thing true.

I havent made up my mind, and I don't think I will.

But it would surprise me if Biden did it if only for the millions of people half starving because of it.

The amount of pro-Russia apologia on this thread is pretty incredible. There are a number of salient points raised in this article discussing how details of the original article are implausible. However instead of addressing any of these points or inconsistencies directly, people simply say this rebuttal is "non-credible." I had expected more from this readership.

What I like about audience here is - majority still express critical thinking while assessing events. If you are looking forward to primitive discussions "Russia bad US good" based on emotions, you may look to other communities, there are aplenty.

I spent a few days with the chief of special operations of the joint chiefs of staff, and he told me many stories of things they would do to cover their tracks in special ops. For example, they would dismantle an airplane and file off every serial number of every part and then put it back together again.

Anyone planning an operation of this scale and significance would have thought to ensure the ship had an alibi. Moving the AIS transponder to another ship and send it on a tour seems trivially easy.

There's satellite photography and a picture by a photographer of the ship in question too.

Well, but, how hard could it be for the world's best resourced intelligence agencies to fake that data? Come on, man.

According to the same analysis: it doesn't even make sense that they'd require an Alta-class ship from Norway's Navy in the first place; the ship was essentially just a diving platform, and civilian ships operate in those waters with far less need for cover. Moreover, the whole structure of the operation Hersh claims: EC-UBA divers planting C4 charges detonated by a sonobuoy dropped by a Norwegian P8, doesn't make sense either: remote underwater detonation is a routine operation performed in the civilian oil and gas industry. Not to mention: the P8 implicated Norway's Air Force, contradiction a big chunk of Hersh's story.

None of this checks out. You can make any number of unfalsifiable arguments about them not checking out deliberately as part of psy-ops or whatever, but at that point you've taken the whole story back to square one: we just don't know what happened, and Hersh's story has essentially nothing to tell us about it, other than that one random, implausibly-well-informed anonymous person told Hersh, one of journalism's least trustworthy figures, that that's what happened.

Look, I'm just a dude on a message board reading a set of competing claims about a subject I know literally nothing at all about. But I trust these claims more than I trust Hersh's claims, by a factor of infinity.

When you qualify Hersh as one of journalism's least trustworthy figures, it's impossible to take the rest of your comment at face value.

I think you have to separate Hersh pre-2010 and Hersh after-2010. He was once one of the greatest journalists in the world, but the last decade he has been putting out poorly-sourced, falsifiable garbage.

Watch the interview he gave the other day (mentioned in this article) and tell me you walk away from it with more confidence that he's fully "there" as a journalist. He goes on a tangent about how Ukraine is doomed and Zelenskiy is killing his own people by resisting, even though 90% of the country is in favor of fighting to regain the occupied territory.

He also doubles down on the ship being, specifically, the ALTA (and not any other ship), but the ALTA has been sitting in a scrap yard for 6 months.

I completely agree. He has a Pulitzer Prize, five Polk awards, two national magazine awards. Broke My Lai, Abu Ghraib, and exposed the Israeli nuclear program.

He is easily the most accomplished journalist for several generations.

That doesn’t automatically mean this story is right but to dismiss him in emotional and inaccurate terms doesn’t speak to a rational, evidence-based interpretation of the facts.

Seymour Hersh has also gone off the deep end lately. Some current examples[1]:

* the Osama bin Laden raid was faked in a conspiracy with Pakistan and he was actually captured in 2006

* much of the US special forces is controlled by secret members of Opus Dei

* that the US military flew Iranian terrorists to Nevada for training

* the 2013 chemical weapons attack in Syria was a "false flag" staged by the government of Turkey

Being right decades ago doesn't somehow absolve you of having to have verifiable sources and evidence when you go on to make numerous other claims that don't happen and no one can verify.

[1] https://www.vox.com/2015/5/11/8584473/seymour-hersh-osama-bi...

We live in a world where the CIA has a heart attack gun [1], a presidential administration faked evidence of WMD to go to war in Iraq, the CDC conducted secret medical torture on black men with syphilis, and the Pentagon sent JFK proposals to justify a war on Cuba by conducting false flag terrorist attacks against American civilians [2]. (JFK rejected them, apparently.)

So I read a list like yours, and read you scoffing at the implausibility of any of those things, and I remember just how different we all can be.

[1] https://www.military.com/video/guns/pistols/cias-secret-hear...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods

Yes and you know what all those things have in common? Actual evidence which corresponds to real events, and multiple sources confirming that they happened.

What Hersh's suppositions have is a stunning lack of verifiable evidence and observably factually incorrect assertions (as in the case of his articles on Nordstream).

Saying someone's claims don't (yet) have the kind of evidence you demand is pretty different from calling someone crazy (and in so doing implying that those claims are not worth the consideration of the sane).

The only thing your bullet points were doing is suggesting "look at the delusions of this maniac! He can't be trusted because of them". But because the completely insane shit in my list turned out to be true, Hersh's sorts of claims are at least as plausible as the insane shit I listed in my reply. (And in the case of the first two, they were labeled by bienpensants of all kinds as proof that the claimant was certifiably nuts or at least unworthy of Serious Attention ... until the day they were shown to be true.)

All I'm saying is that, given the factual record of conspiracy and sociopathy on the part of the world's powerful, something like "2013 chemical weapons attack in Syria was a "false flag" staged by the government of Turkey" can't easily be used to dismiss someone as nuts. Not enough evidence? Sure, whatever (but let's wait a decade or two). Crazy though? Nope.

Over 10 years. It's one thing to have a story out there no one can prove, it's quite another to have been continuously publishing things you can't prove and which no one else can find any evidence of despite looking.

There are multiple factual claims about verifiable vessels, planes and movements being made and none of them are true.

All your saying is, despite obvious factual inconsistencies in the parts of the story which should be publicly verifiable, you've already got a conclusion you like. Which is what everyone's doing because the real big secret is "it was Russia" is a boring conclusion that doesn't move clicks.

> you've already got a conclusion you like

> the real big secret is "it was Russia"

Yes. The previous comment is also problematic. It does not follow from Hersh being one Smiths song short of a mixtape that the opposite of his conclusions are true. It's indicative of how all these discussions happen: points made to impeach Hersh's conclusions are analyzed as if they are arguments for the purity of US foreign policy. Hersh might be "right" that the US is behind the pipeline attack! But that doesn't matter if he got there by guessing. The real question is: can we learn anything from the story he told, and the answer to that seems, pretty convincingly, to be "only that his sources are fabulists".

It would be handy if you could conclude things like "whatever Hersh said, the opposite is true" from his stories! His journalism would be super valuable if that was the case. You'd just read it and draw the opposite conclusions. But you can't do that, because his stories (at least since 2006) are unmoored from reality.

Well, in the last decade he's kinda blown it with multiple claims in Syria. Statements that are either unbelievable, undocumented and easily could be (like building locations), or basically falsified have really brought down his trust. Even if he's just getting bad information rather than coming from a particular angle, his readers deserve better vetting of the material. At some point it feels like he's being driven by narrative more than facts that's a problem, and hanging out with Bashir Al Assad doesn't help to get the "real" story. Also note that Assad does have a particularly aligned geo-political supporter these days, who's directly involved.

   https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v35/n24/seymour-m.-hersh/whose-sarin
   https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v38/n01/seymour-m.-hersh/military-to-military
   https://www.bellingcat.com/news/mena/2017/06/25/will-get-fooled-seymour-hersh-welt-khan-sheikhoun-chemical-attack/
   https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/whatever-happened-to-seymour-hersh

There's no such thing as a chlorine bomb- "Chlorine is just a gas. It's not a chemical warfare weapon. You smell it, you run away." - Seymore Hersh

Tell that to soldiers in WWI.

Bellingcat is a way for UK/US spies to launder intelligence, a bootleg Wikileaks that won't challenge domestic power structures. I wouldn't point to them if I wanted my point to be taken seriously.

> I wouldn't point to them if I wanted my point to be taken seriously.

Bellingcat have a significant proven track record [1] and have won significant awards for their reporting, including the Investigative Reporting Award from the European Press Prize [2]. Do you have evidence for your counter-claim that they should not be taken seriously?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bellingcat#Notable_cases [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bellingcat#Awards

Haha, Bellingcat is your source vs a Pulitzer Prize journalist who may have fallen out of favor with a particular crowd, and you want the comment to be taken seriously? Not all us drink Koolaid. Here's a link to your link - about Brown Moses, an unemployed man from Leicester, England (https://www.cjr.org/business_of_news/bellingcat_brown_moses....)

Good idea, judge based only on the name of the source, completely captured by narrative and unable to make decisions based any measurable facts they present. Pick a football team and cheer them to victory for surely that's the right way to understand the world, the economy, and geopolitics!

Don't read anything from the London Review of Books either since you might not agree with them. It's scary to hear new things.

I'll note that you didn't dispute that chlorine gas was used (eg in Yepres and many other times) and killed thousands in the great war nor that Seymour said it couldn't (there's video). Do you like it when your team slaughters innocents? Tryout Kiwi Farms.

>>>>Good idea, judge based only on the name of the source, completely captured by narrative and unable to make decisions based any measurable facts they present. Pick a football team and cheer them to victory for surely that's the right way to understand the world, the economy, and geopolitics! Lots of words, but nothing that adds to the discussion that the source of your "new things" is a bunch of Tik-Tokers doing armchair analysis. Here's another description of your trusted sources - "Brown Moses aka Eliot Higgins, is the founder of an online collective called Bellingcat that picks apart conspiracy theories and investigates war crimes and hate crimes using clues from the Internet." Wow, how amazing that we can now understand the world, the economy, and geopolitics from sitting in our gaming chair using clues from the internet. Yah, let's dispute about chlorine gas in the "great war" since you and I are experts at chemical warfare and we both have access to proven, evidence-based reliable data aka Bellingcat and London Review of Books!

When you're JAQing off the use of chlorine gas in WWI and comparing LRoB to TikTok, ZyclonB and the holocaust are nearby. Since you use the internet I guess you can't know anything, LOL!

If you're stuck in a time tube and perceive the world as it was in 2005, Hersh is one of the more important journalists in the world. I don't deny that. I only deny that the Jews are attempting to start WW3 in Iran, that Opus Dei runs USSOCOM, that the US faked the UBL raid in Pakistan (and in fact the ISI had UBL for years prior), and that Syria's Sarin attacks on their own people were faked by the US. Oh, also that the US got the Norwegian Navy to put a minesweeper in the Baltic Sea as a diving platform for US divers to blow up a pipeline that wasn't shipping any gas to Germany.

If you're still in 2005, I have great news for you: you've got one more amazing season of the Wire ahead of you, and 5 whole seasons of a show called Breaking Bad --- take my word on this, it's going to be amazing. You can skip The Wire S5 though.

What is your explanation for why the White House, State Department, and CIA immediately responded with public statements about that "blog post" from a "discredited former journalist"?

What is your explanation as to why Washington hasn't put forward an alternative explanation for what happened to the critical infrastructure of their treaty ally, given they have the most powerful intelligence service on the planet?

This was clearly a covert operation and as such is unlikely to have any smoking gun. But As Hersh said, he's merely "deconstructing the obvious".

There are multiple possible reasons for why Washington hasn't put forward an alternative explanation. Maybe they really don't know. Or maybe they do know but can't publicly reveal it in order to protect intelligence sources and methods. Or maybe they did do it, but using a different technique than Hersh alleged. Or maybe they intentionally leaked a false story to Hersh to muddy the waters.

>other than that one random, implausibly-well-informed anonymous person told Hersh

There is no reason to believe that Hersh is working off a single source. If he were, it would be extremely stupid, and certainly unbefitting a journalist with his level of experience, to admit it, since it would make it far easier to determine who the leaker was — it narrows the list of candidates dramatically. It seems like the whole justification for the "single source" smear is coming from a few times when Hersh said "my source" in the essay, which may simply be good practice in ensuring he doesn't accidentally reveal which claims came from one source and which came from multiple, since that could also (unlikely, but not impossible) help the intelligence services find one of the leakers.

>remote underwater detonation is a routine operation performed in the civilian oil and gas industry.

Remote underwater detonation with an unidentifiable signal is not. Using a normal sonar detonator would probably increase the chance of detection.

Detection of what? It's not a secret that somebody blew up the pipeline. Do we have a clear theory of what exactly the conspirators were attempting to conceal?

Obviously, detection of who blew up the pipeline. If you can detect the means, then you have a lead for the culprit.

What kind of question is this? All it does is make me think you're being intentionally obtuse. Anyone who blew up the pipeline — or committed any other crime —would try to cover their tracks, unless they were planning to take credit (which they weren't). That's how you always commit crimes!

How exactly does detecting a remote detonation give you attribution? Google this: a lot of different entities do underwater remote detonation. The one thing you wouldn't want to do is to park a big, beaconing Alta-class minesweeper precisely over the thing you later blow up!

It doesn't immediately give you attribution, but like any other clue, it could contribute to an evidence base that eventually leads to a suspect. Again, this is basic criminology, and you're a security researcher. Why are you suddenly unable to make these connections?

The same argument makes it easy to spin tales. "Of course there's no evidence, they thought of that."

> I am unsure as to why all the intelligence officials in the initial planning meetings for the mission felt that the only possible way to sabotage the pipeline would be at the short section directly bordering Russia, instead of the large section in more favorable waters.

If you (US military / intelligence) knew that the entire world was going to blame you after this happened, you might feel that was critical placement for the sabotage. You would also plan to immediately seed the entire media ecosystem with “Russia obviously did this” statements and the explosive placement would bolster your claim.

The head scratcher is why you would use any surface ships at all for such a clandestine operation.

can you deploy divers from subs?

Easily. It's one of their most used functions.

Yes, it's common practice, and has been for decades. It is my (unfounded suspicion) that submarine-based divers were the ones to destroy the Nordstreams.

You sure can! It was used quite extensively Operation Ivy Bells: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Ivy_Bells

this is amazing! Tysm.

Submarines can also be detected by sonar. Ships are common and do not raise as much suspicion as submarines. Either could have launched the divers.

Sheer hubris, knowing the media will carry water for you later.

Let us consider that, even if he was fed false-information and his story discredited we can do limited conclusions from it.

It might not affirm "the West blew up Nordstream" but it certainly does not affirm "the West NOT blow up Nordstream".

For that matter, it certainly doesn't exclude the possibility that the person posting as molopolo24 was personally responsible for the attack!

And now that the possibility has been raised, we must all very seriously consider it along with all the other possibilities. This is only fair.

I mean, I personally think its reasonable that the USA blew up the pipeline. Personally I'm at about 75% USA, 20% Russia, 5% someone else.

I just also believe that Hersh's article was really, really, incredibly bad.

I haven't followed any of this really at all, but is there a compelling reason why Ukraine isn't at the top of everyone's list? Seems like they would have the motive to prevent Germany from giving-in to Russian demands to keep gas flowing and at the same time hurt Russia. It doesn't seem like it was a highly technical or expensive operation that would have prevented a smaller player from accomplishing it, and in fact there are signs that it wasn't a highly coordinated job. My completely uninformed analysis starts the odds at 75% Ukraine, 10% U.S., 10% some Russian faction, 5% other.

Maybe! I feel everything Ukraine does is under a microscope and they’d be hesitant to upset the USA or risk losing intl support by going rogue on something like this.

That doesn't seem like going rogue. The pipeline was already off. Sanctions are in effect. This just seems like ensuring the status quo is kept in place.

The pipeline was voluntarily disused by the Germans, not under sanction. Whoever blew up the pipeline (come-on, it was obviously the US) attacked critical infrastructure co-owned by Germany, Russia, and some minority interests. That would seem a little ungrateful, wouldn't it, directly attacking your sponsors? The US, on the other hand, has a long list of incentives for doing so.

I think the 2 reasons people don't suspect Ukraine is that:

a) it seems kinda implausible they have ability to blow up the pipe-line, nevermind to do so without being detected in what has to be the most cloesly monitored body of water on the planet.

b) Germany was already backing them. Blowing up the pipeline might make Germany marginally less likely to backslide, but if Ukraine were caught blowing up the pipeline, Germany would almost certainly turn against them. The risk/reward doesn't really make sense.

(FWIW, I think the most likely suspect is the one that doesn't usually get mentioned, that Germany blew it up to demonstrate their resolve regarding Russian sanctions).

(FWIW, I think the most likely suspect is the one that doesn't usually get mentioned, that Germany blew it up to demonstrate their resolve regarding Russian sanctions)

This is very unlikely, the german government simply never would have the balls to do anything remotely drastic.

But they likely would close their eyes, if someone else would do it.

Funny, as a Pole my 1st reaction was "damn our spooks finally did a good job". I was (and still am) very surprised nobody was even considering Poland as a perpetrator.

I know, right. Historical beefs with both Germany and Russia, a history of competent intelligence organizations, a quality military, and obvious current motivations. Yet, every time I bring up Poland as an option, usually I just get ignored.

The time I do get a response, it is usually some story about how only the US has the capability, which is total BS.

Historical grievances aside, no middleman likes being cut out.

That was intended to come under current motivations, but I should have been more explicit. What else are the other Poles around you annoyed about in this situation? Do most think Polish agencies were responsible?

Most folks I know believe it was the US. They think that our leadership lacks the cojones and our military lacks the capability. I believe neither to be true, though I’d imagine there must have been an implicit approval from major NATO partners. Take France for example - Germany getting cheap fossil fuels isn’t exactly great for the French economy.

Funny you should say that: https://www.reuters.com/markets/europe/gas-starts-flowing-po...

"Gas starts flowing to Poland through new Baltic Pipe pipeline"

>a) it seems kinda implausible they have ability to blow up the pipe-line, nevermind to do so without being detected in what has to be the most closely monitored body of water on the planet.

Is there a reason it couldn't have been a couple of zodiac boats? I can't imagine the entire Baltic sea is so well monitored that every craft of any size is tracked, even under the cover of darkness. Seems like a large moving van sized vehicle could hold a couple of deflated rafts, and a 10 man outfit in a trek across Poland.

"We cannot disprove it. Therefore, it must be true." :-)

The reading comprehension has fallen to an abysmal level. Who said it is true?

It's just a possibility and in my opinion a very reasonable one. Does it advance the economic war against Russia? Check. Does it galvanize European support for US and not Russia? Check

You can't draw conclusions of any kind from false information; that's the problem with false information.

Of course you can, you now have valid information about the source of that false information - and can make hypothesis about the motives.

Only if you're very lucky do you actually know any of these things. There's generally a very wide space of things that could have happened, and knowing that exactly one of them is wrong narrows things down very little. The space of motives for people to muddy the water is similarly wide, so you probably don't know anything new about the source.

"Only if you're very lucky do you actually know any of these things."

No, if someone is spreading false information, then this gives the solid information, that this source is tainted.

And everything else is speculation, yes.

You mean you know the outlet is unreliable, if they do it enough times. By "source" I assumed you meant the source of the story, about whom we still know nothing.

I was refering literally to this statement.

"You can't draw conclusions of any kind from false information; that's the problem with false information."

My point simply being, that you get information from false information, regarding the source of the false information. Philosophical and apparently out of place.

> it certainly does not affirm "the West NOT blow up Nordstream".

Well yeah, but only because that's included in the statement "we know nothing more than we did before he wrote the article."

Cui bono?

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

I didn't read Hersh's essay, I did read this and found it logical. BUT independently from these two writeups, the thing that doesn't make any sense is the idea that Russian would blow up their own pipeline.

It is an asset they fully control. The idea that they damaged their own asset "to show the world they are serious" or whatever is about as likely as "to threaten Alice, Bob shot off his own foot." Is it possible? I guess so... but it doesn't make sense as the go-to explanation.

“We couldn’t have done it” seems like a good way to sow discord among the Western allies.

There’s also the theory that it gets Gazprom out of contract violation penalties.

I hadn't heard of that, interesting. But curious, (1) are the penalties greater than the cost of the pipeline + all foregone future revenue? (2) Do they care? Whoever could possibly try to "penalize" Russia for contract violation, is currently already pretty much engaged in a hot war with it, couldn't really get worse in the moment, can it?

The cost of the pipeline was likely a sunk cost before it actually got sunk. Even intact, there’d be little chance of it being activated anytime soon.

Penalties can be taken out of Gazprom holdings abroad. There’s already discussion of giving sanctioned seized Russian assets to Ukraine.

So I still fail to see the logic. If Russian assets are being seized anyway, what's the benefit to Russia to destroying the physical pipeline they control and could choose to use in the future?

The value of an unusable pipeline is zero. Worse than zero, if you have to maintain it.

Gazprom wasn’t fully sanctioned at the time, and seized assets can be returned later. Penalties would eat into that.

And again, sowing discord by accusing someone else probably is worth something.

“Whoever could possibly try to "penalize" Russia for contract violation, is currently already pretty much engaged in a hot war with it”

So they’re at war with their only potential customers. Sounds like the pipeline has zero commercially value to Russia since it’s unlikely anyone would buy the gas.

So there’s no monetary concern to stop Russia doing whatever with it.

Pipeline has zero current commercial value. It has potential non zero future commercial value. And there's no benefit to destroying it. Why would they have?

A. Yes there’s a slight chance that it has future commercial value decades in the future, but it seems unlikely.

B. Can you read Putin’s mind? Actually Invading Ukraine was a fantastically ill-thought endeavor, but that happened. Was Putin grossly misinformed and out of touch reality or what? But now Putin/Russia won’t do anything that certain hackernews commenters don’t think would make sense? That is an interesting take.

Also Why are commenters still saying there is no potential benefit to Russia destroying it? It’s already been pointed out that there are multiple ways it could help Russia. It’s pretty easy to come up with multiple speculative ways destroying it had chances of providing more value over the next decade than doing maintenance on an unusable pipeline.

Just look at how some accuse the USA of doing it while being unable to conceive that Russia could have done it. if Russia did it then that’s exactly what they wanted. Unfortunately that accusation is reserved mostly to internet pundits so that’s been a flop for Russia.

Everything is speculation at the moment. Which means whoever did it at least succeeded fantastically in that regards.

“They” in your 2nd paragraph is probably making it hard to reason out.

You’re imagining Russia to be a nation with somewhat rational self interest, right? It isn’t.

Russia today is Vladimir Putin serving Vladimir Putin’s interests. He is desperately trying not to be ousted after having stepped on his own dick in Ukraine. Destroying his own asset could have been motivated by wanting to reduce the value of what a would-be challenger might gain control of should they try to depose him.

I am curious: how do you know this, and is this logical?

IE, how do you know what Putin is doing and how he's thinking? What give you that insight?

And - even assuming you do, does this make sense? Who is the "would be challenger" who would say "well, damn. I am going to oust Putin and take over the world's largest country, but ... nah, not gonna bother without Nordstream"?

You’re right. Clairvoyance is the only way one could possibly infer anything. My bad.

Not true. You could be Putin in which case you would know.

I am asking why you think what you think. Doesn't sound like there's a reason?

I hear he has a 70-80% approval rating in his country. They have a czarist tradition, and he fits it.

> It is an asset they fully control. The idea that they damaged their own asset "to show the world they are serious" or whatever is about as likely as "to threaten Alice, Bob shot off his own foot." Is it possible? I guess so... but it doesn't make sense as the go-to explanation.

I thought the Russia's problem was that they'd already withheld delivery of gas they were contractually obligated to deliver, and this gives them a cover.

i.e. "Bob had a contract with Alice to deliver her a truckload of gold, but didn't deliver it, and swore never to deliver it. Later Bob's truck mysteriously blew up and now Bob is saying he's freed from his contract."

This just isn’t nearly as compelling as the U.S. wanting to blow it up to prevent Germany from even having the option of using it.

Germany already didn't have the option though - Russia had already halted delivery. That wasn't Germany's call.

As I've argued before, the issue here is that invading Ukraine doesn't really make any sense from the Russian perspective. They've lost so much money in trade, their army is shattered, their soft-power is in shambles, and they've pissed off even the Russian speaking parts of Ukraine that used to view them as friends. This is why there was a lot of dissension in the West over a year ago about whether the Russians would invade- people who looked at the actual Russian actions kept saying 'it looks like they are getting ready to invade' but people who focused on whether it was a good idea or not kept saying that it would be a terrible idea to invade, and gain them nothing, so they weren't going to do it.

So given that Kremlin decision-making clearly does not seem like it is well thought-through, I'm very wary of this particular argument. Of course their decision-making might not make sense. Not that this proves their guilt, of course. As one analyst I saw put it, all of the stories for who planted the bombs seem weak, but one of them necessarily has to be true.

I think Russians can articulate a logical reason for the war: in their perception, Ukraine was becoming unacceptably close to the West/NATO and they took a gamble to prevent it. Whether the gamble will pay off, we'll see. But I can follow the logic - risk for a chance at upside.

What's the upside of blowing up your own pipeline and then denying it?

I mean, I can tell a just-so-story as well. It's just that, like your explanation, it involves Putin making what seems to me to be a dumb decision.

Some parts of game theory emphasizes ostentatious signaling that you can't turn back (e.g. 'win the game of chicken by clearly throwing your steering wheel out of the car before the game starts, so the other person KNOWS you can't turn' line of reasoning, which is stupid but some people occasionally try- the most famous successful example is of course Cortes burning his ships). In support of that, it's possible Putin was afraid of a coup: shortly before the invasion, he made each and every member of the cabinet get up on national TV (recorded to tape and broadcast a few hours later) and give a speech about why the war was a great idea and just the thing for Russia, that seems consistent with preventing an anti-war clique from trying to seize power if the war became unpopular, because you had everyone even close to power on the record, before the war, as major cheerleaders for it. If Shoigu or Lavrov or whomever try to seize power in a coup, banking on ending an unpopular war to give them legitimacy, they have to explain away those speeches and their full-throated support of the war back in 2/2022.

Similarly, ostentatiously destroying the pipelines in a way that will take months to fix even if you wanted to removes the ability of a coup to win goodwill and legitimacy with Europe by immediately turning on the pipeline and letting the CH4 flow. Is it what motivated the bombing? I don't know. Does Putin fear a coup by his senior people? I mean in the vague sense that all dictators are aware that it's a threat, certainly. But is he actually taking steps to prevent it? I dunno. Is this explanation plausible? I dunno, but I wouldn't bet my life on it. Is it just as plausible as the US or Poland or Norway or Ukraine or even Germany blowing up the pipeline? That I do think is a clear yes. Which is why I paraphrased that analyst before, none of the explanations really seem plausible, but one of them has to be true.

Would a coup struggle to get the goodwill of Europe? Kinda feels like they'd top themselves up on European goodwill just by, you know, removing Putin.

Goodwill from Europe is not currency, and they're also not stupid collectively: the most likely outcome of removing Putin is a power-struggle vacuum which you either think you can win, or plan to buy your way free of.

The problem with being part of a conspiracy to overthrow the leader of your country, is the only thing you really know about your co-conspirators is that they're traitors willing to stage a coup.

A coup could result in a more or less desirable regime, from a western perspective.

I’ve read that Putin is getting lots of pressure from his extreme right that criticize him of half-assing the invasion and not being harsh enough on Ukrainian citizens. Be careful what you wish for when you consider a coup. It likely won’t be the intelligent moderates with peaceful sensibilities that do it. Those types have already left or are keeping their heads down.

We don't need to speculate here, Putin has been quite open with his weird attempts at being a historian, that he openly publishes and which make his worldview extremely clear. Ignoring these works from his own hand, would be as hopeless as understanding Hitler's motivations without understanding Mein Kampf.

Putin views "Ukraine" as not a real nation, and Ukrainians as a subservient people that belong to the Russian empire and specifically to him, as the ruler of the Russian empire.

Too "close" to the West/NATO is not the real issueg, rather it's the audacity of a subservient race pretending that they don't owe everything to the racially superior Russians.

I run into this all the time with Russians, even here on HN. They view all Slavic people as "little Russians" and their personal serfs. All the other Slavic countries as "little Russias" that belong to their true master Slavic nation.

And this worldview is 100% consistent with Putin's actions. He never thought that Ukrainians could ever resist, because they are supposed to be inherently inferior to Russians. And for the moment, that is kinda working in Belarus, and it worked in Georgia, but Ukraine has been different. Ukraine has been preparing for the past 8 years, purging all the traitors from their army, and working on removing Russian corruption. And really Ukrainians are fundamentally different from Russians. Ukrainians experienced Stalin and thought about what they could do to prevent it in the future. Russians view the terribleness of bad leaders as something like the weather, or a natural disaster: they take no agency when it comes to their rulers, they are sheep, but they console themselves with their perceived racial superiority over the other subjects of the empire. The other subjects are not the same...

Putin’s statement the night of the invasion: [1]

[1] https://www.c-span.org/video/?518097-2/russian-president-put...

Exactly, the NATO stuff is nonsense from Westerners who are trying to backform a rationale to support Russia, that directly contradicts the motives of Russia. Those who now claim NATO as justification for Russia's aggression were also saying that Russia would not invade as the US predicted, right up until it happened. For true motivations, your video is spot on, and see for example Putin's 2021 essay which was basically a declaration of war:

https://huri.harvard.edu/news/putin-historical-unity

And Russian TV since then has shown that the entire society is being mobilized in similar ways into embracing genocide, such as here:

https://twitter.com/gerashchenko_en/status/16262669917396664...

Claiming that Russia is somehow justified in their imperialism is basically admitting to complete ignorance of Russia, it's aggressions, and it's goals.

I don’t buy the Mearsheimer narrative as the primary purpose for invasion, but I do think it contributed in a small way.

I just happen to believe that Putin wanted the prize, had flawed intelligence, and had gotten away with progressively larger incursions (Georgia, Crimea, fomented rebellions in the Donbas, etc) and nobody was willing/able to stop him, so he had no reason to believe they would in Kyiv.

I’m also not convinced that we know enough of the story yet. Water shortage in Crimea, Putin pressured from the political hardliners, maybe a Wag The Dog situation, possible newly discovered hydrocarbon deposits in UA, loss of energy supply lines, or simply sending a message to other former USSR satellite states.

I read a lot about Ukraine, live with Ukrainians, consume lots of non-Ukrainian Eastern European history and commentary, but I don't know Mearshiemer's point of view. He looks to be a "realist" which I tend to think of as fabulists, so I will happily continue in my ignorance of his views.

What you say are all strong possibilities, in my view. But IMHO the strongest is that he's getting old, drunk on power, too steeped in the pre-WW2 imperial history mindset, and wants a legacy. And when combined with the limp response to his past misdeeds in Georgia, Syria, etc., and watching what happened to Gaddafi in Libya, he massively miscalculated.

But if Ukraine had folded quickly, he would not have miscalculated, IMHO. Western powers, with Ukraine overrun, would probably have just let him have it. If Ukrainians didn't stand up for themselves, put up a fight way above their weight class, and enable the West a trivially easy method of support with just ammo and small amounts of equipment, this would have ended the way of Georgia, with lots of hand wringing and weak sanctions. Maybe more hand wringing than Georgia, because Ukraine is clearly closer to Western Europe, and Ukraine had been the actual battleground in prior European wars, but still nothing more than hand wringing. It's possible that there would not even be NATO applications from Finland.

Nobody fights for somebody who won't fight for themselves, and Ukrainian identity has been growing exceptionally strong. Even amongst those in the East with parents from Russia, who only know a very little of the Ukrainian language, a strong civic Ukrainian identity is fomenting, in a country with many language and many ethnicities. My hope for the future of Ukraine is to band together with other post-colonial nations, especially those in Africa, to use their massive brain power to build new industries, rather than shipping all their best minds to other countries. Perhaps not likely, but there is a new consciousness rising which makes a huge amount of growth possible.

There is a lot missing from this account such as: The US promising not to expand NATO beyond Germany. The Maidan coup in 2014. The Minsk agreement where Kiev agreed to stop bombing the Donbas but has still killed over 14K people doing so.

The Ruble is strong and Russia's GDP will grow more than the UK this year.

The US made no such official promise. Apparently not even unofficially, Gorbachev denied that Clinton ever made that personal promise.

They were informal assurances. Jeffrey Sachs was there at the time. https://www.jeffsachs.org/newspaper-articles/gafr872ellaha3w...

You're wrong. There was indeed never anything "official", but high-level diplomats (such as the US Secretary of State) did promise as much behind closed doors. See https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/russia-programs/2017...

Don't forget the US breach of the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe and the Defensive Alliance NATO (and Clinton) deposing Ghadafi after he got rid of his nukes.

“Deposing Ghadafi after he got rid of his nukes”

(1) Gaddafi never had nukes, only nuclear material, technology, and some parts of the tech pipeline.

(2) Gaddafi never abided by the 2003 treaty and retained some of the nuclear material and equipment (which he had already agreed to export) as of 2009. Even after the 2011 revolution, the IAEA confirmed that Libya still had yellow cake after the revolution

(3) NATO waited until after Libya was already in civil war to engage.

I’m not saying NATO was in the right, but you are wrong on most of the facts and Gaddafi didn’t abide by the treaty, so I’m not sure why you would cite that as an example.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disarmament_of_Libya

The majority of my statement is accurate, from your own link.

1) Mostly wrong by turn of phrase? Please. "Got rid of his nukes" or "Got rid of his nuclear program that was 3 - 7 years from successfully building a nuclear weapon."

"Gaddafi increasingly sought to normalize relations with the United States, initially focusing on the lifting of U.S. sanctions on Libya."

2) Eventually Gaddafi grew disillusioned with the things that the West offered Libya.[6] He considered it too small of a reward for Libya for giving up its nuclear weapons program.[6] Gaddafi was also dissatisfied at the United States' slowness in normalizing relations with Libya and in pressuring Israel to denuclearize.[6] According to Gaddafi's son Saif, this was one of the main reasons why Gaddafi temporarily suspended shipping Libya's enriched uranium abroad in 2009 like he promised he would in 2003.[6] Gaddafi wanted to use the remains of his nuclear weapons program to gain more leverage.[6]

3)NATO's 2011 intervention in Libya (which led to Gaddafi's overthrow and killing at the hands of anti-Gaddafi forces) would make Iran, North Korea, and possibly other countries more reluctant to give up their nuclear programs and/or nuclear weapons due to the risk of being weakened and/or double-crossed as a result.[6][15].

The "civil war" was fomented by clandestine CIA action providing arms to Libyan opposition as reported by the Washngton Post.

"During the early phases of the Libyan air strike offensive, paramilitary operatives assisted in the recovery of a U.S. Air Force pilot who had crashed due to mechanical problems.[8] There was also speculation in The Washington Post that President Obama issued a covert action finding in March 2011 that authorized the CIA to carry out a clandestine effort to provide arms and support to the Libyan opposition.[9]"

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

> The Ruble is strong and Russia's GDP will grow more than the UK this year.

Not. The economic numbers of Russia are now manipulated by Russia and the West. The value of the ruble in many markets is nearing zero, since Russia can't buy much for it, because it has lost access to those markets. It lacks supplies and needs to invest a lot of money into a war economy. Russia now has a war economy - the big and rising economic activity is running a large war and to dampen the effects of sanctions against Russia.

What do you mean the Ruble is near zero? All charts I see show it higher against the dollar compared to a year ago. https://www.wsj.com/market-data/quotes/fx/RUBUSD/historical-...

I’m guessing that ForEx ratio is highly dependent upon where you are when you trade it and I would wager the volumes are low or non-existent in any country that has sanctioned Russian exports like oil, gas, and metals.

After the US seized Russian assets Russia started selling oil in Rubles. This forces its customers such as India and China to first buy Rubles usually with dollars.

You just supported my points.

Putin’s statement the night of the invasion didn’t blame the west, rather Ukraine.

And you conveniently ignore the 1994 Budapest Memorandum in which US, RU, UK (among others) promise to militarily defend UA in exchange for UA giving up their nuclear weapons post-USSR. What good is a (non-existent) agreement for NATO to not expand if a very much real agreement to defend UA won’t be upheld?

Also worth pointing out that there’s a decent change Ukrainians we’re just tired of being chained to a corrupt neighbor whose corruption also caused massive UA government+corporate corruption.

21 people were killed in the Donbas in the year prior to Russia starting a war of aggression, mostly by mines.

Agree with most of your conclusion.

Too many people are making assumptions that governments are giant monocultures that have all departments rowing in the same direction and don’t have some actors with perverse incentives. Nobody in any large organization would realistically make these assumptions.

My take on the war stems from a few facts that I now assume are true:

- RU has publicly stated multiple conflicting reasons for invading UA.

- RU doesn’t incentivize honest and open discussion about intelligence, risks, readiness, etc so intelligence analysts are probably scared to speak truth to their bosses. I remember reading a FB post son after the invasion that claimed an FSB/GRU analyst said as much in a Telegram channel (obviously unverifiable).

- RU’s capabilities have atrophied and are hampered by corruption of their military / industry

- RU isn’t a healthy society; it is largely dominated by wealthy energy magnates (and the politicians/military that enable them)

It’s possible, but not guaranteed that a nation state destroyed the pipeline. I’m curious what the possibilities are about an energy company that rivals Gazprom could/would destroy a rival’s distribution channel. Gazprom was already running those lines below capacity because of “turbine maintenance” issues.

That only complaint I have with your comment is the last sentence. It’s possible that none of the popular narratives are correct.

Ukraine had signed the Minsk agreements only to buy time to build their military to NATO standards. Petro Poroshenko and Angela Merkel have admitted as much. With the US promised them backing they believed that they could be victorious even if Russia intervened.

Armed with this information they were planning and preparing to take back Donbass by force. OSCE data shows increased activity and casualties on the Donbass side in the days leading up to the invasion. Remember how Ukraine was constantly pleading for a no-fly zone? They had likely been counting on it (false promises), that the US and NATO would jump in and give them the upper hand.

At this point Russia couldn't really have let the ethnic Russians there lose and die in large numbers with the remainders getting assimilated through Ukrainization as this would've been quite a bad look back home (Russia has always protected ethnic Russians in other countries) and so it was more or less forced to act. The US knew this and still pushed for it. It was certainly not an unprovoked aggression. Remember Euromaidan where it was portrayed as all of Ukraine protesting? It was actually closer to a 50/50 split (population vote) between EU and the Russian customs union in late 2013.

As for Russia losing much? Compared to Ukraine and Europe (who are the big losers here, Ukraine for obvious reasons and Europe financially and industrially) not so much at all. Since 2014, when the sanctions actually made a decent impact, Russia had spent all this time hardening their economy. Living standards of Russians hasn't really changed, aside from some foreign products that aren't available anymore and many already have Russian replacements. They have managed to switch their exports towards Asia and India (and actually made more profits than before). Sure there are things that will take time to adapt and will be costly in the long run but still nothing compared to the problems Europe is facing, barely managing to fill up its gas reserves for this winter.

You make assertions to statements made by Merkel but give no links to back that up.

OSCE data shows that 21 people were killed the year before invasion, mostly from mines.

My friend that died fighting for Ukraine in this war called himself 'Russian from Ukraine' before the war, went to university in Moscow, spoke Russian, and loved Russia prior to the war and was helping this malinki chuvak learn Russian. He was sadly killed a few months ago but the ethnic Russian Ukrainians that I still know HATE Russia now.

Russia has lost how many working age males to the surrounding counties in order to avoid the draft? But Russia isn't losing much? How is that not losing much? The mayor of Moscow is on record as saying Moscow was losing 200,000 jobs from western companies leaving(2% of the population of Moscow).

This was the winter to impact Europe. By next winter Europe will have plenty of alternatives. Even with blowing up the pipeline and trying to create market uncertainty that would drive up prices to cause Europe pain, Europe survived this winter (the largest hurdle).

First of all I'm sorry about your friend. This whole thing really sucks and the only winner seems to be the US military-industrial complex (and other US investors buying up Ukraine at a discount). There was no reason why it had to happen and could have been avoided. That was what the Minsk agreements were attempting. At least on paper and by some parties.

I just assumed it was common knowledge about the Minsk ruse. Quick search for "Merkel admits Minsk agreements buying time" returns a large amount of sources for me (using kagi.com), first one: https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2022/12/22/ffci-d22.html

Poroshenko's admission was earlier last year.

There are also many Russians who have now, after seeing Ukrainians as their brethren pre-war, grown to despise Ukraine and the west overall.

Losing jobs due to foreign companies leaving is a temporary blip, they will be replaced by local ones. That's actually what the US is trying to do now, to decrease reliance on foreign production. Any people avoiding the draft by legal means are likely to return (this is something I actually don't know much about, will most be able to return without being persecuted?).

And regards to Europe I don't think the worst is over, it's not like things are going back to normal in terms of energy prices any time soon. US LNG for example is a lot more expensive than pipeline gas and Europe might've managed this winter but the increased energy costs will have snowballing effects. Do you think industries won't be massively affected?

As for the OSCE events there were double-digit events most days but they increased to triple and some quadruple digits (from my memory, I can find links when on desktop, have the filtered results from that period bookmarked somewhere) in the days before the invasion. And the vast majority of those events were on the Donbass side, indicating an offensive by Kiev (which they had been planning literally for years). US "intelligence" is of course not very honest with pretty much any of this and neither is the western media.

> As I've argued before, the issue here is that invading Ukraine doesn't really make any sense from the Russian perspective.

In the mode of lay person channeling Russian leadership...

Russia is facing a demographic crisis. Their population pyramid is going the wrong way ( https://www.populationpyramid.net/russian-federation/2020/ ). They are on the path of losing population.

What's more, the ethic Russians are declining faster than others. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnic_groups_in_Russia#Future...

> The ethnic demographic mix of the Russian Federation is projected to change far into the future. The majority population, ethnic Russians, who have been in slight decline since the 1950's will decline further due to a below replacement fertility rate and population ageing. In 2010, rough population projections from Ivan Beloborodov projecting to 2030 estimated that the percentage of Russians within the population would decrease to around 70 to 60% of the total population.

So... how do you fix this? You appropriate a country that is ethnically similar to Russia. If this isn't done willingly, while acting as an occupying force, you deport (import?) the children to Russia which could have the effect of delaying the fertility decline of ethic Russians. https://www.npr.org/2023/02/14/1156500561/russia-ukraine-chi...

I fully admit that this is a just so story ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-so_story ) for the reasoning behind Russia's policy towards Ukraine. It is a last ditch attempt by a the ethnic group in power to prop up its future majority in a country that is losing people and if nothing is done to rectify its future will become an (even more) sparsely populated petro-state fracturing on ethic lines where the current leadership would be in the minority... and eghads is that ever a run on sentence.

> the issue here is that invading Ukraine doesn't really make any sense from the Russian perspective.

It makes perfect sense for Russia to invade, what are you talking about? In one sense its the death throws of a dying nation, in the other its logical national protection of a vital resource - energy. A few questions for you:

- Did you know in 2012 lots of oil and gas was found under Crimea and Donbas? And that US company Shell was preparing to extract it?

- Did you know about the vicious fighting at Stalingrad in WW2 and why the fighting was so vicious?

- Have you heard of "the Volgograd Gap"?

- Have you heard of South Ossetia (and the one next to it, starts with a) and why there was a proxy conflict with the USA in the 2000's there?

The Volgograd gap is the bit of land between Ukraine and the Caspian Sea. All of Moscows energy flows through there. The city used to be called Stalingrad.

It also allows Russia access to its separatist regions in its neighbour Georgia. Those separatist regions put Russia within striking distance of a) the major Georgian port and b) the Georgian capital Tblisi. Guess who tried to join NATO in the 2000s? Georgia.

Zelenskyys second in command is a great geopolitican and he knew this invasion was coming because he knew it was inevitable. There is multiple interviews with him saying as much, and also that they pooh-pooh'd the idea of a Russian invasion to buy time. He knew part of Russias plan was to scare the Ukrainian populace eastward, frustrating the Ukrainians armies effort to reach the front, hence they had to keep even their citizens in the dark to have a fighting chance.

There are other reasons that make this make sense, such as the fact that Russia is facing a demographic crisis thanks to communism gutting it, the Minsk accords being broken, and some other stuff.

I recommend you watch docos and info pieces from the following people to avoid making such silly remarks again:

- RealLifeLore

- Whatifalthist

- CaspianReport

- Good Times Bad Times

- S2 Underground

None of this makes what Russia did and is doing OK by any means, but it explains why they did it.

And Perun

Russia could have done it in a “burn the ships, no way out but forward” type of move. Putin might have been worried by a coup attempt by a faction that wished to restore gas deliveries. There is a lot of very rich and very unhappy oligarchs in Russia.

That being said, it’s almost certainly done by NATO as a punishment to Germany for having gone against everyone else who told them these pipelines were a dangerous tool of russian influence/blackmail.

Dangerous for American hegemony.

One of the more interesting and on some level plausible hypotheses I remember reading at the time of the sabotage was that it was a purely political move for Putin, to remove the possibility of a quick return to their previous status as Europe’s gas provider, in order to dissuade those around him from a coup. Destroying the pipelines removed a major carrot (hundreds of billions of euros per year in exports).

Doesn’t matter. This isn’t a Boolean data type. There are more possible explanations/actors than Russia or USA. And it’s possible that the USA did it even if Hearsh’s article is factually flawed and if his source lied. I’m not convinced if Hearsh’s narrative is true or not.

> Updated to include information given my Seymour Hersh in interviews in the days following his original post.

This was in bold font underneath the picture under the headline. Presumably it should be "Updated to include information given by Seymour Hersh in interviews in the days following his original post."

If Oliver is relying on details to blow holes in the Hersh story, the prognosis isn't that great for Oliver's story, at the moment.

Don't sell him short! At this rate he'll get enough traffic from crackpot-realist dead-enders that NED will make him into a new Bellingcat.

One interesting thing about the Jens Stoltenberg. It’s Thorvald Stoltenberg, his father who was defense minister and foreign minister after 1979 as well as was a high level official in the Norwegian state and defense department during the last years of the Vietnam conflict.

Confusion but basically father and son.

You would think that for releasing a major story like this that Hersh would be trying to get his details correct. Confusing father and son is not a negligible error.

https://www.patreon.com/posts/unlocked-young-78471711

Hersh is in the difficult position of needing to neither confirm nor deny his sources, because if he doesn't then no future internal leaker will talk to him: we're not going to find out "how he knows" because it kills his business.

He's also like John Pilger and Glenn Greenwald very definitely bringing a specific world view to the table. Like the other two, that means his editorial has a direction. I don't personally mind that, I take it on board and think about what I think is factual and what I think is supposition.

The problem however, is that authors like this become aware people are skeptical of their supposition and editorial and they always wind up shifting voice from "I think" to "I know" and .. then you're in a bad place.

Hersh also has a history of breaking stories that are true, like the My Lai massacre, Abu Ghraib, and other things. This counterpoint writer has none of the yank that Hersh has.

Has Hersh slipped in his age? I don’t know. But this nameless IC cutout who wrote this story has basically no credibility. Why should anyone listen to him?

Here's the Financial Times speculation. Russia, or the USA, or a Scandi country which is the USA because.. reasons. Said by Russians. Danes. Poles. Can't be natural. Must be sabotage. Could be from a boat. or a robot pig. Or 100kg of dynamite on the end of a 70m bit of string. You decide.

Seymour is in the mix, sure.

https://www.ft.com/content/294e441d-7b24-4144-a51f-75bdf70d7...

Abu Ghraib was an important story, and Hersh's last real story. The cheese subsequently slipped off his cracker. The Vatican does not in fact secretly control US Special Forces Command.

The good thing about this story is that you don't have to "believe" the author. It makes a series of falsifiable arguments about Hersh's story. Which of them do you contest, and why? This isn't a duel of credibilities.

This whole "IC cutout" thing says more about how you're looking at this issue than it does about the story itself.

What does “IC cutout” say about a Marine who is now a private citizen. How am I looking at this, precisely?

Credit for Abu Ghraib should go to the person who told him about it, not to him. Did he do anything special there?

Recursively applied, almost all journalism based on Whistle-blower or off the record falls to this complaint.

Yes. Also, we give baristas all the credit for things coffee farmworkers did.

If someone was feeding Hersh false information why would they reference the Alta class? Assuming it was some Intel op or some insider, did they just google some Norwegian navy ships that could plausibly fit the picture? Or did Hersh draw that connection himself?

Hersh has been criticized for listening to cranks. Maybe some Intel officer (or adjacent gov/military worker) heard some rumours internally but there was comparmentalization or operational security protecting the details, and then tried to piece it together themselves, before leaking it to Hersh.

If it is false it's worth asking why and who would care to push these angles.

Presumably it's for the same reasons that people gave him faulty technical information about Sarin gas in his debunked Syria story, or whatever weird details he was fed about the notion that the Osama bin Laden raid never happened, or the idea that USSOCOM is secretly controlled by a sect within the Vatican. Because he'll run with it, and people pay attention to him.

People troll all the time on the Internet; why would we assume they wouldn't troll everywhere else too?

I didn't think he claimed that the OBL raid never happened, just that the backstory about how he was found was wrong.

It's above the fold on his LRB story: he claims that Pakistani ISI captured bin Laden, not the US.

... and then the US staged a raid to pick him up from the ISI.

And it was directed by Stanley Kubrick.

As bin Laden was holed up 800 yards from the Pakistan Military Academy, it seems more likely that he was captured by ISI and/or the Pakistani army, as opposed to trying to hide from them there.

ISI dealt with bin Laden in the 1980s, and has good intelligence in the region bin Laden had been rumored to be holed up in.

It takes more of a leap of faith to believe bin Laden was hiding from the Pakistan military/industrial apparatus 800 yards from the Pakistan Military Academy, than that some high officials knew he was there.

I can believe Pakistani intelligence knew where he was the whole time.

I don't believe they cut some deal to stage a raid where they came off looking like total morons for purported military aid that never came.

I'd still give Hersh the benefit of the doubt he's not just listening to some internet troll type person. There has to be some reputation at play here for him to take it seriously. The odds are high it's someone connected to the US or NATO govs. At least you'd assume so. As another commenter mentioned, he claimed he used to the same fact checkers used by The New Yorker.

I would not give him the benefit of the doubt, and I have a hard time understanding why anybody would; there is more than ample reason to doubt any story he runs. I can't imagine a credible source working with him, so far has the presumption of accuracy been shifted on his work over the last 10 years. That's why a famous journalist is reduced to running stories from unnamed (and implausible) sources in the first place.

"Since I posted my original article, I had a short email correspondence with Seymour Hersh, unfortunately he stopped replying once I asked him about several of the above mentioned inconsistencies and factual inaccuracies."

Maybe it was an aging Intel guy relying on old reputation for credibility who later declined into pushing conspiracy tier thing, so basically two levels of Hersh like people cruising off past glory.

You should never give any reporter the benefit of any doubt.

> the notion that the Osama bin Laden raid never happened

The first sentence of Hersh's article reads:

"It’s been four years since a group of US Navy Seals assassinated Osama bin Laden in a night raid on a high-walled compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan."

His entire article then goes on to lay out a set of details for both the lead up and the execution of that raid, including the execution of bin Laden.

Those details conflict with the details officially given by the Obama administration-- both the details given in the days after the event (which Hersh cites) and the clarifications from the administration in the weeks after the event.

In any case, Obama's administration and Hersh both clearly agreed that there was a raid on the exact same location on the exact same evening, involving the exact same helicopters and Navy Seals, in which the exact same bin Laden was killed.

In short, what you wrote here is factually inaccurate.

> the idea that USSOCOM is secretly controlled by a sect within the Vatican

Never heard about that one. Where did he write about that idea?

Edit: decided to not use the word "tenuous" to describe the Obama admin's account in the days after the raid. What I remember Hersh discussing was the admin's initial claim that the Seals had shot him in self defense, which was later clarified/retracted by the administration.

There are all sorts of interested parties in creating doubt about the attack, and the most likely is of course the master of this, Russia. It also fits very well with past bad reporting from Hersh.

The detail makes the story more plausible, later debunking matters far less than the initial report and the uncertainty that this sows in people's minds.

Taking attention away from the true culprit definitely helps. And any ammunition that can be used to make democracies in the West have more doubt and internal wasted debate definitely helps whoever actually destroyed the pipeline.

Trying to work backwards from the (likely true) notion that Hersh's story is fiction is just as intellectually flawed. We don't anything about Hersh's source or their motives. You could write an HN comment about how the CIA planted this whole story to cast doubt on the actual US-led operation to blow up (some) of the Nord Stream pipeline. Or you could write the opposite comment. There's just nothing to go on.

The only thing we can really discuss here is whether the Hersh story is credible. It seems clearly not to be. If we establish that, that's all we get: the fact that one story about what happened is false. We'll be no closer to knowing what actually happened. That's life!

If it were false, it would be Hersh's first false story. He broke My Lai and Abu Ghraib. He's one of the most accomplished journalists in history.

Hersh wrote an article that broke through on Abu Gharib after several other outlets and the Red Cross had already been raising the alarm. His article was important and impactful but "breaking" is really overstating his impact there..

Edited to add a timeline rather than the wall of text;

* June 2023, Amnesty International calls out Abu Gharib as the site where US troops are holding Iraqis without charge in questionable conditions and reports on a riot there that resulted in the death of at least 1 prisoner.

* July 2023, Amnesty reports further after interviewing several prisoners of Abu Gharib that coalition forces are torturing prisoners using prolonged sleep deprivation, prolonged restraint in painful positions -- sometimes combined with exposure to loud music, prolonged hooding and exposure to bright lights.

Amnesty would go on to write dozens more reports about the conditions in the prisons there.

* November 2003, AP writes an article about the terrible conditions faced by prisoners in the largest camps including reports of uprising and shootings at Abu Gharib.

* January 2004, Darby blows the whistle and provides a CD full of images of torture to US Army criminal investigators.

* January 2004, based on Red Cross reports from their inspectors in Iraq, Army commissions Taguba Report to investigate the rampant reports of torture and inhumane conditions in Iraqi prisons. Report was completed in February and found tons of torture.

* February 2004, Amnesty reports on further torture within Iraqi prisons naming specific victims, techniques, and prisons.

* Late April, 2004 First pictures of torture start being released among hints of a secret Army Report.

* April 27, 2004, 60 Minutes publishes report detailing the abuse and publishes several pictures from Darby's disc. Dan Rather names several soldiers who the Army had been quietly court martialing. They had received the report / pictures ~3/4 weeks earlier.

* April 30, 2004, Hersh's New Yorker piece comes out with more details.

That was 20 years ago. Since then he's apparently gone nuts since he eg believes Opus Dei controls the US military.

Though before Abu Ghraib he also claimed the Chicago mob fixed JFK's presidential election.

I can't find anywhere he published those stories. Do you have a link?

If the point is just to muddy the waters, you don't need a story that's airtight, it just needs to be convincing enough to spark peoples' biases.

If it's a crank, well, it's a crank. When I was in the Air Force, and still had a TS clearance, there was a friend+coworker of mine that was deep into conspiracy theories. Flat Earth, Moon Hoax, 9/11 truther, and a few others I don't remember. Everything we talked about he had loads of details. I knew it was all nonsense of course, because you're talking about flat earth and all that; if I didn't know he was a full blown conspiracy theorist? If I just knew he was a system administrator with a top secret security clearance attached to an intelligence squadron? And he was telling me a story about something the intelligence community did? He'd be very believable.

Streisand Effect in full force.

The man who meticulously researched, blew open, and legitimized half a dozen "conspiracy theories" in his storied career is now a senile old man who can't wipe his own ass, let alone do properly sourced research, overnight.

Every lapdog of the establishment is, as they did before, working overtime to discredit Hersh.

Every article I see decrying Hersh, particularly from FVEY-associated authors, only works to bolster the credibility of the original claims. They want to hide it, as they always have, since the sixties.

Barbara would be proud.

Ed Crooks, formerly of the FT and now at WoodMac had this to say in his energy pulse this week.

> While there is clearly still a great deal that we don’t know about this incident, one crucial aspect of Hersh’s story — the supposed US motive for sabotaging the pipelines — seems flawed. He argues that “President Joseph Biden saw the pipelines as a vehicle for Vladimir Putin to weaponise natural gas for his political and territorial ambitions” in Europe, and was determined to stop that. But by September 2022, when the blasts happened, Russia had already stopped flows through Nord Stream, claiming it was unable to operate the pipeline because of the West’s sanctions on critical equipment that required maintenance. There was consensus among commentators and politicians that flows were unlikely to resume.

> Blowing up Nord Stream did not really change the outlook for European gas markets. One thing it did do was provide a more solid justification for Gazprom’s argument that it was unable to supply contracted volumes to Germany. And that is something that will weigh in future arbitration of damages claims from European utilities.

https://www.woodmac.com/news/opinion/us-oil-demand-on-course...

It is probably worth keeping in mind that since at least 2006 or so, Seymour and the truth aren't really much on speaking terms any more.

If he then posts a whole bunch of extraordinary unverifiable claims by an unnamable source, I don't really think there's much need for rebuttals.

Which stories did he get wrong?

> I doubt Jens Stoltenberg was a US intelligence asset in his early teens.

Actually, it seems Stoltenberg was politically active during the late years of the Vietnam war, as a teenager:

https://www.patreon.com/posts/unlocked-young-78471711

that doesn't mean he necessarily "worked directly with US intelligence", but - he might have. He did go on to become a staunch NATO-supporter after all.

> mine clearing has long been a staple of the BALTOPS exercises. Implying that this is something that was added as cover for this operation is honestly laughable.

So, an extra R&D exercise in addition to everything that was already planned. Adding something that doesn't seem extraordinary is a good idea; adding an strange exercise would seem suspicious.

> Secondly, the people behind this highly secret operation that could not afford leaks had now somehow convinced the BALTOPS planners to change the parameters of their exercise

Add another exercise, supposedly similar to existing exercises.

> All of this either without informing them of why or by adding more people to the loop that could leak the plans.

On the contrary. If this had been an isolated operation, it would have been far more likely to raise suspicions. This seems like a way to minimize the disturbances.

Don't know about the ship business, it requires close scrutiny if one is not an expert on these matters and I'm certainly not. What I can say is that reporting based on anonymous sources, no material evidence, and little or no ability to otherwise verify is problematic - even if the US is the most likely suspect for blowing up Nordstream.

Confusion with his father Thorvald Stoltenberg

Thorvald was defense minister. His son had interactions with the student peace movement as a teenager. If the son passed information to the father, and this was passed to the CIA - then the CIA would have known of him from his teenage years.

Norwegian papers were filled in recent years with the massive intelligence operations against Norwegian student anti-NATO groups. The US was terrified Norway would follow France and start pulling back from NATO.

A Norwegian minesweeper was active over the area and returned to the area as well. Norway does have minefields specialized in this field.

If I was going to do this I would drop off the teams in three zodiacs and then pick them up on the return this way my ship was never stationary.

If your response to "The CIA blew up Nordstream" is "Elliot Higgins says they didn't", that's your credibility down the drain.

How easy would it be for a military or intelligence service to fake this data? I don't really have any experience or idea on how reliable these signals are for something like this

Countervailing OSINT data isn't the only problem with the story Hersh is telling; a deeper problem is that the whole scheme doesn't make much sense. The author links to a more expansive debunking at the top of his story (it's a better link than the one we're reading now, because it incorporates all this Norwegian minesweeper OSINT), and the bulk of it is just observations about how dumb this mission structure is.

Implausibly informed anonymous single source? Check.

Midlist Tom Clancy-grade technical details, like salinity camouflaged C4 charges? Check.

Basic factual errors, like the Norwegian Navy not operating P8s? Check.

Irrational strategic details, like using Navy minesweepers as platforms for human divers during a huge, widely monitored, extensively planned military exercise? Check.

That's just this analysis. But you can work back through Hersh's credibility with similar debunkings of his previous stories. Look at the enmity Hersh's cheering section has for Bellingcat, for instance, for taking his Syria Sarin story to pieces.

The same Bellingcat started by an unemployed man from Leicester, England - "perhaps the foremost expert on ammunitions used in Syria"? I've been reading most of your comments and they all lack details and real evidence, but a lot of character assassination thrown in. I love your writing style, though. Check.

Did you see me call Bellingcat "perhaps the foremost expert on ammunitions used in Syria"? Because I didn't see me calling them that. But you might have a better vantage point than I do.

The satellite imagery of the Alta shows the dates June 5, 7, 20, and later (until the Alta is scrapped on the 30th). The BALTOPS 2022 exercises took place June 5–17. So the imagery generally does not provide evidence of the Alta's location during most of BALTOPS 2022.

It's helpful to consider that BALTOPS itself is a batshit cover for one of the highest profile military operations of the last 20 years (it's sort of like the military equivalent of altering the schedule at the San Diego Comic Con to cover a heist), and that it might be hard to even come up with a reason that you'd need an Alta-class ship to pull this off, or really even a military ship at all; a lot of what Hersh is talking about here appears to be stuff that civilian extractive industry professionals already do (remote detonation in particular).

Would a "professional" agree to do this work without extensive obvious evidence that it was sanctioned on high? Wouldn't you risk becoming fall guys if you agree to do all this with a minimal crew on a wooden fishing boat? You'd risk being arrested by the local police. I think there is some holistic view on how to get the whole thing to work that might not lead to an obvious minimal solution. Various interests get in the way and add quite a degree of complication.

You don't need to go find the world's best miners like in the movie Armageddon; you can use military divers. You just don't use a carefully tracked warship, one of a single-digit number in its class, as a diving platform.

You get the same weird thing with this "camouflage" thing with the C4. Camouflaging from what? They need to make the explosive charges undetectable... for what? Like, the US blows up the Nord Stream pipeline and Russia is like, "oh, shit, we never detected a mine, I guess we'll never know if NATO was behind this, and they're innocent until proven guilty!"

Forget for a second about the "salinity matching" thing being gibberish; what exactly was this part of the operation that Hersh decided to document trying to accomplish? There is zero uncertainty that somebody blew up the pipeline.

>Like, the US blows up the Nord Stream pipeline and Russia is like, "oh, shit, we never detected a mine, I guess we'll never know if NATO was behind this, and they're innocent until proven guilty!"

If the US did blow up the pipeline, they would be most interested in keeping it a secret from Germany, not Russia. It would also be important to keep it secret from the voting public, other neutral countries (India, e.g.), pretty much anyone except Russia.

Is there any evidence that Alta was operational? Last time she moved under own power was 2012. She was towed to the scrapper. If could have moved herself, then they could have saved the cost of the tow.

It doesn’t make any sense that would use ship was bound for the scrapper. They would have to fix the engines and half the other stuff wouldn’t work. People would have noticed ship that never moved moving. There are working ships that could have done the job.

these substack posts about the nordstream ii pipeline are still up, but articles from reputable outlets are banned.

It feels rather damning that Hersh didn’t verify some of the easily verifiable claims that his source made.

Why would you not have researchers do some fact checking on the story before publishing it so loudly?

If you fact check and you're right, you've wasted your time.

If you fact check and you're wrong, you either can't publish (wasting the time you took for the story) or you publish anyway knowing it's wrong, in which case, it's still a waste of time.

Or you publish and report the claims made by the source and call out specifically where those claims couldn't be verified. It's like science publishing, too often negative results go unpublished. Knowing what didn't work can be as useful as knowing what did work.

> If you fact check and you're right, you've wasted your time.

That is not how it works. First of all there is no “you’re right”. The journalist doesn’t have first hand observations. They cannot be “right” or “wrong” only their source can be.

The journalist goes and checks what can be verified independently. No matter what the outcome of these checks nobody wasted their time. The result is a stronger article, and continued respect for the journalist in his profession.

> If you fact check and you're right, you've wasted your time.

I see it differently. I used to be a test engineer.

My tests made it onto documentation accompanying a $50,000 RF snooper (in 1985), and were verifications that the item passed the test.

I like it when tests don't fail.

he did do fact checking, with people he had previously worked with at New Yorker

https://www.berliner-zeitung.de/politik-gesellschaft/seymour...

Hersh, fact checking:

https://twitter.com/grodira/status/1626150758017015809

Then they're apparently not very good, are they?

They fact-checked "salinity-matched C4"? My god they're terrible.

"The American explosive devices needed to be camouflaged in a way that would make them appear to the Russian system as part of the natural background—something that required adapting to the specific salinity of the water"

This was the most ridiculous part. I can't think of a reason they would prefer to use an explosive charge in a position visible to inspection.

Acoustic impedance of seawater varies with salinity.

Sure but that doesn’t generalize to other materials. Salinity matched C4 won’t be acoustically matched. Definitely a red herring point.

"Salinity matched" does not make any sense, and the article said nothing of the sort.

It said "make them appear ... as part of the natural background — something that required adapting to the specific salinity of the water". Making something invisible to sonar could depend on the acoustic impedance (which varies with salinity) of the surrounding water and might involve adapting the object accordingly.

For those lacking context, like me:

> Seymour Hersh’s recent Substack post claims to provide a highly detailed account of a covert US operation to destroy the Nord Stream pipelines in order to ensure that Russia would be unable to supply Germany with natural gas through them. All the information in Hersh’s post reportedly comes from a single unnamed source, who appears to have had direct access to every step of the planning and execution of this highly secretive operation.

https://oalexanderdk.substack.com/p/blowing-holes-in-seymour...

This is an impressively thorough debunking.

I'd take any reports done by a self described "OSINT Researcher" with a heavy grain of salt.

It was funny watching people call Hersh “some substack guy” in regards to his original post. We believe what we like.

Which of the "OSINT" arguments in this blog post do you find implausible?

It's well known that amateur OSINT researchers are some of the most reliable people around these days. As long as they aren't Redditors anyway.

Independent journalists vs state funded 'Intel' groups

When it comes to critiquing the government I'm going to balance their incentives.

> "and his recent factually incorrect takes on the Syria gas attacks and Skripal poisoning"

I don't know of anything incorrect in Hersh's take on (one of) the Syria gas attacks:

https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v35/n24/seymour-m.-hersh/who...

and I haven't read what he wrote on the Skripal affair.

The CIA narrative on the "Syria gas attacks" have been roundly debunked by the meticulous reporting of Aaron Mate (and others). The even more absurd "Skripal poisoning" incident has completely fallen apart upon only the barest scrutiny. It is sad and disturbing these these completely debunked narratives are still being touted by people as credible. Anyone (rightfully) calling for skepticism and scrutiny into Hersch's account of the pipeline bombing should, at the very least, have the same skepticism towards CIA/US government claims that are even flimsier.

Aaron Maté is a ridiculous tankie who's currently claiming the US is trying to coup Hungary.

(Why as a leftist he's supporting the current Hungary government is unclear, but being a tankie requires you to start with the US being bad and work the rest out from there.)

"Ridiculous" and "Tankie" are non-specific characterizations which mostly indicate whether or not you like a person or their opinions. But in the same vein, let us recall Mate has been awarded the Ithaca College Journalism School's Izzy award (which is considered prestigious).

Mate, specifically, has a record of reliable fact-based investigative and integrational reporting on subjects such as "Russia-gate" (i.e. the various claims regarding Russian involvement in 2016 US elections and the candidates' campaigns), as well as the alleged chemical attack in Douma, Syria in 2018 and the coverup within the OPCW of the investigation of that attack.

I don't know about the Hungary situation and have not read Mate's work on that; but links would be appreciated.

> But in the same vein, let us recall Mate has been awarded the Ithaca College Journalism School's Izzy award (which is considered prestigious).

Noam Chomsky is also quite decorated but that doesn't stop them both from denying war crimes like Cambodia and Syria.

If you're claiming Russia-Trump coordination and Skripal didn't happen, that's because you're a tankie who can never say Russia has done anything bad, because you think they're secretly the USSR and are going to bring back communism. Bit sad since they're a fascist state. ("Anti-imperialists" are also rather bad at opposing Chinese imperialism.)

> I don't know about the Hungary situation and have not read Mate's work on that; but links would be appreciated.

Doing it right now.

https://twitter.com/aaronjmate/status/1625634526947835907

> https://twitter.com/aaronjmate/status/1625634526947835907

That is a tweet about a suspicion, not a news article with a concrete claim. Also, USAID is indeed widely perceived as an arm of the US government, or the CIA more specifically, for political intervention in foreign countries. And I would be pretty worried if Samantha Power were to land in my country and start driving some "locally-driven" initiatives.

> that's because you're a tankie

This "tankie" thinks the Russian regime has done and does many bad things, like killing civilians, suppressing speech and organization, forcing a military draft, maintaining a social order of massive exploitation of workers by private proprietors, etc. It's just that most of those bad things don't happen to be the bad things which the US is accusing Russia of - and the latter are often just fanciful tales or more elaborate fabrication.

What's the word that requires someone to start with the US being good and working out the rest from there? Samantha Powers' recent trip to Hungary and her statements about USAID’s "newly launched work to help support democracy in Central Europe, including by bolstering civil society and helping independent media thrive and build new audiences" exactly mirrors the rhetoric from what we pulled in Ukraine in 2014 and the rest of the "color revolutions".

>Why as a leftist he's supporting the current Hungary government is unclear

Why is it so difficult for some people to understand that even if you don't like a foreign government, that you still don't have the right to replace it (whether through invasion or subversion) with a government you favor? It is possible to be both critical of the Hungarian government and also to take the position that the US should not be in the game of choosing who leads Hungary. Believing that we should stay out of the internal politics of foreign countries does not equate to apologizing or making excuses for those countries. It is especially ironic that those who insist that we act as policeman of the world and decide who is fit to run foreign countries also cry loudest about "foreign interference" in our own elections.

Skripal poisoning denial is so good man, I've never heard that one before. Especially after one of the guys accused turned out to be a Hero of Russian Federation under a fake name. Found a ria news article with almost exact same wording you used but in russian. Anyway I guess you would say Navalny, Litvinenko were fakes as well. 3% of russians believe in skripal thing, you are preaching to the choir, the real skeptics in russia are the ones saying it is real.

"same skepticism towards CIA/US government" Yeah americans do that all the time and definitely do it the most, but that is also because they live there. maybe its time to take a look in the mirror and start focusing on what your country is doing Stanislav Petrov.

They had means, motive and opportunity, and they even said that would do it. When pushed Biden said, "we'll put an end to it (Nord 2)".

And the number of hit pieces against the journalist in question is telling. Using wholly dubious paid for misinformation from Bellingcat.

But if you still think the US are innocent there is really not much more that can be said.

Damage control - ENGAGE! Hahaha.

Author: > It is often stated that people who lie have a tendency to add too much superfluous detail to their accounts.

Goes on to provide too much superfluous detail to his own account. /s

Not sure why anybody took seriously a story an octogenarian wrote on his blog from interviewing a single anonymous source where he got numerous basic facts wrong anyway.

> OSINT & Analysis by Oliver Alexander OSINT (Open Source Intelligence), natural gas, current events. Get in depth analysis covering a multitude of subjects straight to your inbox.

This looks like an account made to "explain stories". Even the picture is of "young army cadet". He has exactly 1000 followers and i bet the account is only a couple of days long. TBH i hoped that the 3 letter agencies employ better people.

To debunk the story he needs a better story, not a literary analysis.

I’m not going to comment on the how propagandized HN audience seems to be.

Instead I’ll just post additional reading as it seems only things going with official narratives get the upvotes:

https://newleftreview.org/sidecar/posts/how-to-blow-up-a-pip...

This guy says that other intelligence agencies like from Norway being involved is evidence that is not all that secret. In reality, Congressional offices are sieves for intel though unlike Foreign intel agencies on the other hand which are professionals.

He then complains that publicly available ship and aircraft data don’t line up as if they would use publicly tracked craft for a secret operation.

No holes have been blown.

One of the central claims of Hersh’s story is that it was done using publicly tracked craft during a prominent and highly observed training exercise… on purpose. Supposedly because it’s cover to be in the area at all, it’s a benign explanation for when someone suspects something. No need to do any funny business turning off transponders, if you were doing it this way, you’d want the transponders on. When you read that and then find out the ships claimed to have been used weren't even there, then yes, it does blow a hole in the credibility of the source. At best it is some Army veteran or someone like that, speculating from the outside, because the story does not line up with the facts and they don’t offer an explanation for why that’s the case. And then Hersh has reported them as being credible. If he offers more explanations now, it doesn’t ameliorate the stain, because a real source should have known those things and not made factual errors in the first place.

You can’t even twist it into a story that the US deliberately did it incompetently so that reports about it would not be believed. Apparently they involved the Norwegians (telling them about a secret op!) for their expertise in how deep the sea is, as if the US doesn’t have maps of the Baltic Sea floor. Telling your allies what you’re doing in an attempt to prevent them from finding out you did it does not make sense.

It does blow a hole in the credibility of Hersh’s source and his reporting. It brings the information we have about US involvement back to zero, it’s not an argument that they didn’t do it or couldn’t have done it. We all know the Americans are perfectly capable of blowing up a pipeline without leaving evidence. But nobody has any evidence they did it.

Hersh is clearly a douche. But what if the US did, indeed, destroy those pipelines? Great job, guys. Blow up the rest of them. The last I’ve heard, South Stream is still operational.

Yep, nothing like blowing up your allies' infrastructure to make them like you.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com