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Why do you say failure? Who do you think blew up the pipeline?
https://www.themotte.org/post/2269/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/348794?context=8#context explains better than I would do
I expect that German conclusion that pipeline was blown up by Ukrainians is correct.
I would bet on Ukrainian state - country at war with Russia, risking far less from detection/failure and far more motivated to do so. And demonstrated both capacity and willingness for some zany schemes that worked.
But I leave some space that it was someone else. But if it was USA then it was not done in way claimed by Seymour Hersh.
And Poland is still more likely than USA, if it was not Ukraine.
The German conclusion is political theater. Ukraine may have had single digits of people with the right expertise to dive 100m down in a strong current. Furthermore the yacht they supposedly took was so small they'd have had problems carrying all the gear this needed.
https://politiken.dk/danmark/art10057566/De-første-dage-måtte-havnefogeden-på-Christiansø-»ikke-sige-en-dyt«.-Men-i-dag-kan-han-godt-afsløre-en-smule
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Even assuming that this is true, could they really have done it without support or at least acquiescence+aftercare from the US? The way the adjacent Baltic states froze Germany out of the investigation and conclusions seems implausible if it was a Ukrainian solo gig that they were not appraised of, and without US pressure it seems quite strange that Denmark and Sweden would choose to snub Germany (if not the government, then at least its public) so heavily to give a small PR edge to Ukraine. (Meanwhile, with the Assange case, we have precedent showing that the Swedish legal system is happy to engage in perversion of justice at US behest.)
Acquiescence+aftercare from the US was reportedly that the Americans told the Germans before the attack, as well as soon after.
As for being puzzled by regional parties whose security concerns Germany dismissed and ignorred in pursuing Nord Stream, I suspect you believe they have a far greater fear and/or positive opinion of Germany than they do. Germany's Nord Stream policy was not exactly considered a benign or neutral policy by its Baltic neighbors. German politicians had not only insisted it was ridiculous to oppose Nord Stream on grounds of Russian concerns, but also that it was ridiculous to believe Nord Stream interests might sabotage Germany's willingness to support its European neighbors security if Russia did do something stupid. Both of these concerns were validated by the German response to Putin.
If anything, rather than a snub the non-cooperation was both a retaliation and a warning. Germany could not defend Nord Stream when it was warned in advance. Germany could not pursue Nord Stream saboteurs without the cooperation of its neighbors in the present. And Germany would not be able to protect any future Nord Stream in the future, if it disregarded its neighbors security concerns. The Nord Stream concept was not a German-Russia bilateral concern. It was a concern of far more people, and far more veto authorities in practice.
Germany was never so adored and/or feared that it could expect other countries to defend Germany's privileged energy relationship with Russian at their own expense. If that surprised the Germans, well it wasn't for a lack of being warned.
I knew it:
@dr_analog, you got your wish!
...no?
I may not be understanding your quote from the thread correctly, but I may not have been clear. In the quote you are citing of me, I am referring to what I believe was the WSJ account that reported that Germany was warned of the Ukrainians before the attack occurred, as well as post-incident reporting.
'We are warning you of what someone else is thinking of doing to you,' followed by 'we think the people we warned you about did what we warned they considering, which just happened,' is substantially different than 'we are warning you of what we are doing to you so you can minimize the harm we are doing to you.'
Or rather, if warning someone of third party hostile intent is evidence of responsibility, I'm not sure I can contribute anything on the subject.
Sorry, I misunderstood the contents of these warnings, but can you blame me for liking my version better?
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yes ... ha ha ha ... yes!
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