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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   29290 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 6, 2023

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Did the US blow up the Nord Stream Pipeline?

https://seymourhersh.substack.com/p/how-america-took-out-the-nord-stream

That was linked to me and it appeals to my sense of - conspiracy? warmongering? ... But I also don't really understand if it could be true.

What's the consensus here about the pipeline?

(I don't really even care if we discuss the article, it's long and I don't know who the person is - just interested in all kinds of thoughts)

Of course USA blew it up, no one else had a motive. For more than ten years they have opposed it, sanctioned it, and straight up threatened to stop it any way they possibly can. Only a person who is not paying attention or has no deductive capacity would not be able to conclude that.

Here's a noncomprehensive list of the positions of top U.S. officials and presidents:

  • Obama administration opposed the pipeline

  • Trump administration sanctioned any company doing work on the pipeline

  • Biden administration made opposition to the pipeline a top priority

  • Biden said he was "determined to do whatever I can to prevent"

  • Nuland said "If Russia invades, one way or another, Nord Stream 2 Will. Not. Move. Forward."

  • Biden said "If Russia invades…then there will be no longer a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it." and after being questioned "I promise you, we will be able to do that."

  • After the attack Blinked said the bombing was a "tremendous opportunity to once and for all remove the dependence on Russian energy," and "offers tremendous strategic opportunity for years to come."

  • Nuland said "Senator Cruz, like you, I am, and I think the administration is, very gratified to know that Nord Stream 2 is now, as you like to say, a hunk of metal at the bottom of the sea."

I believe Condoleezza Rice also said something along those lines.

But who could have the motive? That's a puzzler!

Here's a few more articles about the motives, which you will never find in mainstream media:

Of course USA blew it up, no one else had a motive.

Lots of counties had motive, most notably Norway, Finland, and pretty much every NATO member east of Germany

Did their officials and presidents also spent a whole decade publicly in opposition to it, sanctioned it, and threatened that no matter what they will not allow it?

Overall, not impressed or compelled by the claims. People have already noted the singular anonymous source claiming, in an era where anonymous sourcing has been as disreputable as ever, but there are other elements that raise eyebrows.

-The claim it was done by the pure navy, as opposed to special forces, to avoid Congressional oversight really suggests someone who is not familiar with the other forms of oversight- and security vulnerabilities- of American military branches. There's a reason that the US black projects generally don't operate from the conventional forces, but in separate elements.

-The mind-reading/framing of motives is projection, or at least certainly not how the western military-security types would view items. I've yet to meet an American in a serious position of government responsibility who frames concerns over Nordstream in terms as abstract as 'threat to western dominance,' as opposed to the more concrete concerns of 'energy blackmail' or 'gas turnoffs.' This is arguing by connotation and pejorative rather than actual positions. If this is the author, that's on him, but if it's from the source, that's indicative.

-The discussion on the German political situation in May 21 is missing some rather significant context- such as the points that Merkel had just retired and there was a multi-month German political paralysis as the government formation negotiations were ongoing, the Russian military buildup adjacent to Ukraine had already started, the Belarusian migration crisis and Russian gas supply slowdown was already starting. The last three are generally now seen as pre-invasion shaping efforts by the Russian government before the invasion- which we know that the Biden administration was aware / observing in 2021. Instead of 'making a concession he knows will be invalidated', however, the author frames the motive as Biden's internal political floundering to war-criticisms.

-The 'planning' meeting that rests solely on the anonymous source is, ahem, silly. Just reverse the sentence order of the paragraph to see how so-

The CIA argued that whatever was done, it would have to be covert. Everyone involved understood the stakes. “This is not kiddie stuff,” the source said. If the attack were traceable to the United States, “It’s an act of war.” - The Navy proposed using a newly commissioned submarine to assault the pipeline directly. The Air Force discussed dropping bombs with delayed fuses that could be set off remotely.

The proposed plans, as described, don't pass muster in the context of their own paragraph, let alone broader realism. For one, submarines don't "assault". That's the sort of language of someone larping military insight. Similarly, the airforce plan of 'bombs with delayed fuses' makes no sense. Aircraft are incredibly visible, so you'd be guaranteeing a record trail, and either the aircraft would have to bomb land-based targets- which is to say, where timed fuse bombs would be found by the Germans in Germany- or a sea target. Now, this may surprise, but dropping bombs from a bomber entails the bomb hitting with terminal velocity. When very small things hit very big bodies of water at very high speeds, they do not penetrate and then become precision submersibles, they go splat.

This is something deserving of /r/credibledefense, but not credibility inspiring.

-The argument about no longer being a covert option because of the Biden Administration's public statements on Nordstream are nonsense.

"According to the source, some of the senior officials of the CIA determined that blowing up the pipeline “no longer could be considered a covert option because the President just announced that we knew how to do it.”"

This is a red flag for credibility. Covert options aren't covert because you have a known capability, but rather the secrecy. When we read declassified / released examples of covert operations, they almost always involve known capabilities of the actors. It's the who/when/if they are actually doing it that's the secret item. This objection is just about the one part that wouldn't matter, precisely because the Navy diving programs are openly acknoweldged capabilities.

-The whole Norway angle is just comedic. The narrative flops between the need for operational and legal secrecy as needed, without actually explaining why informing the Norwegians is necessary to carry out the operation... except to tell the Americans, who have been reviewing the problem for months, where to hit the pipe. The operational simultaneously needs to be secret, but also incredibly expansive in people and organizations involved.

-The timeline is also all over the place. Biden is alleged to have committed to planning the attack on the pipeline as a result of domestic political pressure before the war, but with target selection only occuring in March after engagement with a foreign nation, with the exact timing being... one of the most observed military maneuverings in the region for the year. Except, now with an even later bomb-on-command requirement, late in the process... which indicates they didn't have a time intended to blow it up originally, even as they were engaging the Norwegians to place it.

And- despite all the effort in creating a command-detonated timing... no reason for the timing is apparent. The article tries to go with a citation to imply it had to be done eventually, but there's a roughly 3 month gap between the alleged emplacement and alleged trigger.

-The argument on Russian mine-detection technology is getting into the military spy-fiction, and not the good kind. Tom Clancy was at least good at not just hand-waving technology. You don't get to just allege that the Russians built an entire undersea surveillance network along the Nordstream pipeline to justify the Norwegians as the only people who can counteract it with their inherent anti-Russian traits.

-The regular appeals to the 1970s is less relevant and more argument by historical innuendo. This is a normal element of conspiracy building, to break down temporal relevance and start building connections between unconnected things while also obscuring temporal and contextual relevant information. This isn't the first part of the article to do this, but it's reocurring enough to note, especially since the 1970s Church hearings drove very significant changes in the American intelligence community... changes that are being implicitly covered over by the appeal to the 70s for narrative continuity.

-The air-dropped sonar bouy is yet another red flag. You could get a better engineer to discuss the dynamics of sound propagation through water, but the real item is the fixation on dropping it out of an aircraft.

There is literally no reason to use an aircraft to drop a sonar bouy if you're trying to have a secret signal. Aircraft are easily observable on a number of sensors or by regional naval traffic. Even if your broadcast device weren't detected by any/all systems in the broader area at the moment it signals- and remember the Norwegians are being involved on the basis of a Russian surveillance system for underwater threats, ie. sound-based detection- the aircraft flight for recote detoation would be easily observable...

...and unnecessary, because you could just sail a boat and drop it over the edge. Boats are far, far harder to monitor for unusual activity than aircraft.

I could go on, but that's kind of enough. There are a number of things in this story that are meant to sound vaguely informed and insightful, but with a pretty clear lack of understanding of the material or the alternatives. The way this is written, this is less written by someone who actually knows how governments work and reads far more like being written for the sort of people who don't.

Really, it's targeting ignorance with a hope of shaping your views without remembering how they were shaped. It hopes you don't remember that it's all based on a single anonymous source, that no motivation is provided for the source providing all this information, that you won't remember the argument by connotations in rhetorical lines not used by the people it claims to reflect the positions of, that you won't dwell on the communication role/purpose of the various time-skips in the narrative, or the omissions of 2021 and awkward time gaps, the mechanical alternative methods, and so on.

All told, I do not find it credible, and would lower my judgement of someone who found it compelling.

Overall, not impressed or compelled by the claims. People have already noted the singular anonymous source claiming, in an era where anonymous sourcing has been as disreputable as ever, but there are other elements that raise eyebrows.

Most importan stories are broken out with singular anonymous sources, and mainstream publications mention a single anonymous source all the time.

-The claim it was done by the pure navy, as opposed to special forces, to avoid Congressional oversight really suggests someone who is not familiar with the other forms of oversight- and security vulnerabilities- of American military branches.

It wasn't just the Navy, it was remote corner of the Navy.

There's a reason that the US black projects generally don't operate from the conventional forces, but in separate elements.

Yeah, and the reason may not have anything to do with oversight.

-The mind-reading/framing of motives is projection, or at least certainly not how the western military-security types would view items. I've yet to meet an American in a serious position of government responsibility who frames concerns over Nordstream in terms as abstract as 'threat to western dominance,' as opposed to the more concrete concerns of 'energy blackmail' or 'gas turnoffs.'

As if any politician is transparent about their true motives ever. As Noam Chomsky says: the stated motives of the government are never the true motives, therefore you can pretty much disregard the stated motives.

That being said, Condoleezza Rice did pretty much spell it out in 2014:

"But now we need to have tougher sanctions, and I am afraid at some point this is going to probably have to involve oil and gas. The Russian economy is vulnerable. 80% of the Russian exports are in oil, gas and minerals. People say that the Europeans will run out of energy. Well, the Russians will run out of cash before the Europeans run out of energy. And I understand that it is uncomfortable to have an effect on business ties in this way, but this is one of the few instruments that we have. Over the long run, you want to change the structure of energy dependence. You want to depend more on the North American energy platform, the tremendous bounty of oil and gas that we are finding"

The first thing she mentions is the Russian economy was vulnerable, suggesting they did want to attack the Russian economy.

There's also this 2019 Pentagon-funded study from the RAND Corporation: Extending Russia.

"Drawing on quantitative and qualitative data from Western and Russian sources, this report examines Russia's economic, political, and military vulnerabilities and anxieties."

They want to exploit all Russian vulnerabilities. How much spelled out do you need it to be?

It's clear USA has always been an enemy of Russia.

The proposed plans, as described, don't pass muster in the context of their own paragraph, let alone broader realism. For one, submarines don't "assault". That's the sort of language of someone larping military insight.

Why does the source have to have military insight? He could be part of the CIA, or any number of options.

This is something deserving of /r/credibledefense, but not credibility inspiring.

The fact that you don't see how something is possible doesn't mean it is impossible. That's an argument from incredulity fallacy.

-The argument about no longer being a covert option because of the Biden Administration's public statements on Nordstream are nonsense.

Is it? The exact moment I saw the clip of Joe Biden saying they would put an end to it after it was blown up I put two and two together, and so did many people.

This is a red flag for credibility. Covert options aren't covert because you have a known capability, but rather the secrecy.

But if everyone already suspects the USA did it--as it happened--then the secret would be much harder to keep, because people will not stop investigating--as it happened.

The more eyes, the harder to hide. How is that not obvious? Your desire to not see the obvious seems like motivated reasoning from you.

-The whole Norway angle is just comedic.

Once again this is a fallacy. The fact that you find something comedic doesn't imply that it didn't happen.

The narrative flops between the need for operational and legal secrecy as needed, without actually explaining why informing the Norwegians is necessary to carry out the operation...

It was explained that it wasn't necessary, but it would facilitate the operation. Plain and simple.

-The timeline is also all over the place.

Events unfold that way many times, so what? Things happen and plans change. That happens all the time.

-The argument on Russian mine-detection technology is getting into the military spy-fiction, and not the good kind.

Argument from incredulity fallacy.

This isn't the first part of the article to do this, but it's reocurring enough to note, especially since the 1970s Church hearings drove very significant changes in the American intelligence community... changes that are being implicitly covered over by the appeal to the 70s for narrative continuity.

It wasn't the intelligence community who ordered this, it was the neocon administration. The hatred for Russia runs deep, as anyone familiar with Victoria Nuland knows.

Aircraft are easily observable on a number of sensors or by regional naval traffic.

So? You just pick an aircraft that is going to travel that route anyway for whatever reason.

Once again: argument from incredulity fallacy.

All told, I do not find it credible, and would lower my judgement of someone who found it compelling.

I find all your arguments weak and relying precisely on what you accuse Seymour Hersh of doing: preying on the laziness of the reader. Many of your arguments boil down to "I don't see how this is possible", as if you were an semi-omniscient being. You may not see how X is possible, but I do. So what?

It's also a clear Gish gallop strategy: overwhelming an interlocutor with as many arguments as possible, without regard for accuracy or strength of the arguments. It's no surprise that your comment received zero replies. Who would sit down and read the entire thing, think about critically, and then reply. Well, I just did.

If you are trying to analyze this critically and actually give the article a fair shot, I would pick a single argument against it, your strongest argument, and defend it at depth, not throw dozens which in my opinion are weak.

Most importan stories are broken out with singular anonymous sources, and mainstream publications mention a single anonymous source all the time.

And we generally agree mainstream publications are bad in quality, and that a good indication of trash articles is when massive claims rest on singular anonymous sources. Bad practices don't stop being bad practices when they conform to your prejudices.

It wasn't just the Navy, it was remote corner of the Navy.

The statement still applies that there are still reporting requirements and oversight channels.

As if any politician is transparent about their true motives ever. As Noam Chomsky says: the stated motives of the government are never the true motives, therefore you can pretty much disregard the stated motives.

If Noam Chomsky is your guiding star on objectivity or insight into government thinking, you might as well take the government at face value. Likewise, if government motives were never true, you wouldn't be quoting government persons like Condoleezza Rice for motives.

That being said, Condoleezza Rice did pretty much spell it out in 2014:

   "But now we need to have tougher sanctions, and I am afraid at some point this is going to probably have to involve oil and gas. The Russian economy is vulnerable. 80% of the Russian exports are in oil, gas and minerals. People say that the Europeans will run out of energy. Well, the Russians will run out of cash before the Europeans run out of energy. And I understand that it is uncomfortable to have an effect on business ties in this way, but this is one of the few instruments that we have. Over the long run, you want to change the structure of energy dependence. You want to depend more on the North American energy platform, the tremendous bounty of oil and gas that we are finding"

The first thing she mentions is the Russian economy was vulnerable, suggesting they did want to attack the Russian economy.

Only if you want to project a specific interpretation of 'attack' to fit a quote approaching a decade ago well outside of the context of an alleged Nordstream attack.

They want to exploit all Russian vulnerabilities. How much spelled out do you need it to be?

Competently. People studying Russian vulnerabilities does not mean they are responsible for any perceived attack on a Russian vulnerability.

This is also where I'll note that this actually is an example of the incredulity fallacy. That you cannot see how others would interpret does not mean that others would not do it differently.

It's clear USA has always been an enemy of Russia.

Not really. Also, consensus building.

Why does the source have to have military insight? He could be part of the CIA, or any number of options.

Thus diminishing the credibility of the source, whose claimed insight into the military operational dynamic is the crux of the article.

The fact that you don't see how something is possible doesn't mean it is impossible. That's an argument from incredulity fallacy.

Only if I was arguing on the basis that I don't see how something is possible, as opposed to arguing on the basis of something not being possible on grounds X, Y, Z.

-The argument about no longer being a covert option because of the Biden Administration's public statements on Nordstream are nonsense.

Is it? The exact moment I saw the clip of Joe Biden saying they would put an end to it after it was blown up I put two and two together, and so did many people.

Yes, because many people are inclined to blame the US no matter who does something. The fact that you treat the Biden statement is a causal link is precisely the dynamic why it would work as a covert operation by anyone else- because, in lack of evidence, people will project.

And also because your response is irrelevant to how covert operations are categorized, which is the argument you are responding to- that the person claiming to be a government source is mis-using a government term in ways that it does not actually mean.

But if everyone already suspects the USA did it--as it happened--then the secret would be much harder to keep, because people will not stop investigating--as it happened.

If everyone already suspects the USA did it, it would be much easier for someone else to pull off a covert operation.

The more eyes, the harder to hide. How is that not obvious?

It is obvious. Hence why the lack of verifiable evidence despite all the eyes significantly undermines the claims of the story, as do some of the factual inaccuracies.

Also, argument by incredulity again.

Your desire to not see the obvious seems like motivated reasoning from you.

I'm sure it would seem so to someone operating from motivated reasoning.

Once again this is a fallacy. The fact that you find something comedic doesn't imply that it didn't happen.

This, again, assumes the characterization is the argument, as opposed to the other points.

It was explained that it wasn't necessary, but it would facilitate the operation. Plain and simple.

Counter-productive and against the earlier limitations that prioritized secrecy.

You can be secretive or you can facilitate with more actors, but you can't use both arguments simultaneously.

Events unfold that way many times, so what? Things happen and plans change. That happens all the time.

So do conspiracy theories, which regularly rely on inconsistent timelines to create context from unrelated events and then ignore related relevant context that inconveniences the theory.

The author of this article is a past conspiracy theorist. This is a matter of record, and does shape the level of scrutiny their reliance on various techniques might imply.

-The argument on Russian mine-detection technology is getting into the military spy-fiction, and not the good kind.

Argument from incredulity fallacy.

No, argument that the author doesn't know what he's talking about, and is bad at inventing capabilities.

"This isn't the first part of the article to do this, but it's reocurring enough to note, especially since the 1970s Church hearings drove very significant changes in the American intelligence community... changes that are being implicitly covered over by the appeal to the 70s for narrative continuity."

It wasn't the intelligence community who ordered this, it was the neocon administration. The hatred for Russia runs deep, as anyone familiar with Victoria Nuland knows.

I'll leave in my original text here in quotes just to emphasize that this is neither a counter-argument for the quote or relevant to what the quote was pointing at.

So? You just pick an aircraft that is going to travel that route anyway for whatever reason.

Then the aircraft's presence isn't a secret, which means it's proximity at the time of command detonation wouldn't be a secret, which defeats the purpose of a secret operation secretly placing explosives.

The theory simultaneously requires the US government to care about secrecy to go to exceptional lengths to maintain it, and not caring about it.

All told, I do not find it credible, and would lower my judgement of someone who found it compelling.

I find all your arguments weak and relying precisely on what you accuse Seymour Hersh of doing: preying on the laziness of the reader. Many of your arguments boil down to "I don't see how this is possible", as if you were an semi-omniscient being.

Strangely, no. Now, admittedly, it might look that way if you cut out the supporting arguments, but this is the sort of removal of context typical in conspiracy thinking.

You may not see how X is possible, but I do. So what?

Not much. You'll continue being wrong for the wrong reasons, continue to discredit your general position in the contrast, and continue to undermine your favored associates by contagion of ferverently pushing a weak conspiracy theory as stronger than the evidence supports. By contrast, I'll get a wry amusement.

It's also a clear Gish gallop strategy: overwhelming an interlocutor with as many arguments as possible, without regard for accuracy or strength of the arguments.

When there are many weak elements in an article that demonstrate a trend, the volume is the point.

Also, irony.

It's no surprise that your comment received zero replies.

Certainly. I wrote it days after the initial posting, when it was no longer in the automatically expanded part of the browser, when new sub-topics had already buried it.

Thanks to your re-post trying to put it back on visibility, some might actually be curious enough to follow a link. No promises, since you were buried pretty quickly.

Who would sit down and read the entire thing, think about critically, and then reply. Well, I just did.

Yes, well no. You certainly did reply. If it weren't for you also re-posting this, I wouldn't have a reason to link to it either.

If you are trying to analyze this critically and actually give the article a fair shot, I would pick a single argument against it, your strongest argument, and defend it at depth, not throw dozens which in my opinion are weak.

The argument remains that in addition to the issues that other people have pointed, it retains the characteristics of being source by someone someone unfamiliar with how governments work and with inconsistent claims of the level of secrecy entailed, of which many examples were raised, which undermines the validity of the single claimed source who is supposed to be a highly placed person in the US government who stated that secrecy was a priority.

And we generally agree mainstream publications are bad in quality,

Yes, but not because of that.

and that a good indication of trash articles is when massive claims rest on singular anonymous sources.

I don't think you do understand how journalism works.

The story is the story. If the story has a single source, that's the story. What is a journalist supposed to do in that case? Extort a source? Betray him? If nobody wants to talk, then nobody wants to talk. A journalist reports on what can be reported.

If Noam Chomsky is your guiding star on objectivity or insight into government thinking

He has been right since I have been alive, and everything historical I've checked.

Or do you honestly believe USA went into Iraq to liberate the country and fight terrorism?

Only if you want to project a specific interpretation of 'attack' to fit a quote approaching a decade ago well outside of the context of an alleged Nordstream attack.

You are throwing a smokescreen. You said you haven't met an American in government framing the concern in terms of "threat to western dominance", and I showed you one. If USA wasn't worried about Russian influence in Europe, why would they want to attack Russia economically?

I'm not talking about the explosion, I'm talking about your claim about the motive. No mind-reading is necessary to show that USA has always been an enemy of Russia. I can give you many more examples.

And BTW, in 2014 Nord Stream 2 already had 3 years in the making.

People studying Russian vulnerabilities does not mean they are responsible for any perceived attack on a Russian vulnerability.

Straw man.

This is also where I'll note that this actually is an example of the incredulity fallacy. That you cannot see how others would interpret does not mean that others would not do it differently.

Another straw man. I never said I don't see how others could interpret this.

It's clear USA has always been an enemy of Russia.

Not really. Also, consensus building.

How many examples do you need of American bureaucrats interested in hurting Russia do you need? Would 10 do the trick?

Or are you going to dismiss every one of them? Then the claim is falsifiable, isn't it?

Thus diminishing the credibility of the source, whose claimed insight into the military operational dynamic is the crux of the article.

False. The article never stated that.

Only if I was arguing on the basis that I don't see how something is possible, as opposed to arguing on the basis of something not being possible on grounds X, Y, Z.

No. The fallacy applies regardless of how many grounds you have.

Yes, because many people are inclined to blame the US no matter who does something.

Hasty generalization fallacy. The fact that many people did that doesn't mean that all people did that, and in particular doesn't mean that I did that.

The fact that you treat the Biden statement is a causal link

Straw man. I never said I treated it as a causal link.

That's as far as I go. I'm not going to chase hundreds of week arguments on top of dozens of weak arguments.

If you wanted to seriously defend your position you would have picked your strongest argument and defend that instead of keeping up this Gish gallop strategy.

Yes, but not because of that.

Well that's a shame, because I do criticize the western media for running shakey and often wrong stories on singular anonymous sources. If you do not, that's on you.

I don't think you do understand how journalism works.

The story is the story. If the story has a single source, that's the story. What is a journalist supposed to do in that case? Extort a source? Betray him? If nobody wants to talk, then nobody wants to talk. A journalist reports on what can be reported.

Simple- find corresponding evidence to support the claims. A single person making claims is not news to report, it is rumor-mongering. More importantly, it's a known type of journalistic failure that's prone to confirmation bias where reporters report the things they want to be true in order to impact the world, as opposed to questioning things that might undercut the narrative.

As the author has in the past engaged in conspiracy theory publication, such as the OBL raid, this isn't just a hypothetical concern, but a known weakness.

He has been right since I have been alive, and everything historical I've checked.

This suggests you are either very young, or very modest checking skills, when it comes to Chomsky.

Or do you honestly believe USA went into Iraq to liberate the country and fight terrorism?

I absolutely believe that many American government people who advocated the Iraq War thought they were, in fact liberating the Iraq War. I think they were incompetent and arrogant, but not insincere that they thought that the Iraqis would be better without a tyrannical dictator who suppressed a majority of his own populace.

I have met other people whose frank assessment was that they fully expected radical islamic group attention to re-focus onto Iraq and not on AQ-style projection attacks into the US.

I also find credible that the neocons thought Iraq was but the first step in a broader campaign to topple multiple regimes in the middle east, especially Iran, which was and is a state-supporter of terrorism, and that while incredibly condemnable it was a sincere interest to go after past and present state sponsors of terrorism.

I also believe the USA had many overlapping interests to go into Iraq, in addition to its views on Iraqi liberation and the war on terror plans of the neocons.

You are throwing a smokescreen. You said you haven't met an American in government framing the concern in terms of "threat to western dominance", and I showed you one.

You didn't. Your own quote didn't frame it terms of "threat to western dominance." This is precisely the sort of 'unable to use their own terminology' I accused the article of lacking.

If USA wasn't worried about Russian influence in Europe, why would they want to attack Russia economically?

And this is a shift in claims to a strawman. The claim isn't that the USA wasn't worried about Russian influence in Europe. The claim is that the Americans in the American government don't frame the implications of Russian influence in Europe as "threat to western dominance." Government bureaucracies have their own sub-cultures on how they view and describe the world, but characterizations like "threat to western dominance" are how people outside of, and generally opposed to, the US government frame the US government concern, not how the US government views its own position.

Thus, an alleged highly placed US government person who uses turns of phrases and sub-cultural memes typical of outside critics of the US government lowers the credibility of the claim that they are a highly placed US government person.

I'm not talking about the explosion, I'm talking about your claim about the motive. No mind-reading is necessary to show that USA has always been an enemy of Russia. I can give you many more examples.

And many examples would not support a totality argument, or a how the US government viewed the Russian government. As open for criticism as the Clinton administration was, characterizing its Russian policy as viewing Russia as an enemy is more than a stretch, and even the Bush 2 government had more than a little internal debate on how to approach Putin, hence the criticism of Bush by members of his own party.

How many examples do you need of American bureaucrats interested in hurting Russia do you need? Would 10 do the trick?

The fact that you think 10 examples could represent the totality of American government of perspectives on Russia over thirty years is rather indicative of your lack of understanding of the US government.

Different Administrations over the post-Cold War period had different perceptions and prescriptions for Russia policy. The Clintons thought neoliberal reforms and supporting Yeltsin would help Russia. He may have been wrong- but the failure of neoliberal reforms with Russia is not evidence of ill-will as opposed to part of the general critque of the Clinton-era neoliberalism. Bush II was pre-occupied by the Iraq War, and governed over internal party splits between old-guard Cold Warriors who were suspicious, the religious right which was more interested in domestic items and the war on terror, and the then-nascant base rebellion that would manifest in the Tea Party and later trump that doesn't really care about Russia. Obama tried his own anything-but-his-predecessor, and infamously sent Hillary Clinton for an attempted 'reset' and reframing. Trump was infamously not a NATO-Atlanticist, and both he and his faction of the Republican party regularly accused of being soft on Russia.

Or are you going to dismiss every one of them? Then the claim is falsifiable, isn't it?

The claim is falsifiable because it claims a totality that doesn't exist no matter how many examples are provided, because totalities are disproven by the existence of counter-examples, not proven by supporting examples.

That different people in the US government had different views of how hard (or soft) Russia policy should be, and what is or is not an anti-Russia action, just means there is dispute, not that the people who wanted a hardline were somehow the consensus of the US government.

Thus diminishing the credibility of the source, whose claimed insight into the military operational dynamic is the crux of the article.

False. The article never stated that.

The article sites the source for a number of military operational dynamics that serve as demonstration of both the source's access into the conspiracy and to explain claimed means and requirements of the conspiracy over time.

No. The fallacy applies regardless of how many grounds you have.

This is not true, and is an extension of the fallacy of fallacies.

Yes, because many people are inclined to blame the US no matter who does something.

Hasty generalization fallacy. The fact that many people did that doesn't mean that all people did that, and in particular doesn't mean that I did that.

The fact that you have cited events without causal relationships to the Nord Stream pipeline as evidence of a causal relationship indicates that yes, you did do that.

The fact that you treat the Biden statement is a causal link

Straw man. I never said I treated it as a causal link.

I did not say that you said you treated it as a causal link. I said that you treated it as a causal link. Your stated position on the manner is irrelevant.

That's as far as I go. I'm not going to chase hundreds of week arguments on top of dozens of weak arguments.

Aside from the lack of hundreds, I rather suspect you will, so that you can get the last word once again.

If you wanted to seriously defend your position you would have picked your strongest argument and defend that instead of keeping up this Gish gallop strategy.

The argument- which you once again avoided addressing by this attempted gish-gallop, remains as stated:

The argument remains that in addition to the issues that other people have pointed, it retains the characteristics of being source by someone someone unfamiliar with how governments work and with inconsistent claims of the level of secrecy entailed, of which many examples were raised, which undermines the validity of the single claimed source who is supposed to be a highly placed person in the US government who stated that secrecy was a priority.

Though there is one last thing before I leave you to get the last word once again, just to revist your earlier counter-argument.

It's no surprise that your comment received zero replies. Who would sit down and read the entire thing, think about critically, and then reply. Well, I just did.

Thank you for raising interest in the original posting. The streisand effect says hello, and it has received far more engagement than it would have had you not posted.

Simple- find corresponding evidence to support the claims.

I would love for you to try to find the "evidence" of whatever claims you are supposed to be making about Nord Stream 2.

Journalists don't make claims, they simply report the evidence they managed to find.

As the author has in the past engaged in conspiracy theory publication, such as the OBL raid

That's a hallucination. Hersh has never engaged in conspiracy theories, the Osama bin Laden information was confirmed by Obama. Hersh was vindicated, as he usually is.

It is you the one that has a motivated reasoning to distrust Hersh's reporting.

This suggests you are either very young, or very modest checking skills, when it comes to Chomsky.

Neither of which can be falsifiable. Right?

The fact that you have cited events without causal relationships to the Nord Stream pipeline as evidence of a causal relationship indicates that yes, you did do that.

Converse error fallacy.

I said that you treated it as a causal link.

And you are wrong. You are mind-reading based on a converse error fallacy.

Aside from the lack of hundreds, I rather suspect you will, so that you can get the last word once again.

You are wrong again. I said I was done with that particular subthread, I didn't say I was done with all subthreads.

You may notice I didn't address every single weak argument you've put forward in this subthread either.

The argument remains that in addition to the issues that other people have pointed, it retains the characteristics of being source by someone someone unfamiliar with how governments work

False. You have never established that. All your arguments point towards someone who doesn't know how the military works, which I already addressed.

who is supposed to be a highly placed person in the US government

The article never mentioned anything remotely close to that. How many people do you think hold a top-secret clearance in USA?

The streisand effect says hello

Once again I don't think you know what you are talking about. The premise of the Streisand effect is someone trying to hide information. What information do you think I'm trying to "hide"?

I would love for you to try to find the "evidence" of whatever claims you are supposed to be making about Nord Stream 2.

Journalists don't make claims, they simply report the evidence they managed to find.

The 'evidence' in this report is a series of claim made by an alleged anonymous source with access. Moreover, the claims of the anonymous source are unsupported by corroborating evidence (hence the reliance on argument by narrative), and contradicted by available evidence (flight data that doesn't match the claimed trigger mechanism).

That's a hallucination. Hersh has never engaged in conspiracy theories, the Osama bin Laden information was confirmed by Obama. Hersh was vindicated, as he usually is.

This now begs what you think is a hallucation, as well as what specific information you think was verified versus what wasn't.

It is you the one that has a motivated reasoning to distrust Hersh's reporting.

Repeating the claim from a position of motivated reasoning neither makes it motivated reasoning or disarms the stated basis of skepticism.

This suggests you are either very young, or very modest checking skills, when it comes to Chomsky.

Neither of which can be falsifiable. Right?

No, you could certainly identify your age and the depth of your checking to Chomsky's more contentious claims which have been critiqued over time.

The fact that you have cited events without causal relationships to the Nord Stream pipeline as evidence of a causal relationship indicates that yes, you did do that.

Converse error fallacy.

Misuse of converse fallacy.

I said that you treated it as a causal link.

And you are wrong. You are mind-reading based on a converse error fallacy.

Still misuse. The criticism was a characterization. Your rebuttal was that it was false as you never claimed the characterization. The rebuttal to your rebuttal is that it was never claimed you claimed the characterization. This is not a converse error fallacy, this is basic strawman fallacy being rejected.

Aside from the lack of hundreds, I rather suspect you will, so that you can get the last word once again.

You are wrong again. I said I was done with that particular subthread, I didn't say I was done with all subthreads.

I am quite correct that you lack hundreds, and remain vindicated in my expectation that you will continue to strive for the last word despite multiple claims you are done.

I note you are also still on the same subthread, and expect you to continue to do so for reasons of predictability and ego.

You may notice I didn't address every single weak argument you've put forward in this subthread either.

No, I'm well aware you're not addressing them, but my viewpoint is that you're abandoning weak positions that your deflections could not resolve.

The argument remains that in addition to the issues that other people have pointed, it retains the characteristics of being source by someone someone unfamiliar with how governments work

False.

True. This is and remains my argument.

You have never established that.

I have made my argument on multiple points. Whether you accept it as established is irrelevant.

All your arguments point towards someone who doesn't know how the military works, which I already addressed.

All of my arguments were not restricted to the military, nor did your addressing actually resolve or mitigate the criticism. 'Address' does not mean 'defeated,' and you have consistently dropped threads that remained contested, even if you claim to do so because they are weak.

who is supposed to be a highly placed person in the US government

The article never mentioned anything remotely close to that. How many people do you think hold a top-secret clearance in USA?

With access to covert operations planning at the White House level for black operations specifically designed to avoid oversight? Very, very, very, very few, and only at high levels of the US government where alleged meetings were taking place with people who constitute highly placed members of the current administration.

This, again, is indicative of someone who doesn't understand the workings of the US government.

The streisand effect says hello

Once again I don't think you know what you are talking about. The premise of the Streisand effect is someone trying to hide information. What information do you think I'm trying to "hide"?

Hiding is only one of the causes of the streisand effect. Trying to otherwise draw attention away from information is another form. By placing your particular rebuttal well below the current topic of the day- below the fold in American media parlance- even as you created a new subthread, you engaged in a way to minimize attention to standing counter-arguments.

However, your attempt to re-raise the topic in a different space, and let the previous thread die in obscurity with your rebuttal as the last word in any future review, only drew more attention to the counter-argument... even though you attempted to use a lack of attention as a basis of criticism in the lower thread.

That argument seems to be a little humorous in retrospect, given the unmasked voting ratios in periods where anyone likely read it, but the obvious argument on appeal to the majority is obvious, even as it would be wrong here.

However, as we're sufficiently meta here to note that the scope of discussion is narrowing, and I've made clear my perception of why, I'll let any future reviewers make their judgement as to who is correct. You can have the last word if it will help you feel better, but this exchange has drawn it's expected pattern, and I doubt you'll find any vindication in being predicted.

The 'evidence' in this report is a series of claim made by an alleged anonymous source with access.

That is evidence.

contradicted by available evidence (flight data that doesn't match the claimed trigger mechanism).

Prove it.

No, you could certainly identify your age and the depth of your checking to Chomsky's more contentious claims which have been critiqued over time.

I am 40. And you pick a controversial Chomsky "claim".

Misuse of converse fallacy.

No, it's not a misuse. You are literally saying because I appear to have done something, therefore I did it. If it glitters, then it's gold. That's a fallacy.

my viewpoint is that you're abandoning weak positions that your deflections could not resolve.

Your viewpoint is wrong. If you want me to address your "strongest" positions, then only mention those.

True. This is and remains my argument.

Simply saying "true" does nothing, you have to substantiate your claim, which you haven't done so far. Therefore your claim is dismissed.

With access to covert operations planning at the White House level for black operations specifically designed to avoid oversight?

This is a probabilistic fallacy. You are talking about P(X), we are talking about P(X|O). Yet another example of motivated reasoning.

Thin a fuck and overwrought as hell, doesn't change my opinion.

Still think that it's 50/50 shitty russian engineering vs. some eastern member in the NATO constellation doing a little undersea trolling, with Poland in the lead.

Personally I'd put the balance at more like 60/40 for shitty Russian safety practices vs intentional sabotage. But yes, this is pretty much my take as well.

But if it was sabotage, would you agree the US is the most likely culprit?

Maybe, but far from the only suspect.

It is at least very certain that bombs where placed on the pipelines since the explosions where recorded on seismic instruments https://www.gpb.org/news/2022/09/27/seismologists-suspect-explosions-damaged-undersea-pipelines-carry-russian-gas

Accidents can cause explosions too. I don't think anyone disputes at this point that there were explosions. The question is whether these explosions were caused deliberately, and if so, by whom.

FWIW, the Swedish investigation claims traces of explosives were detected, which would rule out an accidental cause. The question is then whether you believe them, though it seems hard to imagine why they would lie about it, unless they want to pin it on Russia, but for obvious reasons that's one of the less likely culprits.

I hope this doesn't violate any rules, but I want to slide in with a big old "consider the source." Hersh used to be the pinnacle of deep investigative journalism ... and then something happened? His coverage of the Bin Laden raid was the marker for me of him really falling off.

Look it's not complicated, this takes a certain amount of ressources and benefits America, and America alone, tremendously. Who else?

Russia wouldn't destroy their own investment they can just turn off the stream.

I've heard multiple theories of the actual op, including the British being the actual executants but always for US interest, because who else would want to switch energy dependency from Russia to them and properly sever the russo-german tie.

"Russia" is not a monolith. There are plenty of Russians, some quite powerful, with lots to gain from destroying the pipeline.

Restricting ourselves to people with access to sufficient ressources to pull off such an operation: who and for what reason? The non state actors with sufficient ressources that I know of don't seem to me like they would benefit.

Restricting ourselves to people with access to sufficient ressources to pull off such an operation: who and for what reason? The non state actors with sufficient ressources that I know of don't seem to me like they would benefit.

This restriction doesn't meaningfully narrow it down, since every power in the geographic neighborhood and many outside would qualify. It's not like boats and diving equipment and explosives are the sole scope of a superpower.

For motive, there can many multiple and even overlapping motivations, both externally oriented (geopolitical advantage) and internal (domestic political maneuverings). Simply hoping to have the Americans be blamed would be a motive.

https://twitter.com/BadBalticTakes/status/1623606025071783936?s=20&t=PXShQfsqToxfHV3qYYjzkg

Hersh himself acknowledges how the pipeline would be politically unviable during Russia’s full scale war. That means the continued existence of the pipeline is far more valuable only to someone who could replace Putin and change the course he wants Russia totally committed to. Putin’s top priority is remaining in power at all cost. He would sacrifice an incentive to replace him & end war.

Hersh himself acknowledges how the pipeline would be politically unviable during Russia’s full scale war.

How does he figure? Isn't Russia shipping gas to Germany via a surface pipeline through Ukraine right now? Doing the same thing but not transiting the war-zone should be just as viable.

That might have been Putins plan at the outset, but then (Wikipedia):

Scholz suspended certification of Nord Stream 2 on 22 February 2022 in consequence of Russia's recognition of the Donetsk and Luhansk republics and the deployment of troops in territory held by the DPR and LPR.[40]

Now, the Germans might theoretically have realized that it was pretty weird that they were still buying gas but not approving this specific pipeline, but in practice, it seems very unlikely that that Nord Stream 2 would ever deliver gas while the war was ongoing. E.g. this Metaculus question goes down to 5% after Sholz announcement: https://www.metaculus.com/questions/5170/nord-stream-2-be-completed-before-2025/

Since we are basically mindreading Putin here, it kind of doesn't matter what metaculus or twitter randos think the likelihood of the pipeline being certified was -- I can't mindread Putin either, but "sell as much gas as possible on the international market" seems to best serve his war aims. And I can easily imagine a plan in which Germany caves during a hard winter, which again seems like the sort of thing Putin would like.

Sure, we are mindreading: so is Hersh and everyone else in this discussion: It's a discussion about motives, thus we are mindreading.

And I can easily imagine a plan in which Germany caves during a hard winter, which again seems like the sort of thing Putin would like.

Putins plan likely looked like your scenario above (or even "Germany is weak and decadent and they won't cancel Nord Stream 2 to begin with"). Then Germany made it very clear that they wouldn't reopen Nord Stream 2 (hence the 5% on the prediction market) and they managed to stock up on gas and otherwise prepare for the winter much better than expected. Also Russia seems to have underestimated the west in all their plans everywhere (thus the fiasco of the invasion) so they might realize from that general principle that they have likely been underestimating Germany in this specific case. So Putin realized that this plan wasn't going to work, so he went for another option.

Your argument seems grounded on that Nord Stream 2 was viable after the invasion. I have tried to present evidence to the contrary but it seems I haven't convinced you. What evidence would make you change your mind? Do you have any evidence for your position, beyond "I can imagine it"?

An attempt to publicly verify some of the few specifics that can be verified, specifically that the explosives were set during Baltops via an Alta-class minesweeper (of which Norway has three) and that the explosions were triggered by a Boeing P-8 (of which Norway has five). The vehicles' positions at the time (accessible via historical ADS-B and AIS records) don't line up with their claimed use.

Did the substack piece claim Norwegian minesweepers deployed the alleged divers? I didn’t recall that and quickly scanned. If it didn’t, that reduces credibility of the debunking.

You could have looked harder

That would be well within the range of the divers, who, operating from a Norwegian Alta class mine hunter, would dive with a mixture of oxygen, nitrogen and helium streaming from their tanks, and plant shaped C4 charges on the four pipelines with concrete protective covers.

The word "would" implies that was the proposed plan at the time (before USA approved it), not that this is what they finally did.

I don't think any of my hypotheses for the NS incident are above 50% probability, tbh, which is not a particularly confident place to reason from. Accidental clathrate gun is like 40%, some combination of West state actors is like 30%, leaving another 10% each for Ukraine, non-state actor explanations, and Russian sabotage. Despite the ink here on sonic buoy-activated detonators, nothing about this necessitates a particularly complex or expensive operation. I do think that conditional on the US being behind it, it is unlikely that Germany was not also in on it. It cuts through a particularly thorny knot for German leadership, taking a decision out of their hands that had no good political options. It also could have been an unwritten part of the July 2021 agreement reached between the US and Germany that had Germany commit to decertifying the pipelines in the event of Russian invasion.

I do think that conditional on the US being behind it, it is unlikely that Germany was not also in on it. It cuts through a particularly thorny knot for German leadership, taking a decision out of their hands that had no good political options.

Do you actually believe USA cares about its "allies" or considers them in any way peers?

It has betrayed pretty much all its "allies" to the point it's not trusted anymore by most of the world, and two quotes of Henry Kissinger explain that:

  • “To be an enemy of America can be dangerous, but to be a friend is fatal.”

  • “America has no permanent friends or enemies, only interests”

Do you actually believe USA cares about its "allies" or considers them in any way peers?

What does it mean for a country to care about another country? Not everyone in the US feels the same way about anything, but I'd venture that a sizeable majority do care about our allies, and a smaller majority do consider them peers. For one thing, many of us look to Europe as an example of good policies. Another partially overlapping group looks to Japan for examples of good governance.

It has betrayed pretty much all its "allies" to the point it's not trusted anymore by most of the world

OK, when has the US ever betrayed Japan? I won't count a reasonable number of spies here because I think basically all nations spy on each other.

I'd be interested in hearing about these "betrayals" more generally because the world has a lot of history and this is one part of it that I haven't heard much about.

Not everyone in the US feels the same way about anything

We are not talking about everyone in the USA, we are talking about USA in practical terms.

It literally doesn't matter what USA citizens feel about Germany, the USA government can do whatever they want in regards to Germany independently of its citizens.

So what does the USA government consider Germany? Not an ally.

I'd be interested in hearing about these "betrayals" more generally

Here's a brief list:

  • Afghanistan

  • The Kurds

  • France

  • Georgia

  • South Vietnam

  • Philippines

The more alarming question the article raises is : /If/ the US did blow the pipeline, could anyone in traditional civilian or military leadership corroborate they gave their blessing (or even stern objection) to this operation before or during or after those charges were placed?

The article highlights that this project was run out of a A. small inner circle of whitehouse insiders, B. an intelligence agency, C. a small detached unit of navy personnel, D. some collaboration with NATO commanders in the Baltics. Not a single member of congress (or a single Republican?) is ever told about this for nine months.

Basically, we may have initiated an act of war against a nuclear power, and 99.9% of our leadership is completely ignorant if we even did it! Obviously, the military chain of command under proper civilian leadership is broken if the whitehouse insiders are allowed to run black ops that could trigger a nuclear war with no accountability or oversight.

Hersch has given an investigator with subpoena powers everything they need to corroborate or debunk his claims: the location of the navy base where the divers would have been stationed, and the dates the charges were planted. From there, narrowing the small cadre of elite divers, to the even smaller cohort actively diving on the days should narrow the list down to a manageable set of interviews and figure out if they placed the charges. Then the other question to ask, ideally again through subpoena of all records: is it true that all of congress can claim full ignorance of this operation?

The more alarming question the article raises is

The more alarming question for USA citizens, sure. But the citizens in Germany would be alarmed in a different way: "USA are not our allies".

Obviously, the military chain of command under proper civilian leadership is broken

Yes, but it is also, ACTUALLY broken if we consider the current POTUS to be nothing more than a walking and talking vegetable hopped up on god knows what meds. It feels like his lucidity and "coherence of taught" is drifting one way or the other depending on what meds and how much they've been given to him just before the press conference.

Do you genuinely believe Joe Biden is in a near vegetative state powered only by drugs, and lacking normal cognitive abilities?

Do you consider dementia a near vegetative state?

These are medical definitions on which our personal opinions have no bearing. Vegetative state means a specific thing - if someone's view is "Biden is too old and dopey to be trusted to be president" then say that.

It's a manner of speaking, just like saying he isn't sharpest pencil in the box. Doesn't mean he is literally a pencil.

So it would be accurate to say he very likely has dementia?

Of course "He isn't the sharpest pencil" doesn't mean he's literally a pencil, it's a negation - it's saying he is not.

it's saying he is not

Yes, that's exactly what the idiom means: the person is literally not a pencil.

If this is not bad faith argumentation, I don't know what is.

Circumstantial evidence suggests that it was Spain:

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/poland-mystery-divers-gdansk-port-energy-oil-gas-infrastructure/

Kidding, but something tells me that Poland has looked into these divers and as a result has a pretty good idea who blew up the pipeline.

It sounds like a Tom Clancy-style story. Which doesn't mean it's false, but doesn't mean it's true either. It doesn't seem to add evidence either way.

But look at the motive. Obama opposed it, Trump opposed it and sanctioned, Biden made opposition to it a top priority, multiple officials said they would stop it no matter what, and after the fact claimed it was a tremendous opportunity, and boasted about how glad they are it happened.

Doesn't it strike you as odd that somebody else did what they wanted to happen for more than ten years now?

No.

Big prior against the US explicitly blowing up energy infrastructure. Bigger prior against the evidence only showing up on a random Substack. Sets off my “epistemic learned helplessness” flags.

I’d change my mind if mainstream outlets can point to a smoking gun.

a random Substack

A substack of one of the most decorated and impactful journalists of all time is "random".

OK.

I’d change my mind if mainstream outlets can point to a smoking gun.

So, a genetic fallacy then.

I really don't like the rat-adjacent obsession with the idea of "priors". It's just a fancy way of saying "I believe X" or "I don't believe X" and acting like that somehow means the burden of proof is on the opposition.

I’d change my mind if mainstream outlets can point to a smoking gun.

Sure much like with the Twitter Files, it'll be a conspiracy theory until it becomes undeniable, at which point we'll hear "this is nothing new, why are you talking about it?".

If the OP wants personal opinions, priors are appropriate. I don’t believe the US did it, or that Sy Hersh would be scooping it on substack if we did. As such, yeah, I’m claiming the burden of proof is on the opposition—if they care about convincing me.

the difference between prior assumptions and beliefs is that priors are expected to update or change with new info whereas beliefs tend to be much closer to permanent. Its a way for people to say "i currently believe X but i'm not married to the conclusion" in fewer words.

That said its also the designated socially acceptable space to traffic obvious personal bias into an otherwise ratty conversation, so i do understand being annoyed by it. "those aren't my unsupported dogmatic opinions, those are just my priors"

It's funny because netstack was basically saying "I believe the US will never blow up energy infrastructure" and "I don't believe in evidence from substack."

Counter. At the time the US didn’t want to claim responsibility. It’s a slow escalation. I wouldn’t be surprised if this is an official leak. Wait a bit and people don’t care as much. Leak a non sourced story thru a guy whose sometimes right but comes off conspiratorial. So you slowly build up the idea that we did it. From we make the most sense. Then conspiracy guy says how we did it. Then a year from now some more official backing.

That’s kind of how I would do it. Day one we did it would have escalated it too much. But as a spook this is about the timeline I would pursue.

While I agree it is unlikely, Sy Hersh isn’t exactly a random substack.

That said, this is thinly sourced, would indicate criminal behavior by multiple people in the executive branch, and an act of aggression against a warring nuclear power. I think Biden is an idiot, but I have to think the joint chiefs would have stopped this.

I think the joint chiefs are idiots and Biden is the only sane man.

Although it’s worth mentioning that I’ve always held the view that the nord stream pipeline was blown up by the US.

It hurts Germany because it stops them from trading with Russia. But it also distances Germany from Russia, and removes leverage Russia has over Germany.

The US isn't primarily interested in Germany's prosperity - only the political effect thereof. A weakened Germany that is firmly on the side of NATO is better for the US than a prosperous Germany that peacefully trades with Russia and doesn't do anything against them.

If Russia profits from the pipeline existing, it cannot also profit from it not existing. You're arguing that Nordstream was a marginal cost to Russia over not-Nordstream? Then why'd they build it?

If you wanted to hurt Germany more than Russia you would blow up the other gas pipelines, the ones that go through Poland and Ukraine. Then Russia would still get to pipe its gas to Europe, but Germany would have to reverse its position on NS2.

I'm not sure if Russia torpedoing their own critical infrastructure (and their only major pipeline to the euros that doesn't run through Ukrainian territory) makes much sense.

I'm not sure if Russia torpedoing their own critical infrastructure (and their only major pipeline to the euros that doesn't run through Ukrainian territory) makes much sense.

I have a friend who is very pro-Russia at the moment and often makes this same rhetorical argument. However, he also thinks 9/11 was an inside job and is full of theories for why the U.S. would have inflicted such an attack on its most important city. "Makes sense" seems to me to be a too-loosely employed criteria when it comes to the world of international subterfuge, where "not making sense" can look like a smokescreen to those who see things in smoke or just smoke to anyone who doesn't want to see in anything in the smoke.

there is a pipeline that runs through Turkey

I weakly thought it was russia when it happened, but assuming the US has informational dominance, the lack of evidence for russia's involvement months later makes me lean towards US or US ally. If this is what happened, it should come out when the Burgfrieden of the ukrainian war is over.

While the pipeline was (is?) reachable by divers, I still favor a blockage/poor maintenance as the most likely theory, followed by sabotage from within NordStream's operation.

Thing is that the two pipelines blew something like 18 hours apart that strikes me as a long time for a group of divers and their support vessel to sit around waiting to be caught. If one were planning to destroy the pipes by planting bombs on the exterior, I would expect those bombs to be on a timer to allow the divers to already be long gone when shit goes down, and I would expect timers would be set to detonate simultaneously so as to minimize the risk of a bomb being discovered before it had gone off.

I still favor a blockage/poor maintenance as the most likely theory

Poor maintenance that just happened to cause exactly what USA had wanted for more than 10 years and has pretty much said they would do if they have to.

You should read it -- it's detailed and seems plausible. (IANANS)

The source claims that a timed explosion was the original plan, but concerns were raised that having stuff blowing up 2 days after a mine-sweeping exercise would ruin plausible deniablity -- so a remote trigger set off by a specific signature generated by a sono-buoy that the Norwegians could drop whenever they wanted during the course of normal operations was deployed.

I don't think the blockage theory can explain N.S. II blowing up -- wasn't it non-operational at the time? (not to mention that simultaneous events in two pipelines which have not exploded in the past seems a bit unlikely)

Off topic, but can you expand IANANS? Google says "I Am Not A Native Speaker", but that doesn't make sense in context I don't think (though if that is what you mean, congratulations on your impeccable English). Maybe "I Am Not A National Securitist"? Or "I Am Not A Nord Stream"?

I thought it was "I Am Not A Naval Specialist."

I have not been involved in numerous secret raids on Al-Quaeda, do not have over 300 confirmed kills, am not trained in gorilla warfare and I'm definitely not the top sniper in the entire US armed forces.

Ah. That'd do it. Thanks.

The pipes were pressurized but there was no flow which is pretty much the exact scenario in which you would expect a blockage to develop.

As for the rest, it all sounds way to "clever" to me. Too many steps and too many people involved. Where as lax safety standards (possibly helped along by someone quietly disabling a failsafe or three) strikes me as reasonably "on brand" given how often other bits of infrastructure in Russia seem to explode.

IDK man, we have no way of really knowing at this point. (or maybe ever)

But the hydrate plug thing was also promoted only by basically one I-am-very-smart type IIRC? I see no particular reason to believe him either -- and I do have serious technical doubts about how this would happen in a non-operational, brand new pipeline which I assume would be full of retail-ready (ie. pretty dry) gas.

P-T curve for methane hydrate formation is here: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b4/Methane_Hydrate_phase_diagram.jpg

Looks like under about 4-5 MPa you are safe -- presumably this is something that Russian pipeline engineers are aware of? I see no reason to keep your dormant pipeline pressurized more than that, but I'm not a pipeline engineer either, so who knows.

The level of detail in this new story is pretty impressive if fabricated -- that doesn't make it true, but I couldn't see anything implausible there.

Looks like under about 4-5 MPa you are safe

Seafloor temperatures in the Baltic Sea can be about 0-5C, so you may be looking at the wrong part of the graph. From here, you have an average gas pressure of 16,300 kPa and temperature of 5C, which puts you clear above the line. (in the average case, to say nothing of in extremis)

This article also says that the rupture was found when pressure in NS-2 dropped from "dropped from 105 to 7 bar overnight". 10,500 kPa at 5C.

But the hydrate plug thing was also promoted only by basically one I-am-very-smart type IIRC?

If you want independent, pre-2022 corroboration that this is indeed a thing, you can see here

The first link is for an operating pipeline, which is as I'd expect -- the second does seem to indicate that they were keeping it at pretty high pressures for whatever reasons though, so hydrate formation was certainly a possibility.

Questions remain as to why the Russians would be fooling around with a pipeline that nobody was using -- "Russians dumb" is a nice catch-all argument, but not really very convincing. "Russians lazy" doesn't really work in this case, as the lazy thing to do would be to leave the pipeline alone.

Also you and @HlynkaCG will need to explain why the Swedes claim to have found "foreign objects" and "explosives residue" around the incident site:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-11-18/nord-stream-explosions-were-caused-by-sabotage-sweden-concludes?srnd=premium-europe

I hadn't seen this the last time I looked into the hydrate plug thing, but it seems pretty dispositive?

I hadn't seen this the last time I looked into the hydrate plug thing, but it seems pretty dispositive?

The Swedish claims are largely why I've adjusted my view of the hydrate stuff down from maybe 60% to 40%. I don't think it's enough to discount it completely, just because the details from the Swedish Public Prosecutor (Mats Ljungqvist) at the investigating authority (aklagare.se) have been pretty woeful. It's been impossible to find anything substantive even going through all the swedish language reports.

You're starting to require a lot of incompetence everywhere with this theory -- what should be the prior on hydrate plugs blowing up pipelines? I know that hydrate is a problem in pipelining, but it's pretty rare for NG pipelines to explode in dramatic fashion for any reason on a given day -- now take the third power of that number, and multiply by the chance of Sweden incorrectly detecting explosive residue and I think the prior is getting pretty small to come up with a 40% chance of this event unfolding as it did.

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I don't think the blockage theory can explain N.S. II blowing up -- wasn't it non-operational at the time?

The hydrate plug theory is basically that leaving a pipe non-operational for a long time and then trying to unilaterally unplug it was rolling the dice on spectacular failure.

But was NS II ever operational? I guess there was some gas in it (probably to prevent contamination/corrosion) but AFAIK no production pumping had ever been done on it. (and nobody was trying to make it otherwise at the time, so it's not clear why they'd be unplugging it at that moment either)

The pipe was pressurised with gas (which was almost certainly very slushy in parts). If the Russians wanted to make sure that the pipe was in a ready-to-supply state (or if some gazprom official had been making representations this had been the case), plugs are cleared through careful depressurisation and slowly melting them. Depressuring unilaterally too quickly could create a pressure gradient over any hydrate plugs and accelerate them off down the pipe.

Why would it be slushy? It's dried methane, already processed for consumption I think -- and here's the P-T curve for hydrate formation, which seems to indicate that you can keep gas in the pipe indefinitely with no issues so long as you don't ramp up to higher pressures. Which I'm not sure why you would do if you were forbidden from pumping gas at the time.

A lot of theories around this war seem to require every Russian to be a moron -- which is almost certainly wrong, and in any case a canonical example of underestimating your enemy.

Per my other comment, I'd expect the pipes on the seafloor to be at >10,000 kPa at <5C, sufficient for hydrate formation.

How could poor maintenance destroy two separate pipelines nearly simultaneously, while producing shockwaves that everyone agrees look like they come from high explosives? And why would they blow up right next to the Swedish and Danish undersea border, if not to complicate an investigation by blurring jurisdiction?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Nord_Stream_pipeline_sabotage#/media/File:Nord_Stream_gas_leaks_2022.svg

This has to be sabotage. And since it is sabotage, the most obvious conclusion is that it's anti-Russian sabotage. It's a Russian pipeline, something that Russia paid for, something that Russia hoped to use to lessen trans-Atlantic unity and bring Germany closer to them. It's absence means higher profits for American energy exports, higher reliance of Europe on America, stronger influence of Ukraine and Baltics on Russia-Europe energy exports and poorer Euro-Russian relations.

The US has the world's most powerful navy, a navy with a considerable presence in the Baltic. The US leads NATO and has enormous global influence. The investigation is being conducted by a NATO country and a NATO hopeful, excluding Russia, the aggrieved party. Surely the most likely conclusion is that it's a NATO operation, probably formulated and executed by the US! People have raised the idea of Russia playing 4D chess to demonstrate that they were committed to cutting ties with Europe, that it was a false-flag operation to worsen NATO unity...

But this is a pretty contrived argument. If the Norway-Poland gas pipeline that recently opened blew up, would they say it was clearly a NATO sabotage attack? No, the party that would gain in that scenario is obviously Russia and so Russia would be the primary suspect.

How could poor maintenance destroy two separate pipelines nearly simultaneously

Pretty easily actually. Especially if the issue was "helped along" by somebody working for NordStream. The pipes were pressurized but product hadn't been flowing for months which means plenty of time for water to seep in and start forming methane hydrate. IE the liquid natural gas turns into a solid. You let that go on long enough and it becomes rather hard not blow to the pipe up entirely by accident. The Water hammer effect is bad enough when dealing with a fluid that is relatively inert, never mind one that's actually volatile.

The pipes were pressurized but product hadn't been flowing for months which means plenty of time for water to seep in and start forming methane hydrate. IE the liquid natural gas turns into a solid.

Water at 210 ft of pressure does not and will not ever "seep in" to a pipeline at 105 bar / 3500 ft pressure. Any water in NS1/NS2 was what couldn't be taken out at the point of injection / compression.

That says "water hammer", not "natural gas hammer". It has nothing to do with "volatility" and everything to do with incompressibility which gasses lack. The increase in pressure caused by instantaneously stopping the average flow of the pipeline is well under one percent.

The term "natural gas" as it's used in this context is just another name for methane and is not indicative of phase state. Despite the name, the fluid that flows through a natural gas pipeline is a liquid not a gas, and as a liquid is incompressible (or more accurately comes pre-compressed) wich is why the formation of methane hydrate and other condensates on the interior walls of the pipeline are something that has to be actively monitored and guarded against.

Occams razor holds that the theory requiring the fewest assumptions/steps is the most likely. Accordingly, which of these scenarios sounds more plausible given what we know? Some whacky Tom Clancy-esque scheme involving hundreds of people across half a dozen countries was executed successfully and in complete secrecy outside Hersh's unnamed source? or Russian industrial safety standards being a bit shit?

Butane and propane liquify just fine at room temperature, but methane does not. Methane has to be below -80C in order to form a liquid, and therefore cannot be transported through a pipeline as a liquid. Liquids can end up in the pipelines anyway, but that is not the same thing and requires an additional detail to be specified -- something that cuts against your Occam's razor argument.

Whether you think it's a priory super unlikely that a military would ever attempt a clandestine operation and only kinda get caught is really beside my point.

Butane and propane liquify just fine at room temperature, but methane does not.

You're neglecting pressure, critical pressure for Methane is around 50 bar as I recall which means it will be either be a liquid or a super critical fluid depending on where exactly we are at on phase chart.

No HylnaCG, I am not. It boggles my mind that you'd double down with such confident counter assertions without checking if you understand what is being said or whether you have your facts straight. Google "critical temperature" and "critical temperature methane", then reread my comment. Then maybe google "supercritical fluid compressibility".

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Despite the name, the fluid that flows through a natural gas pipeline is a liquid not a gas, and as a liquid is incompressible (or more accurately comes pre-compressed)

No, any methane in a normal natural gas pipeline is not liquid and will never be a liquid. The critical temperature of methane is -82 C and actual liquid natural gas as made is much colder. It takes special built terminals and a ton of refrigeration and a ton of very expensive insulation. Any methane in a transmission pipeline is either gas or supercritical

Some whacky Tom Clancy-esque scheme involving hundreds of people across half a dozen countries was executed successfully and in complete secrecy outside Hersh's unnamed source? or Russian industrial safety standards being a bit shit?

Iran-Contra? Manhattan Project? US bombing Cambodia? I mean I generally agree with you that complicated conspiracies' are hard to keep secret. But at least you have to admit that maybe your perception is flawed as you have no idea what the success rate is by definition, as they remain a secret and you only hear about the ones that are revealed.

No, any methane in a normal natural gas pipeline is not liquid and will never be a liquid. The critical temperature of methane is -82 C and actual liquid natural gas as made is much colder. It takes special built terminals and a ton of refrigeration and a ton of very expensive insulation. Any methane in a transmission pipeline is either gas or supercritical

Supercritical in this case -- the series of engineering case studies of NS 1 linked by @sansampersamp above are frikkin fascinating:

Transportation of Natural Gas in Dense Phase – Nord Stream 1

Part 2: Nord Stream Pipelines – Multiple Parallel Paths to Success or Failure?

Nord Stream Long Distance Gas Pipeline – Part 3 Application of Basic and AGA equations for estimating maximum gas flow in a long‐distance pipeline

It's quite a thing actually -- they are (were) pumping the gas with no booster stations, compressing it to 3190 psi (using a mere half-million horsepower) and having it arrive in Germany still at 1500 psi, enough to distribute it a little ways from the pipeline terminus.

AIUI hydrates are less likely to form in dense phase natural gas, which is one of the advantages of this kind of pipeline -- is that right?

AIUI hydrates are less likely to form in dense phase natural gas, which is one of the advantages of this kind of pipeline -- is that right?

No, that would seem to be a disadvantage of a high pressure pipeline based on the methane hydrate phase diagram you linked, looking at the chart as pressure goes up so does methane hydrate formation.

Supercritical methane: above -82 C and 46 bar

NS1/2 Operating from your first link: 2 to 6 C and 220 to 106 bar

Methane hydrate from the phase diagram you linked elsewhere in the thread: NS1/2 is pretty much exclusively operating in the methane hydrate range, at 2 - 6 C it looks like you need to be under maybe 20 bar to be out of the methane hydrate zone.

So if NS 1 has been operating in the methane hydrate zone for 20+ years why has it not had any issues until now? Well if no water is in the gas stream then no methane hydrate can form. And going off of steam tables and partial pressures at the injection state of 220 bar and 6 C the water content is 43 ppm, which does not leave much water at all for methane hydrate formation. Even less if they stuck the gas stream through a final dehydration step.

Given the above I really question the methane hydrate theory, especially in NS2. I could see at least being possible over time in NS1 as a build up they ignored. But still very doubtful, you'd have to assume that the Russians and Germans both ignored it. For NS2 which hasn't ever been sending gas through, any methane hydrate would be forming out of at most 43 ppm of water that was originally in the pipe when pressurized. Which is a very small amount of methane hydrate.

Above is also assuming that the Russians were not adding any kind of methane hydrate inhibitor to their gas. Or doing any further dehydration after compressing and cooling. Either way the gas is very dry to begin with, so there is not much water to form into methane hydrate, so there won't be much methane hydrate.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b4/Methane_Hydrate_phase_diagram.jpg

https://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/methane-d_1420.html

https://www.thermopedia.com/content/1150/

Whats the argument multiple pipes blew up at the same time from this? The occams razor bit would seem to fail when three pipes are blowing up at the same time and the same place.

Also the people keeping it secret are guys who specifically trained to keep it secret and no doubt relish getting security clearances.

They didn't blow up at the same time though, see my original comment.

Likewise, when you're actually in that sort of the the first thing you learn is that every "jump" a secret has to make is an opportunity for it to be exposed, the more people who know, the more organizations in the loop the less of a secret it becomes, which is exactly my prior on a scheme involving hundreds of people across half a dozen different countries being executed successfully without being immediately exposed is pretty close to zero.

I thought they blew up quicker and not 18 hrs. Still weird three same day from real issues.

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Look up the compressibility of methane hydrate.

According to the article, the bombs were planted during BALTOPS 22 in June, while the explosions were on Sep 26.

For a story based on a single source, it's weirdly detailed - technical aspects of the bomb, with informative anecdotes about the White House, Navy, the Norwegian Secret Service and Navy, CIA, State Department, NSA, Air Force ... for such a secret operation, all known to one person?

Hersh is a well-known investigative journalist, "exposing the My Lai Massacre and its cover-up during the Vietnam War, for which he received the 1970 Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting", "covered the Watergate scandal for The New York Times and revealed the clandestine bombing of Cambodia". But more recently "Hersh has accused the Obama administration of lying about the events surrounding the death of Osama bin Laden and disputed the claim that the Assad regime used chemical weapons on civilians in the Syrian Civil War", and "U.S. Defense Department spokesman Bryan G. Whitman said, "This reporter has a solid and well-earned reputation for making dramatic assertions based on thinly sourced, unverifiable anonymous sources." ... Slate magazine's James Kirchick wrote, "Readers are expected to believe that the story of the Bin Laden assassination is a giant ‘fairy tale’ on the word of a single, unnamed source... Hersh's problem is that he evinces no skepticism whatsoever toward what his crank sources tell him, which is ironic considering how cynical he is regarding the pronouncements of the U.S. national security bureaucracy."[26][76]". The wiki article has detail on many questionable claims.

Maybe if he'd managed to confirm parts of the source's story, but eh. The piece could've anticipated objections like 'one anonymous source with no other evidence', or more generally tried to convince instead of just providing novel-style narrative, but didn't. There's plenty of information in the article not from the source, but removed from the narrative it's just 'regular military exercises', 'military bases existing', 'media is unsure why explosions happened'. It's not implausible the US blew it up IMO, but this isn't convincing.

But more recently "Hersh has accused the Obama administration of lying about the events surrounding the death of Osama bin Laden and disputed the claim that the Assad regime used chemical weapons on civilians in the Syrian Civil War"

Is the intended message that both of those are so obviously false that it's not even necessary to say out loud that you believe them to be, let alone to argue for it?

U.S. Defense Department spokesman Bryan G. Whitman said

I don't think much information is added by quoting a spokesman for $organisation saying that someone who accused $organisation of malfeasance is wrong.

Of course, the question is (especially considering the Slate quote) what sort of secondary source would in fact be informative regarding his trustworthiness, or more generally how to evaluate claims that amount to "the sources you currently use to evaluate claims are untrustworthy". Trusting a particular set of sources shouldn't be an epistemic black hole.

Is the intended message that both of those are so obviously false that it's not even necessary to say out loud that you believe them to be, let alone to argue for it?

I don't really know what he said about Assad but his claims about Bin Laden were pretty out-there as I recall. Things like the raid on Abbottabad being completely staged, and how the Bush administration had actually known where Bin Laden was since 2006 but instead of going after him, they had instead paid the Pakistani government to apprehend him on their behalf.

Is the intended message that both of those are so obviously false that it's not even necessary to say out loud that you believe them to be, let alone to argue for it?

Seriously -- I'd put ~90% odds that the public story on the death of OBL was significantly manipulated from true events, and "USA uses misinformation about chemical weapons as a casus bellum" is... not exactly unprecedented.

I don't know enough about what Hersh said on either of these cases to form an opinion as to the accuracy of his reporting, but this argument sounds too much like "fall in line, peons" for it to erode his credibility on the NS issue.

The vox article linked below points out many specific holes in Hersh's OBL claims, which hold even if you significantly doubt the public story.

The intended message is that he has a recent history of making controversial claims based on single sources that haven't been confirmed since, and has a reputation of unreliability.

After making that comment, I read more about him - this article pretty convincingly makes the case he's unreliable.

My prior was that the United States was more likely to be behind it than any other nation due to their motive and capacity. I haven't really heard any version of the story where it would have made more sense for someone else to do it.

While it sounds rather conspiratorial, i don't see any other major power that would have the incentive to blow it up other than the united states. Russia is not going to damage their own infrastructure that gives them leverage in Europe, and no mainland European power would damage such a vital piece in their economic structures. While there is no real legitimate proof, the United States is the only real player that can benefit from it. They damage Russia's soft power in Europe while also forcing the European countries effected to rely more on the United States resources than before. It's a win-win. I don't see any other alternative.

What's conspiratorial about it? They have been opposed for more than ten years, they have implemented sanctions on it and threatened to stop by any means. And afterwards claimed it's a great opportunity, and boasted that they are glad that it's "a hunk of metal at the bottom of the sea".

Who says it had to be a "major power" Poland arguably had both motive and means as did Lithuania and a few others.

The US blowing up Nordstream has always struck me as an extraordinarily risky gambit. There may be an economic motive, but if it were uncovered that the US is directly responsible for acts of terrorism on critical infrastructure in the heart of Europe, the diplomatic fallout would certainly outweigh whatever the US would make from the added natural gas exports.

Granted, I don't know how risk-tolerant the US covert-operations apparatus is. I also didn't think Putin would invade Ukraine.

There may be an economic motive

It's not mainly economic, it's geopolitical. USA cannot allow Europe to get cozy with Russia, it undermines their worldwide vision of a strong united West.

If USA thought they would get caught they probably wouldn't have done it.

Eh, I always thought the argument that the US wouldn't do it because the negative political consequences if it came out would be too great was unfounded. The US has a long history of engaging in actions that, viewed in isolation, seem at least as outrageous, but tribalism, FUD and superior opinion engineering reliably result in them being forgotten quickly and even the mention of those where the evidence of US culpability is unequivocal evoking gut feelings of conspiracy theories and unhinged contrarianism. In the context of MH17 (the plane downed by Russian-backed separatists in Ukraine), people would sooner bring up Korean Air 007 (Soviets in the '80s) than that the US did the same thing to an Iranian passenger plane in 1991 in a war they weren't even a party to. More egregiously, during the Cold War, the US organised false flag bombings with actual human victims in Italy, which surely is worse than blowing up a pipeline that nobody would even admit to quite endorsing anymore; but there, the pressure from amenable news outlets and historians over the decades has actually managed to shift the narrative so far away from this that flagship articles of English Wikipedia frame it as an unfounded conspiracy theory and its proponents are widely viewed as cranks. (Other versions and less-popular articles on English Wikipedia, such as the one I linked, still seem to endorse US involvement.)

In an August 2000 interview with Il Secolo XIX newspaper Taviani said that he did not believe the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was involved in organising the Milan bomb. However he alleged "It seems to me certain, however, that agents of the CIA were among those who supplied the materials and who muddied the waters of the investigation."

Could be whitewashed, but even in that article, US involvement seems pretty thin. There's a large difference between supporting a foreign far right group that carries out a bombing and carrying out a bombing on foreign soil yourself. This would be as if there were some links between the CIA and the german eco-terrorist group that blew up the pipeline.

I think that allegations of supplying the material go beyond "some links". In another case, they posit that the attack was committed with C4 explosives from a NATO stay-behind army stash. The Italian Wikipedia article on the perpetrator has some additional information and statements where he heavily implicated US forces after being taken into custody, but then that particular act of opposition is also consistent with his declared political position and so one may or may not choose to trust it.

A lot of the German-language sources unfortunately rest on Daniele Ganser, a Swiss historian (disgraced) who unfortunately also seems to have fallen into the pit where constantly being at odds with establishment truth-finding processes results in your own epistomology being damaged. (His remaining social credit with the Germanic sphere seems to be draining rapidly as he took an anti-US position on Ukraine.) His main book on the topic, in my estimation, indeed does lean rather far out of the window in making inferences at times, and the immediate backlash has some merit, but then it also seems comically unsurprising that it would come from a Dane (this old anecdote is completely in line with my impression from every interaction with them).

In general, I think that the beauty of US psyops is precisely that they are so well-supported by an interlocking network of straight up competent fieldwork, patronage networks in narrative-making institutions and the soft talk and big stick needed to provide hard diplomatic cover when needed that you can't oppose them in the long run without either going crazy, disappearing or being exposed as the crook you coincidentally always were and sent to rot in prison to universal cheers.

In another case, they posit that the attack was committed with C4 explosives from a NATO stay-behind army stash.

But that is what I mean, if that is the extent, it amounts to not guilty. Bombs do not kill people, at least not with mens rea.

US forces involvement is another ballgame.

In general, I think that the beauty of US psyops is precisely that they are so well-supported by an interlocking network of straight up competent fieldwork patronage networks in narrative-making institutions and the soft talk and big stick needed to provide hard diplomatic cover when needed

This wouldn't fit with the straightforward story that biden ordered some marines to do it after hinting that he would. Find some tree-huggers to blow it up, sell that story and use the combine to erase any incriminating links.

Couldn't they be confident that it wasn't discovered? They have considerable energy leverage over Europe now, they've got considerable media influence, there's strong anti-Russia feeling all over the place.

Besides, the US is not known for its cautious 'light touch' foreign policy. Invading Iraq and Afghanistan was an extraordinarily risky gambit! Sending special forces surreptitiously into Pakistan, a nuclear power, to have gunfights on their soil is a risky gambit. They invade countries all the time: Panama, Grenada, Syria... They've financed terrorism in Europe before via Operation Gladio. They launch various attacks on Iran, created a massive nuclear crisis over a nothingburger when the Soviets decided to base missiles in Cuba.

I was right with you until you framed nukes off the coast of the US as a nothing burger. The fact that we did it too doesn't change that.

The rest is pretty spot on though

created a massive nuclear crisis over a nothingburger when the Soviets decided to base missiles in Cuba

What an amazing reframing of the Cuban missile crisis.

It's not a reframing, it's the correct framing. The US decided to base missiles in Turkey and the Russians didn't throw a massive tantrum about it, they behaved quite reasonably. They felt threatened but they didn't try to blockade the country, botch an attempt to invade the country or threaten to invade it again, or give ultimatums. This is a mature and statesmanlike approach to a potential nuclear crisis.

Kennedy gets far too much credit, he chose to invent a crisis over something that was easily ignorable. At least he cooled the Joint Chiefs of Staff who wanted to start bombing and invade immediately.

Terrorism seems too strong. This is more like an act of war. But since it’s a proxy war it was done secretly. There wasn’t an attempt to scare people but instead hitting a legitimate military target.

My main complaint if this report is true is congress should not have been worked around. Yes you increase leak risks but as an act of war the people on the appropriate committees should have been informed.

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