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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   29311 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)

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.

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"?

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