why does it looks like it was coordinated by the Ukrainian military, and hypothetically, would would Ukraine win by weakening gas supply to western Europe?
These are the right questions to ask and given that a successful attack on EU infrastructure that got traced back to Ukraine would be an extremely risky thing to do for Ukraine I have my doubts about the likelihood of that scenario. It's within the realm of the possible but of course there are also false flag operations. I wonder if we'll ever know with certainty who did this short of someone spilling inside info, and I also wonder whether any of the participants in that raid are still alive.
As for what Ukraine would win: hypothetically: they could cause Germany to stop relying on Russian gas a bit quicker. But there are other parties that stood a lot more to gain from this and 'qui bono' is an even better question, especially in the context of a false flag. The fact that the trail that was uncovered was a mile wide is in itself quite suspicious.
It's not an unreasonable idea; the other major routes for Russian gas imports transit through Ukraine and Belarus (https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Map-of-oil-and-gas-pipel...). Nordstream was the only major one not within reasonable reach of Ukraine's normal armed forces. For obvious reasons, Ukraine doesn't want Europe paying Russia billions for natural gas right now.
I'm dubious that the risk to European support is worth it for Ukraine; they're hardly the only ones with means, motive, and opportunity.
And yet, the pipelines on Ukrainian soil remain unmolested. It's entirely possible though that there is a schism in the Ukrainian power structure that would insulate the politicians from over-eager military people.
It's very far away from anything that you could call proof. Read carefully: besides the title the whole article is full of disclaimers. Already on line two "say people familiar with planning" -> but not who those people are.
Anonymity, 'people familiar with his role', that bit is repeated over and over.
I'll reserve my skepticism until there is hard proof and even then: if it turns out that this was a rogue action how much weight should be attached to it? Does that rule out some invisible paymaster?
Ukraine top government officials have denied involvement and knowledge of involvement and that's where it stands for now. The article would have been improved if it had said 'Allegedly' in the title, which given the thin sourcing is not a minor oversight.
It's a huge mess and with Putin, the US and the Ukraine all in play there are a whole slew of possible scenarios. Nothing short of a massive investigative effort will clear this up.
Bright democratic countries are not interested in the investigation. The resolution failed to pass because it only received three votes in favor (Russia, China, and Brazil) and 12 abstentions.
I think the general consensus is that they don't want this to become a distraction. Regardless of who did it it's a footnote and it doesn't change the fact that Russia started a war next door to the EU on a flimsy pretext and that's the thing that matters.
I kinda both agree and disagree with you. I agree that it won't change much in the grand scheme of things, but at the same time I disagree on the footnote part. If blowing up a natural gas pipeline is just a footnote, then it means the responsible parties can do all sorts of attacks and then later simply say: "well, it's just a distraction, let's forget about it and move on".
Compared to attacking a nuclear plant and blowing up a dam I think it's a footnote. War is ultimately destructive and any kind of infrastructure connected to the belligerents is at risk.
Here's a funny weird little fact. The IAEA inspectors and even Mr. Grossi himself have been documenting and even 'hearing' shelling 'on a regular basis' while present on the ZNPP premises. But they've never attributed the shelling to either of the parties, not once. [1]
Isn't that unusual given how quick all the officials and media are to blame just one side of the conflict (we know which one) for everything, with or without evidence?
> ... it should be clear that "just asking questions" only applies when the answers are already well known, where the question embodies a point refuted a thousand times, and where the questioner exhibits willful ignorance. If, for example, someone phrased their political argument as a series of questions — but provided sources to back up said questions, or has raised logical arguments in said questions — then it is not enough to dismiss the argument as "just asking questions".
So, the IAEA and Grossi either can't establish where the shells are fired from (hard to believe given the prolonged and intensive nature of the shelling and the amount of evidence) or are hesitant / not allowed to incriminate the party they believe is responsible.
If we apply the same logic of no A : no B, then "Russian invasion" would be the B in some other equation, e.g., no A : no Russian invasion. What would that A be?
You sound fairly confident in all of your responses, but as soon as the question leads to anything less convenient, you bail. I encourage you to spend less time watching/reading the mass media news.
NATO never would have accepted Ukraine but now that Russia has invaded Ukraine if the Russians get kicked out it might just happen. See also: Finland, Sweden.
Note that since you claim you are Dutch: it's amazing that given your access to news sources that you should be carrying water for a party that does not exactly have your best interests at heart, and I'm saying that as someone who has lived in a country under Russian occupation.
> Isn't that unusual given how quick all the officials and media are to blame just one side of the conflict (we know which one) for everything, with or without evidence?
Does it really matter who's doing the shelling? The shelling is fundamentally happening because Russia invaded Ukraine in a war of aggression.
(The IAEA is likely not all that equipped to determine the source of artillery fire. That's not really their thing.)
> The safety and security officials will allow the agency to possibly perform a forensic evaluation of shelling that has occurred at the plant, Bloomberg reported. This evaluation could be used to hold attackers of the plant responsible for the damage it has received. [1]
It's unclear what happened to the planned 'forensic evaluation', but somehow there was no further interest in holding attackers responsible.
> Does it really matter who's doing the shelling?
Sure it does. The entire good guys vs bad guys narrative falls apart when your, cough, ally is the one attempting "nuclear blackmail" against you. I for one don't want to help things escalate to the "together into the abyss" stage [2], not for any reason, least of all because someone's intergenerational vendetta went off the rails.
> The entire good guys vs bad guys narrative falls apart
It really doesn't. There'd be precisely zero shelling near the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant if Russia hadn't invaded anyone. They clearly bear the lion's weight of responsibility here, and they additionally have a vested interest in using the plant as cover for their forces.
The IAEA isn't going to rock the boat, as criminal responsiblity isn't their mission; keeping the plant safe is. Getting thrown out by the Russians won't help that mission any; any criticisms are going to be... cautious.
(Like the ones in https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/pressreleases/update-192-iae... "The IAEA experts also need access to all six turbine halls together. However, they were only granted partial access to the turbine hall of reactor unit 2 on 27 October, after earlier the same month receiving similarly restrictive access to the turbine halls of units 1 and 4.")
And again moving the moral goalposts. One minute it's an existential struggle between good and evil, the next minute it's "well, it's a gray area, you actually are allowed to shell nuclear power plants, everything that's gonna happen is on your enemy anyway, and as a bonus we'll keep our mouth shut about any inconvenient evidence, mkay?". Seems more like one sports team versus another one looking to bend the rules a little.
That's my problem. One can't have their moral cake and eat it too.
"But overthrowing the democratically elected governments, meddling with politics and financing gallant people is fine, because it's not our boots on the ground who dies there"
> Does it really matter who's doing the shelling? The shelling is fundamentally happening because Russia invaded Ukraine in a war of aggression.
Well, I guess nothing really matters because "Russia invaded Ukraine in a war of aggression"? I encourage we go with Five whys [1] to dive deeper into the why of them doing it. Maybe we'll find something new. Justifying everything with "they invaded first" is, apologize, fucking stupid.
Why? Because there are troops fighting there. Why? Because Russia invaded Ukraine. Why? Because Russia wanted to weaken NATO. Why? Because Russia isn't managing to compete for a sphere of influence on merits. Why? Because Russia has long lost trust as it attempts to expand its sphere of influence via force in other places like Georgia.
The problem here is that the main suspect has control over both WaPo and those who hold the guy in jail. Oh, and over the countries that carry out the investigations too. Essentially, you're asked to disregard the motive, the capabilities, the unambiguous public statements made by the most likely suspect and accept their fall guy explanation. That's a bit too much disbelief to suspend.
Nord Stream 2 was ended long before it blew up. February 2022 saw it decertified; March 2022 saw its employees fired and the company filing for bankruptcy. Sanctions and diplomatic pressure successfully prevented it from "moving forward" and "brought an end" to the pipeline's existence as a going concern.
Nord Stream 2 was pressurized ready to deliver cheap gas (which German industry desperately needs) with one flip of a switch. That presented a risk to the United States, who didn't want them to be tempted.
>If you believe "bring an end to it" can only encompass explosive options
Absolutely not but when an end to it is brought explosively and one party has threatened to do just that and has the most motive:
* German energy intensive industries is being lured over to America with promises of cheap energy.
* Germany is now paying a lot more TO America for its expensive LNG (something it has publicly wanted for a while).
* The US has been wanting to pull Germany out of Russia's economic orbit for a long while now.
Then the most plausible story is the one broken by the same guy who broke my lai: Biden not only threatened to do it, he did it.
> Nord Stream 2 was pressurized ready to deliver cheap gas (which German industry desperately needs) with one flip of a switch. That presented a risk to the United States, who didn't want them to be tempted.
That's a potential motive, yes. "Make it look like US/NATO/Ukraine did it to sow discord" is also a plausible potential motive. (It has also been speculated that the destruction of the pipeline gets Gazprom out of some delivery contracts via force majeure.)
> Absolutely not but when an end to it is brought explosively and one party has threatened to do just that and has the most motive:
When was an explosive resolution specifically threatened? Biden was even asked in said press conference how it'd be accomplished and declined to be specific.
>That's a potential motive, yes. "Make it look like US/NATO/Ukraine did it to sow discord" is also a plausible potential motive.
It's surface level plausible, as was the theory that 9/11 was an inside job because it gave the US an excuse to attack Iraq.
Russia was trying to reel Germany in with cheap gas as the bait. The whole point of natural gas to putin was to use as leverage. Blowing up their own bait and their leverage (which cost 11 billion dollars to build) doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
>When was an explosive resolution specifically threatened?
Well if you put it like that I'm pretty sure he didn't mention the precise date, the type of explosives used or the name of the diver that placed the explosives either, so maybe you're right and Putin set the explosives himself.
>Speaking at a joint news conference with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Biden said, "If Russia invades... again, then there will be longer Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it."
>When asked how he would do that, he responded, "I promise you we will be able to do it."
He couldn't have been much plainer. The only thing that was required after pressuring the Germans to stop taking the gas was to ensure that they weren't tempted to turn the taps back on again when their economy started to scream: https://apnews.com/article/german-economy-growth-recession-2...
Yes, that's the point. You say "one party has threatened to do just that", but it's demonstrably untrue. Again, Nord Stream 2 was "ended" as a going concern well before the explosives showed up.
edit: Parent post was extensively edited after this; above was a response to the "Well if you put it like that I'm pretty sure" bit.
> When asked how he would do that, he responded, "I promise you we will be able to do it." He couldn't have been much plainer.
"I promise you we will be able to do it via sanctions and diplomacy" is an entirely comprehensible statement.
> Russia was trying to reel Germany in with cheap gas as the bait. The whole point of natural gas to putin was to use as leverage. Blowing up their own bait and their leverage (which cost 11 billion dollars to build) doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
It does if you a) acknowledge internally said pipeline's likely to be shutdown a decade or more and b) if you think it potentially does $billions in damage to Ukraine aid if it sows dissension amongst the allies.
>"I promise you we will be able to do it via sanctions and diplomacy" is an entirely comprehensible statement.
9/11 is an inside job is also a comprehensible threat. It doesnt mean it's realistic.
The US can and did regularly make specific sanctions threats. This wasn't a sanctions threat it was a deliberately and overtly vague threat that he did not clarify even when clarification was demanded of him.
There was no reason for Biden not to make specific sanctions threats while there is every reason for Biden to vaguely and covertly threaten an act of war.
When the US makes a "nice pipeline you've got there be a shame if something happened to it" statement then hanlon's razor says that they're probably making a "nice pipeline you've got there would be a shame if something happened to it".
When Putin makes this type of vague threat and a violent event results, his loyal supporters react much as you just did. This type of mentality is as common among loyal supporters of the Russian state as it is, I suppose, for similar reasons, among loyal supporters of the American state.
> Through 2015 and early 2016, domestic and international pressure (including from the IMF, the EU, and the EBRD) built for Shokin to be removed from office. The Obama administration withheld $1 billion in loan guarantees to pressure the Ukrainian government to remove Shokin from office.
It's great when corruption and influence peddling can happen out in the open. When it can become the official policy. Right?
> "The truth is that I was forced out because I was leading a wide-ranging corruption probe into Burisma Holdings, a natural gas firm active in Ukraine and Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, was a member of the Board of Directors." Shokin continued, stating that, "On several occasions President Poroshenko asked me to have a look at the criminal case against Burisma and consider the possibility of winding down the investigative actions in respect of this company, but I refused to close this investigation."
Nothing fishy about any of this. Good, honest public servants doing their job.
The point is that the EU, IMF, US, and Ukraine itself appears to have wanted Shokin gone; he raided anti-corruption groups on pretenses; his prosecutors were demonstrably corrupt; public protests against him occurred, and Ukraine's parliament voted to get rid of him.
In opposition to all those facts, we have... Shokin himself being grumpy over being fired.
Just curious, how do you rationalize Hunter's employment at Burisma? Was it his business acumen or maybe background in natural gas? Or something else altogether?
The same mildly sleazy stuff that tends to happen with politicians' children; companies hoping to garner favor. Same reason Jenna Bush and Meghan McCain wind up working for big media conglomerates. Hunter Biden's hardly unique in this regard.
What's in question is whether it works, which I suspect varies from politician to politician. The assertions of Joe Biden having acted based on Hunter's desires, thus far, don't seem compelling.
A cushy job at a domestic propaganda outlet is a bit different from selling access to a top US official to foreign oligarchs. That's if you believe that it was strictly about 10% for the Big Guy and didn't involve undue political influence in the other direction, which is more than plausible judging by the level of political mobilization against the prosecutor guy.
It may simply have been that people thought that it would give them access. Or did you really think that Trump's children have incredible insight into world politics, the Palestinian question or immigration?
This is funny. Did you assume I was rooting for Trump because of my comments about the Bidens? Sorry, I don't have a dog in this race. In my book if something looks like corruption it is likely corruption, regardless of which side of the uniparty one's dad is on.
You could have made that exact argument wherever Hunter Biden would turn up. It's a cheap shot at best and given that the 'rabid right' can't let go of it it's getting more than a bit annoying. Focus on the stuff that matters, Hunter Biden isn't it.
As always, I'm going to assume it was done by the US until proven otherwise. Given their past underhanded treatment of allies, presumption of innocence is not something they deserve.
In this case they were also one of the countries most strongly lobbying against the pipeline. I don't think it should exist either, so even though I "blame" the US for having blown it up, I think it's a good thing it happened.
A democratic or diplomatic solution would have been nicer. So... thanks but not thanks?
I can easily believe any of the US, Russia, and Ukraine did it.
The US because I agree with you about their history of playing such games; Russia because they are currently doing stupid things and blaming everyone else for it; and Ukraine because (while it would be really risky if they were found out) it has an obvious direct benefit of making it much harder for anyone in the EU to spend money on Russian gas even if they wanted to.
There could be others, but I'm not sure who. China doesn't seem likely to be interested to me, but I could be wrong. North Korea seems like a chaos gremlin, but I don't think they have the capability.
But the others all have motive means and opportunity to varying degrees. The one thing that is still most underdeveloped is how hard it really is to perform a feat like this.
Note that the original cast of Greenpeace might not have been all against doing something like that. They started out as what today would be called eco-terrorists, and they had some pretty amazing capabilities for a group that small. Beware of intelligent and dedicated people. Their roots are in anti-war and anti-nuclear groups and over time their goals broadened. Today's Greenpeace is a gentle marketing club in comparison with how it all started.
A turning point was the bombing of the Rainbow Warrior, after that the nature of the organization changed considerably.
Ironically, it served as a wake-up call that something like Greenpeace is very much needed and was probably one of the biggest reasons people changed from 'neutral' to 'pro environment'. The French did not exactly do themselves a service with that action.
By making this comment you want to shift blame away from Russia towards Ukraine, implying that Ukraine is somehow responsible for the uptick of hostile actions against EU and not Russia.
Or in other words: you're being a useful idiot for Russia.
Really, we are all so far removed from the geopolitical reality, who can say what is the truth of the matter? Please share your info/reasoning, if you think you have a special reason for thinking you have a better handle on it than others.
In fact, this is really a general comment, that I direct at anyone who purports to know this or that.
I was correct in pointing out that it looks like Ukraine may have coordinated the attack, as substantiated by the WaPo article. I also believe that WaPo may be making Ukraine look like they've coordinated the attack in order to keep blame away from any US involvement. The most unlikely guilty party would of course be Russia, who has the most to lose in Nord Stream's sabotage.
No, you are not correct. You are pointing out that there is a vaguely sourced article that makes such claims, not that it looks like that is the case.
> I also believe that WaPo may be making Ukraine look like they've coordinated the attack in order to keep blame away from any US involvement.
No, that's not what the WaPo is doing.
> The most unlikely guilty party would of course be Russia, who has the most to lose in Nord Stream's sabotage.
This is factually incorrect for a number of reasons, a big part of which is that Russia has more to gain from dividing the EU than from losing Nord Stream.
I like how I use sources when stating things but you just state things are factually incorrect without any references. How about you try backing up your statements else you're just spreading disinformation.
Perhaps, if the information is not something you have verified it could be false. Governments and media do lie. If that is the case here, by providing sources, it is you spreading misinformation. The other person is merely giving am opinion.
Myself, I am trying to establish the truth of the matter - I don't accept so-called authoritative sources when they are proven liars. The only way I know of to satisfy myself off the truth is to verify it personally. Involving myself in these narratives, is like acting upon (convincing) hearsay or gossip. It's simply not part of my life.
I won't call for harm to people I do not know on account of a story that could be a lie.
That’s fair and I think you’re wise to only try to verify information yourself, but atleast by providing sources I am giving you more information you can digest to make your assessment. More information is better than less information even if its bad information (since as you say, you’re assessing the quality of the source anyway). So I think it’s still fair to say that it’s better to provide possible sources or support for a statement than not.
By making this comment you want to shift blame away from Ukraine towards Russia, implying that Russia is somehow responsible for the uptick of hostile actions against EU and not Ukraine.
Or in other words: you're being a useful idiot for Ukraine.
To try to make both sides as equal, as if both are lying to the same extent and there's the same amount of evidence for either side and that we cannot know anything.
I say that comments like these are useful idiots for Russia because they're echoing the Russian propaganda and talking points.
Am I echoing "EU propaganda"? (Which is really the whole western world, not just EU.)
Is trying to take a nuanced view really a common talking point? I mean, hopefully it is, but to suggest that saying "both are lying to the same extent" is Russian propaganda seems poisonous to me. Like how can we actually have a conversation if you just dismiss a priori other perspectives? Almost certainly both sides are lying to some extent, whether to the same extent who knows but certainly up for discussion and debate.
Not willing to entertain the idea that yes Ukraine is lying and engaging in propaganda too (just like the Russians), I'd say that yes you are echoing western propaganda; though it may not be conscious, hence the word echo.
You suggest saying this quote was like echoing Russian propaganda:
"To try to make both sides as equal, as if both are lying to the same extent and there's the same amount of evidence for either side and that we cannot know anything."
I said that's a poisonous perspective to anyone who actually values reasonable discussion and trying to ascertain the truth, because you're effectively saying only your side (ukraine) is right and suggesting anything else is russian propaganda. So again that's why I think your perspective is poisonous.
> You suggest saying this quote was like echoing Russian propaganda:
"To try to make both sides as equal, as if both are lying to the same extent and there's the same amount of evidence for either side and that we cannot know anything."
I'm not suggesting it.
> I said that's a poisonous perspective to anyone who actually values reasonable discussion and trying to ascertain the truth, because you're effectively saying only your side (ukraine) is right and suggesting anything else is russian propaganda. So again that's why I think your perspective is poisonous.
You are not going to get much traction with this nonsense, there is no 'my side' or anything else but thank you for confirming what 'your side' is.
> I mean, hopefully it is, but to suggest that saying "both are lying to the same extent" is Russian propaganda seems poisonous to me.
This is a fine starting point, but only if you ignore the mountains if evidence where Russia has consistently lied about everything from Ukraine being Nazis to who set up the torture chambers on liberated land, while racking up thousands of war crimes.
Implying that both sides lies to the same extent is just stupid wrong, and is exactly the narrative that Russia wants to promote.
Of course everyone uses propaganda, but there's an incredibly large difference between what the free world can get away with and what the totalitarian Russian government csn and will do.
It seems there is a pattern here. They attacked Danish power plants using hosts in Ukraine and Poland, and then started to attack the USA and Hong Kong from Denmark. It looks like a silly provocation as these DDoS attacks didn't seem very effective.
What is really worrying is the SolarWinds attack - it allowed Russians to plant deep roots in many big orgs around the world and it might take years to uproot them all.
> We have seen the far-reaching disruptive impact a serious supply-chain compromise can have through the SolarWinds intrusions, conducted by the Russian SVR.
Right. But you do realise, if there is political capital or some other advantage to be gained by this perception, that the fbi or some other agency, would potentially undertake an operation that would allow the impression to be given that it was Russia that did it?
Do you remember when North Korea hacked Sony films?
Of course, but there is this thing called Occam's Razor and it applies just fine here, the evidence for Russia doing this is far more convincing than that the FBI (not really the agency that I would task with trying to hack the EU energy supply) did it.
That's preposterous at best and lunatic territory at worst.
I see the same kind of smug nihilism as the parent comment all over this site. They imply that the FBI is lying (which is possible) without providing a shred of evidence.
You should probably check up on what the brief of the FBI is before continuing to post in this thread. Hint: it's the very first word of the definition.
Imagine you are dealing with a liar. If this person then tells they are good, and even provide a brief to say so, should believe them?
You think because it says 'protect' it must be true? If it says 'defense' does that also mean countries only defend themselves from attack? Or can you also defend yourself, by invading other countries? Isn't that when 'attack' is the right word?
Having room enough in your worldview for an FBI that goes so far over their brief that they could start a war is well outside my comfort zone. Note that what you are describing goes directly against anything the FBI stands for and with a flourish you equate that 0.0000001% possibility with the 98% possibility (based on the evidence available) that this is Russia acting to sow dissent in the EU.
Note that these are borderline acts of war, we're not talking about some minor stuff, even though in the context of the present conflict they are in fact minor, but that's just because there is already a hot war going on and most parties are trying to contain the conflict, not broaden it (they've had plenty of excuses to do so).
Just the fact that two things are possible does not make them automatically equally possible, this is the 'both sides' fallacy and hence logic failure.
Right - it could be outside your comfort zone. But not a logic failure.
If you want to see an example of how this might be done, can I recommend the entertaining movie: 'Wag the dog'?
What we are really talking about is the problem of presentation. Very few people/companies have a very broad reach. If you are an agency/organisation that is able to intercept and alter the message that is sent, perhaps even create the message completely (you can call this propaganda or spin) if no one is checking the reality on the ground, would you do it? Do you think those organisations tasked with governing minds (govern mente) would consider this as the easiest way to manage their message? And, as a consumer, how would you know the truth of whatever is portrayed?
There are plenty of reasons not to take the presentation we are provided literally.
The FBI consists of so many people that an effort like this isn't going to pass unnoticed so it really doesn't make any sense to postulate that they did it when there is a perfectly good explanation available already that also happens to fit all of the available data.
Santa's elves (if we're going to allow fiction...) could have done it too but nobody in their right mind would suggest we raid lapland to get at them because we pretty much know who is behind this even if we can't do much about it short of isolating Russia from the Internet. Which I would be absolutely fine with and any country that offers them transit can get blocked as well. Having a connection to the internet comes with the implicit assumption that your country does not want that connection to wreak havoc on the rest of the world.
As for the FBI abroad: they have local people called liaison officers that rely heavily on cooperation with their counterparts abroad, if the FBI was ever caught in a circumstance like the one you suggest all of that would go out the window and that would be an extremely high price to pay.
Occam's razor here is that Russia has been engaged for years in a wide range activities with the sole aim of, simply speaking, creating all kinds of problems in the West. [0] Many of these are very well documented. There is no single cause - they will support both extreme right and extreme left, aiming to sow trouble. These actions are not so subtle and everybody can analyze them. Their ex-prime minister openly threatens to nuke EU countries, not just once, but on several occasions.
Moreover, Russia had high hopes the EU will not manage without Russian gas. They even made this scary video on how the whole EU will freeze[1]. But we managed to solve the problem and nobody in Europe is fearing the next winter. It would be a strange coincidence if power plants in the EU started malfunctioning in February causing country-wide outages because of some complex software problems that got undetected for months...
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[ 4.7 ms ] story [ 179 ms ] threadSource: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/11/11/...
As for what Ukraine would win: hypothetically: they could cause Germany to stop relying on Russian gas a bit quicker. But there are other parties that stood a lot more to gain from this and 'qui bono' is an even better question, especially in the context of a false flag. The fact that the trail that was uncovered was a mile wide is in itself quite suspicious.
I'm dubious that the risk to European support is worth it for Ukraine; they're hardly the only ones with means, motive, and opportunity.
There are so many little factoids about this thing that it is very hard to make sense of it, for instance this little tidbit:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/apr/28/russian-navy-v...
Barring some country coming out and admitting it, we may never know for certain.
Anonymity, 'people familiar with his role', that bit is repeated over and over.
I'll reserve my skepticism until there is hard proof and even then: if it turns out that this was a rogue action how much weight should be attached to it? Does that rule out some invisible paymaster?
Ukraine top government officials have denied involvement and knowledge of involvement and that's where it stands for now. The article would have been improved if it had said 'Allegedly' in the title, which given the thin sourcing is not a minor oversight.
But nobody knows who the paymasters were. Note that there are still Ukrainians fighting on the Russian side and that 'the fog of war' is a thing.
It's a huge mess and with Putin, the US and the Ukraine all in play there are a whole slew of possible scenarios. Nothing short of a massive investigative effort will clear this up.
Isn't that unusual given how quick all the officials and media are to blame just one side of the conflict (we know which one) for everything, with or without evidence?
[1] https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Aiaea.org+znpp+shellin...
So, the IAEA and Grossi either can't establish where the shells are fired from (hard to believe given the prolonged and intensive nature of the shelling and the amount of evidence) or are hesitant / not allowed to incriminate the party they believe is responsible.
If we apply the same logic of no A : no B, then "Russian invasion" would be the B in some other equation, e.g., no A : no Russian invasion. What would that A be?
> I encourage you to spend less time watching/reading the mass media news.
Thank you for your life advice.
NATO never would have accepted Ukraine but now that Russia has invaded Ukraine if the Russians get kicked out it might just happen. See also: Finland, Sweden.
Note that since you claim you are Dutch: it's amazing that given your access to news sources that you should be carrying water for a party that does not exactly have your best interests at heart, and I'm saying that as someone who has lived in a country under Russian occupation.
Does it really matter who's doing the shelling? The shelling is fundamentally happening because Russia invaded Ukraine in a war of aggression.
(The IAEA is likely not all that equipped to determine the source of artillery fire. That's not really their thing.)
It's unclear what happened to the planned 'forensic evaluation', but somehow there was no further interest in holding attackers responsible.
> Does it really matter who's doing the shelling?
Sure it does. The entire good guys vs bad guys narrative falls apart when your, cough, ally is the one attempting "nuclear blackmail" against you. I for one don't want to help things escalate to the "together into the abyss" stage [2], not for any reason, least of all because someone's intergenerational vendetta went off the rails.
[1] https://thehill.com/policy/international/3615324-internation...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrich_Glasl%27s_model_of_c...
It really doesn't. There'd be precisely zero shelling near the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant if Russia hadn't invaded anyone. They clearly bear the lion's weight of responsibility here, and they additionally have a vested interest in using the plant as cover for their forces.
The IAEA isn't going to rock the boat, as criminal responsiblity isn't their mission; keeping the plant safe is. Getting thrown out by the Russians won't help that mission any; any criticisms are going to be... cautious.
(Like the ones in https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/pressreleases/update-192-iae... "The IAEA experts also need access to all six turbine halls together. However, they were only granted partial access to the turbine hall of reactor unit 2 on 27 October, after earlier the same month receiving similarly restrictive access to the turbine halls of units 1 and 4.")
That's my problem. One can't have their moral cake and eat it too.
No, the US shouldn’t be in the Middle East in a military capacity. It hasn’t done the world much good there.
"But overthrowing the democratically elected governments, meddling with politics and financing gallant people is fine, because it's not our boots on the ground who dies there"
The US should remain involved diplomatically.
I eagerly await the next faux outrage about some bizarre misreading of that statement.
> faux outrage about some bizarre misreading of that statement.
I'm eagerly await the next reason why US has the right to fuck with anyone.
Well, I guess nothing really matters because "Russia invaded Ukraine in a war of aggression"? I encourage we go with Five whys [1] to dive deeper into the why of them doing it. Maybe we'll find something new. Justifying everything with "they invaded first" is, apologize, fucking stupid.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_whys
There's shelling near the nuclear plant.
Why? Because there are troops fighting there. Why? Because Russia invaded Ukraine. Why? Because Russia wanted to weaken NATO. Why? Because Russia isn't managing to compete for a sphere of influence on merits. Why? Because Russia has long lost trust as it attempts to expand its sphere of influence via force in other places like Georgia.
If you believe "bring an end to it" can only encompass explosive options, Trump's call to "put an end to" the Republican primary debates must be quite confusing. https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4227533-trump-campaign...
Nord Stream 2 was pressurized ready to deliver cheap gas (which German industry desperately needs) with one flip of a switch. That presented a risk to the United States, who didn't want them to be tempted.
>If you believe "bring an end to it" can only encompass explosive options
Absolutely not but when an end to it is brought explosively and one party has threatened to do just that and has the most motive:
* German energy intensive industries is being lured over to America with promises of cheap energy.
* Germany is now paying a lot more TO America for its expensive LNG (something it has publicly wanted for a while).
* The US has been wanting to pull Germany out of Russia's economic orbit for a long while now.
Then the most plausible story is the one broken by the same guy who broke my lai: Biden not only threatened to do it, he did it.
That's a potential motive, yes. "Make it look like US/NATO/Ukraine did it to sow discord" is also a plausible potential motive. (It has also been speculated that the destruction of the pipeline gets Gazprom out of some delivery contracts via force majeure.)
> Absolutely not but when an end to it is brought explosively and one party has threatened to do just that and has the most motive:
When was an explosive resolution specifically threatened? Biden was even asked in said press conference how it'd be accomplished and declined to be specific.
It's surface level plausible, as was the theory that 9/11 was an inside job because it gave the US an excuse to attack Iraq.
Russia was trying to reel Germany in with cheap gas as the bait. The whole point of natural gas to putin was to use as leverage. Blowing up their own bait and their leverage (which cost 11 billion dollars to build) doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
>When was an explosive resolution specifically threatened?
Well if you put it like that I'm pretty sure he didn't mention the precise date, the type of explosives used or the name of the diver that placed the explosives either, so maybe you're right and Putin set the explosives himself.
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/if-russia-invades-uk...
>Speaking at a joint news conference with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Biden said, "If Russia invades... again, then there will be longer Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it."
>When asked how he would do that, he responded, "I promise you we will be able to do it."
He couldn't have been much plainer. The only thing that was required after pressuring the Germans to stop taking the gas was to ensure that they weren't tempted to turn the taps back on again when their economy started to scream: https://apnews.com/article/german-economy-growth-recession-2...
edit: Parent post was extensively edited after this; above was a response to the "Well if you put it like that I'm pretty sure" bit.
> When asked how he would do that, he responded, "I promise you we will be able to do it." He couldn't have been much plainer.
"I promise you we will be able to do it via sanctions and diplomacy" is an entirely comprehensible statement.
> Russia was trying to reel Germany in with cheap gas as the bait. The whole point of natural gas to putin was to use as leverage. Blowing up their own bait and their leverage (which cost 11 billion dollars to build) doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
It does if you a) acknowledge internally said pipeline's likely to be shutdown a decade or more and b) if you think it potentially does $billions in damage to Ukraine aid if it sows dissension amongst the allies.
9/11 is an inside job is also a comprehensible threat. It doesnt mean it's realistic.
The US can and did regularly make specific sanctions threats. This wasn't a sanctions threat it was a deliberately and overtly vague threat that he did not clarify even when clarification was demanded of him.
There was no reason for Biden not to make specific sanctions threats while there is every reason for Biden to vaguely and covertly threaten an act of war.
When the US makes a "nice pipeline you've got there be a shame if something happened to it" statement then hanlon's razor says that they're probably making a "nice pipeline you've got there would be a shame if something happened to it".
When Putin makes this type of vague threat and a violent event results, his loyal supporters react much as you just did. This type of mentality is as common among loyal supporters of the Russian state as it is, I suppose, for similar reasons, among loyal supporters of the American state.
He's notorious for confusing and incoherent ramblings like this:
"I looked at them and said, ‘if the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money'. Well son of a bitch, he got fired".
We will never know what he meant, but I'm confident it was just a parable.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hXjLqhtnIRI
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viktor_Shokin
> Through 2015 and early 2016, domestic and international pressure (including from the IMF, the EU, and the EBRD) built for Shokin to be removed from office. The Obama administration withheld $1 billion in loan guarantees to pressure the Ukrainian government to remove Shokin from office.
> "The truth is that I was forced out because I was leading a wide-ranging corruption probe into Burisma Holdings, a natural gas firm active in Ukraine and Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, was a member of the Board of Directors." Shokin continued, stating that, "On several occasions President Poroshenko asked me to have a look at the criminal case against Burisma and consider the possibility of winding down the investigative actions in respect of this company, but I refused to close this investigation."
Nothing fishy about any of this. Good, honest public servants doing their job.
In opposition to all those facts, we have... Shokin himself being grumpy over being fired.
What's in question is whether it works, which I suspect varies from politician to politician. The assertions of Joe Biden having acted based on Hunter's desires, thus far, don't seem compelling.
You're mixing up your different administrations I think.
And if it isn't your administration why bother polluting this thread?
https://oalexanderdk.substack.com/p/blowing-holes-in-seymour...
In this case they were also one of the countries most strongly lobbying against the pipeline. I don't think it should exist either, so even though I "blame" the US for having blown it up, I think it's a good thing it happened.
A democratic or diplomatic solution would have been nicer. So... thanks but not thanks?
The US because I agree with you about their history of playing such games; Russia because they are currently doing stupid things and blaming everyone else for it; and Ukraine because (while it would be really risky if they were found out) it has an obvious direct benefit of making it much harder for anyone in the EU to spend money on Russian gas even if they wanted to.
There could be others, but I'm not sure who. China doesn't seem likely to be interested to me, but I could be wrong. North Korea seems like a chaos gremlin, but I don't think they have the capability.
Greenpeace? :P
But the others all have motive means and opportunity to varying degrees. The one thing that is still most underdeveloped is how hard it really is to perform a feat like this.
Note that the original cast of Greenpeace might not have been all against doing something like that. They started out as what today would be called eco-terrorists, and they had some pretty amazing capabilities for a group that small. Beware of intelligent and dedicated people. Their roots are in anti-war and anti-nuclear groups and over time their goals broadened. Today's Greenpeace is a gentle marketing club in comparison with how it all started.
A turning point was the bombing of the Rainbow Warrior, after that the nature of the organization changed considerably.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinking_of_the_Rainbow_Warrior
Ironically, it served as a wake-up call that something like Greenpeace is very much needed and was probably one of the biggest reasons people changed from 'neutral' to 'pro environment'. The French did not exactly do themselves a service with that action.
Or in other words: you're being a useful idiot for Russia.
Really, we are all so far removed from the geopolitical reality, who can say what is the truth of the matter? Please share your info/reasoning, if you think you have a special reason for thinking you have a better handle on it than others.
In fact, this is really a general comment, that I direct at anyone who purports to know this or that.
The only account that actually makes sense is still Seymour Hersh's - especially given the small matter of Biden's public threat and the motives.
> I also believe that WaPo may be making Ukraine look like they've coordinated the attack in order to keep blame away from any US involvement.
No, that's not what the WaPo is doing.
> The most unlikely guilty party would of course be Russia, who has the most to lose in Nord Stream's sabotage.
This is factually incorrect for a number of reasons, a big part of which is that Russia has more to gain from dividing the EU than from losing Nord Stream.
Myself, I am trying to establish the truth of the matter - I don't accept so-called authoritative sources when they are proven liars. The only way I know of to satisfy myself off the truth is to verify it personally. Involving myself in these narratives, is like acting upon (convincing) hearsay or gossip. It's simply not part of my life.
I won't call for harm to people I do not know on account of a story that could be a lie.
Or in other words: you're being a useful idiot for Ukraine.
Do you see now how useful your comment is?
To try to make both sides as equal, as if both are lying to the same extent and there's the same amount of evidence for either side and that we cannot know anything.
I say that comments like these are useful idiots for Russia because they're echoing the Russian propaganda and talking points.
Am I echoing "EU propaganda"? (Which is really the whole western world, not just EU.)
Not willing to entertain the idea that yes Ukraine is lying and engaging in propaganda too (just like the Russians), I'd say that yes you are echoing western propaganda; though it may not be conscious, hence the word echo.
"To try to make both sides as equal, as if both are lying to the same extent and there's the same amount of evidence for either side and that we cannot know anything."
I said that's a poisonous perspective to anyone who actually values reasonable discussion and trying to ascertain the truth, because you're effectively saying only your side (ukraine) is right and suggesting anything else is russian propaganda. So again that's why I think your perspective is poisonous.
"To try to make both sides as equal, as if both are lying to the same extent and there's the same amount of evidence for either side and that we cannot know anything."
I'm not suggesting it.
> I said that's a poisonous perspective to anyone who actually values reasonable discussion and trying to ascertain the truth, because you're effectively saying only your side (ukraine) is right and suggesting anything else is russian propaganda. So again that's why I think your perspective is poisonous.
You are not going to get much traction with this nonsense, there is no 'my side' or anything else but thank you for confirming what 'your side' is.
When you have something productive to add to the conversation, let me know.
This is a fine starting point, but only if you ignore the mountains if evidence where Russia has consistently lied about everything from Ukraine being Nazis to who set up the torture chambers on liberated land, while racking up thousands of war crimes.
Implying that both sides lies to the same extent is just stupid wrong, and is exactly the narrative that Russia wants to promote.
Of course everyone uses propaganda, but there's an incredibly large difference between what the free world can get away with and what the totalitarian Russian government csn and will do.
What is really worrying is the SolarWinds attack - it allowed Russians to plant deep roots in many big orgs around the world and it might take years to uproot them all.
Assuming they can all be found. Chances are that some of these will simply remain undetected.
Did it? You know it was the Russians?
https://www.fbi.gov/news/testimony/oversight-of-the-federal-...
> We have seen the far-reaching disruptive impact a serious supply-chain compromise can have through the SolarWinds intrusions, conducted by the Russian SVR.
Do you remember when North Korea hacked Sony films?
That's preposterous at best and lunatic territory at worst.
Is your account name a wordplay on 'Pravda'?
You should probably check up on what the brief of the FBI is before continuing to post in this thread. Hint: it's the very first word of the definition.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Bureau_of_Investigatio...
Imagine you are dealing with a liar. If this person then tells they are good, and even provide a brief to say so, should believe them?
You think because it says 'protect' it must be true? If it says 'defense' does that also mean countries only defend themselves from attack? Or can you also defend yourself, by invading other countries? Isn't that when 'attack' is the right word?
Note that these are borderline acts of war, we're not talking about some minor stuff, even though in the context of the present conflict they are in fact minor, but that's just because there is already a hot war going on and most parties are trying to contain the conflict, not broaden it (they've had plenty of excuses to do so).
Just the fact that two things are possible does not make them automatically equally possible, this is the 'both sides' fallacy and hence logic failure.
If you want to see an example of how this might be done, can I recommend the entertaining movie: 'Wag the dog'?
What we are really talking about is the problem of presentation. Very few people/companies have a very broad reach. If you are an agency/organisation that is able to intercept and alter the message that is sent, perhaps even create the message completely (you can call this propaganda or spin) if no one is checking the reality on the ground, would you do it? Do you think those organisations tasked with governing minds (govern mente) would consider this as the easiest way to manage their message? And, as a consumer, how would you know the truth of whatever is portrayed?
There are plenty of reasons not to take the presentation we are provided literally.
The FBI consists of so many people that an effort like this isn't going to pass unnoticed so it really doesn't make any sense to postulate that they did it when there is a perfectly good explanation available already that also happens to fit all of the available data.
Santa's elves (if we're going to allow fiction...) could have done it too but nobody in their right mind would suggest we raid lapland to get at them because we pretty much know who is behind this even if we can't do much about it short of isolating Russia from the Internet. Which I would be absolutely fine with and any country that offers them transit can get blocked as well. Having a connection to the internet comes with the implicit assumption that your country does not want that connection to wreak havoc on the rest of the world.
As for the FBI abroad: they have local people called liaison officers that rely heavily on cooperation with their counterparts abroad, if the FBI was ever caught in a circumstance like the one you suggest all of that would go out the window and that would be an extremely high price to pay.
Moreover, Russia had high hopes the EU will not manage without Russian gas. They even made this scary video on how the whole EU will freeze[1]. But we managed to solve the problem and nobody in Europe is fearing the next winter. It would be a strange coincidence if power plants in the EU started malfunctioning in February causing country-wide outages because of some complex software problems that got undetected for months...
[0] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-022-01399-3 [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5x4RzDL8ps