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Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

forsvaret.dk

141–150 of 1001 posts

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#141
post #13
post #4

I read talks of sabotage but I struggle to understand the point, surely russia wouldn’t sabotage their own pipelines (they can just shut them) and I understand they are not in use right now. In fact doesn’t that mean that the pipeline will be flooded? Is that recoverable?

> I read talks of sabotage but I struggle to understand the point Pure speculation: A very hard winter is predicted with sky-high energy prices. If people, the economy and industry is suffering one can easily imagine that Germany wavers and opens up the taps. If the pipes are damaged and it will cost a lot to repair and restart the flow that supports those who want to keep the gas flow off and hinders those who wante…

> A very hard winter is predicted

If you are implying that weather forecast is accurate months ahead - nobody knows what the temperatures will be this winter. Everything further ahead than 7 days is pretty much rolling the dice.

https://scijinks.gov/forecast-reliability/

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sabotage makes sense, but by whom? Surely Russia has no interest in sabotaging the pipelines that give them leverage over Europe. Without the pipelines, the whole "you lift the sanctions, we deliver natural gas" game is gone. Even if unlikely to happen, it would have been an important psychological and political factor over the winter. Meanwhile European powers don't seem to have an incentive. They would benefit from…

Europe didn't need the gas [1] [2]. Russia has nothing to lose by sabotaging it. Don't forget that Russia had already slowed/slopped NS1 by this point. [1] https://twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/15747542772681031... "Those shipments are enough to cover a complete halt in Russian pipeline flows from Oct. 1." [2] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-09-27/europe-is... (paywalled version of the original quot…

Europe needs the gas. Not enough LNG stations to import this amount. Also prices are absurdly high.

Saying Europe doesn't need Russian gas sounds almost like propoganda.

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#144
post #54

The Swedish national seismic network picked up two explosions within kilometers of the reported gas leak locations yesterday. The time of the first explosion: Yesterday, Monday morning at 02:03 am, second one Monday evening at 7:04pm (local time, CEST). The reports of the gas leaks came at 1:52pm and 8:41pm, respectively - by means of ships reporting bubbling at the surface level. One of the two events registered at…

Act of war by USA? (equivalent if done through ally)

[deleted]

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#145
I don't see a mention that today is the day Poland officially opens up its pipeline to Denmark and Norway. The pipeline Russia (and to a much lesser extent Germany) put a lot of resources trying to jeopardize.

Some of the things those two countries did include: Financing of various "grassroots ecology groups" that managed to find an extremely important field mouse (no joke!) habitat on the planned route which caused many months of delays in Denmark. Constant media pressure and a smear campaign of lies against PL in Europe and elsewhere. And many more including those we don't know about. No one is surprised at all that they would blow up their own pipeline to gain various PR points in sympathetic media.

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#146

If I were a betting man, I'd put my money on Poland. The Polish prime minister immediately called "sabotage" and fingered Russia, while everyone else is still saying "it could be sabotage but we need to investigate first". Russia wants the taps capable of being turned ON at their discretion, not permanently broken. This hurts their bargaining position in a big way because they've just lost their biggest source of lev…

I'm sure you have heard about these technical problems Russia is having with the terminal on their side, the technical problems they claim are behind the reason the gas is turned off? Well it's not really technical problems, it's "technical problems" because otherwise the shut off would have been contact violations. This is no different, now they can keep the gas off without violating international trade law.

I think Russia is well past the point of caring about international law.

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The conspiracy theory is that either the United States or some member of NATO sabotaged the pipeline so that Germany will not have the option of easing up on sanctions in order to purchase Russian Gas this winter.

Not every theory about conspiracy is a conspiracy theory. Fixed version: > The theory is that either the United States or some member of NATO conspired and sabotaged the pipeline so that Germany will not have the option of easing up on sanctions in order to purchase Russian Gas this winter.

Even the German government might have done it in a "burn the boats" strategy.

I don't think Russia had interests in doing it, unless it is for some internal power play.

edit: or plausible denial when they won't send gas to Europe this winter. But do they even need the deniability at this point?

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sabotage makes sense, but by whom? Surely Russia has no interest in sabotaging the pipelines that give them leverage over Europe. Without the pipelines, the whole "you lift the sanctions, we deliver natural gas" game is gone. Even if unlikely to happen, it would have been an important psychological and political factor over the winter. Meanwhile European powers don't seem to have an incentive. They would benefit from…

> Meanwhile European powers don't seem to have an incentive. I don't think that's what happened, but I do see an incentive. If you can turn "we're going to increase the conflict by refusing trade" into "we'd buy, but you can't deliver", that's a potentially politically useful change. Also internally "we're taking a stance and sacrificing your comfort during the winter" is worse optics than "we need to deal with the s…

EU/Germany is already at that point because Russia openly stopped honoring the existing contracts and ceased deliveries months ago. So even this constructed incentive does not exist.

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#150

If I were a betting man, I'd put my money on Poland. The Polish prime minister immediately called "sabotage" and fingered Russia, while everyone else is still saying "it could be sabotage but we need to investigate first". Russia wants the taps capable of being turned ON at their discretion, not permanently broken. This hurts their bargaining position in a big way because they've just lost their biggest source of lev…

> Russia wants the taps ON, not off. This hurts their bargaining position in a big way because they've just lost their biggest source of leverage against Germany.

No, it's the other way around. It signals that Russia is burning bridges, and makes it nuclear threat seem much more real.

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