Live data from Hacker News

Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

forsvaret.dk

541–550 of 1001 posts

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#541
Could this be to vent gas to keep Russian pipelines from bursting during the winter due to a lack of flow from the sanctions?

I’ve only recently heard about this phenomenon from a talk with Peter Zeihan[1], but have been unable to find more information about oil pipelines freezing and bursting.

Time stamped to where he brings it up:

[1] https://youtu.be/Wi_nFz1CJSI?t=984

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#542

To me, the most fascinating thing about this is the complete and utter uncertainty. Who is responsible, USA? Russia? Ukraine? Poland? Terrorists? No one? You'd think that in the 21st century, a piece of infrastructure getting blown up during a war, between two clearly defined sides, there wouldn't be nearly as much mystery surrounding the events.

> between two clearly defined sides

One should note: "between two clearly defined sides" but also with a few dozen other factions supporting one side or the other as a proxy war and negotiating with one side or the other to attempt to manipulate food and energy supply chains on a global scale.

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#543
post #507

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Russia's greatest leverage was Europe needing their gas, and eventually agreeing to stop supporting Ukraine in order to get the gas turned back on. Now if the pipelines are destroyed, no matter how cold and angry citizens in the EU get, EU leadership has no reason to give in to Russian since that now won't get the gas turned back on. If anything, this points to Ukraine or the US doing it.

Yes, Ukraine's famous Baltic sea combat divers.

Ukraine has a sea coast and a Navy, so I have no doubt that they have combat divers. Thus the only issue would be a logistic one. My take is that it is trivial to send people to the Baltic along with access to diving equipment and boats. Via sea route it should also be very doable to ship explosives.

So it is at least plausible.

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#544

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People need to stop thinking of 'Russia' (or any other country for that matter) as a single monolith. For example, a possible motive that may be bad for Russia but good for Putin is that maybe he wants to deter any would be assassination attempt coming from within the Kremlin by making it abundantly clear that there will be no going back to business as usual if he was to be eliminated. Blowing up the Nord Stream pipe…

This could be the same for the US or Ukraine. So considering that, all things being equal, it sounds pretty terrible for the main Russian goals, so I'm going to say no it wasn't Russia.

No post body was provided.

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#545
post #113
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…

So that doesn't look like an accident. I have difficulty imagining accidental ignition in an underwater gas pipeline. Where would the oxygen come from? Plus it's more than one explosion on the same day - can't be a coincidence. The next question is, who did it? It doesn't seem like something in Russia's interest, they've been wanting to get that pipeline approved and operational. They invested huge sums of money to b…

> The next question is, who did it?

A Polish member of the European Parliament has thanked the US: https://twitter.com/radeksikorski/status/1574800653724966915

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#546
post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So that doesn't look like an accident. I have difficulty imagining accidental ignition in an underwater gas pipeline. Where would the oxygen come from? Plus it's more than one explosion on the same day - can't be a coincidence. The next question is, who did it? It doesn't seem like something in Russia's interest, they've been wanting to get that pipeline approved and operational. They invested huge sums of money to b…

Common theme I've heard here (Kyiv, Ukraine) is that this sabotage is in Putin's direct interest. There are rumours of political infighting among Russia's leaders and that there are several factions trying to seize power, however since there is no clear winner, those guys need powerful allies, EU being a very important one. The idea is that Europe really wants to buy Russian gas, but not from Putin, so if Russia some…

No post body was provided.

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#549
post #113
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…

So that doesn't look like an accident. I have difficulty imagining accidental ignition in an underwater gas pipeline. Where would the oxygen come from? Plus it's more than one explosion on the same day - can't be a coincidence. The next question is, who did it? It doesn't seem like something in Russia's interest, they've been wanting to get that pipeline approved and operational. They invested huge sums of money to b…

IDK about the details underlying the argument (whether the contract is actually structured this way, etc.), but https://mobile.twitter.com/nierobmitak/status/15747490369129... mentioned the possibility that the contracts entail fines for non-delivery (which they might not have to pay if the pipeline is unusable).

Re: Gas Leak in the Baltic Sea

#550
post #507

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Russia's greatest leverage was Europe needing their gas, and eventually agreeing to stop supporting Ukraine in order to get the gas turned back on. Now if the pipelines are destroyed, no matter how cold and angry citizens in the EU get, EU leadership has no reason to give in to Russian since that now won't get the gas turned back on. If anything, this points to Ukraine or the US doing it.

Yes, Ukraine's famous Baltic sea combat divers.

This entire war has been an exercise in Ukraine using other people's resources to attack Russia. If they wanted to I'm sure the US and Ukraine could figure out how to get this done.
Post reply on HN