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Blowing Holes in Seymour Hersh's Pipe Dream

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Re: Blowing Holes in Seymour Hersh's Pipe Dream

#181

Post by kcplate »

smcl wrote: post #119
DeLeeuw wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US was always opposed to Nord Stream and for good reasons. I'm in fact glad it's gone. Many people already speculated it was the US, because Biden himself literally says "we will bring an end to it": https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OS4O8rGRLf8 With a smirk. Even when pressed how he is going to do it. For me, Hersh' story is the secondary corroboration.

Seems to me equally likely he's saying they'd pressure Germany to not use it or introduce sanctions (to bring an end to Nordstream 2, as a source of foreign currency for Russia and as leverage over the EU). Additionally wasn't Nordstream 2 not yet operational, and mostly Nordstream 1 that was sabotaged?

“Put an end to it” seems to carry a bit more finality then “we are going to encourage to not use it, or introduce sanctions to not use it”. Especially in light of the damn thing actually being destroyed…and an end being put to it.

The action that was taken, even though it’s not acknowledged, has brought weight to the statement.

Re: Blowing Holes in Seymour Hersh's Pipe Dream

#182

Post by erentz »

kubectl_h wrote: post #157
erentz wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let me also add these point that everyone seems to want to ignore: NordStream 2 was never put into service. Germany halted it due to the invasion. This was considered a very big deal. At the time of the explosion on 26 Sep there had been no gas flowing on NordStream 1 at all. None! Flows on NS1 were shutdown by Russia on 31 Aug. This came after a series of declining flows from Russia accompanied by various efforts by…

> (one of those pipes was suspiciously left undamaged). You do not offer any reason for Russia to blow up three of four pipelines just to leave around one.

Well if you want to consider motives, what I said makes a clear motive IF Russia did it, for them to leave one of the NS2 pipes untouched doesn't it. Because the history was of Russia trying to blackmail Germany and get Germany to turn on NS2.

But I didn't claim Russia did it. You know you can suspect the US did it but that doesn't mean you need to promote fake made up stories that defy scrutiny to believe it. You can still search for the actual truth and want to see actual facts presented rather than fiction.

Re: Blowing Holes in Seymour Hersh's Pipe Dream

#183

Post by nkurz »

BWStearns wrote: post #173
alienicecream wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand how it is "observably false". It seems at least like a plausible story, although without hard evidence no one can say for sure. Calling the whole story "observably false" and "trivially falsifiable" seems to way overstate the case, and I wonder what the motivation and emotion behind that is.

The overarching accusation is plausible but many of the claims to support the story are observably false, as outlined in the linked article. And yes, as per your innuendo I’m clearly an agent of the state here to shut down your free thinking.

I think you might be misreading alienicecream's tone. Maybe I'm naive, but I'd like to think that he wasn't accusing you of being a shill. I think he was genuinely wondering about your reasoning. At the least, I am. I appreciated (and upvoted) your answer higher in the thread.

I find it interesting that different people have very different reactions to this. I don't think it's just national politics, although that often plays a role. For me, I was bothered by the way the news coverage immediately after the event converged to "Russia did it". It wasn't that I was in any way sure that they were wrong, but I was sure that they were absurdly overconfident.

I'd like to know what caused them to take this stance so universally and so strongly. My would guess would be tribalism and fear of offending the US government. Since then, I've been pleased to see that some recent articles that are moving more to the "we don't really know yet" stance. The New York Times had such an article in late December (https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/26/world/europe/nordstream-p...), and the London Times had a similar one about a week ago (https://archive.is/A35Ce).

Hersh's article doesn't bother me in the way that it seems to bother you. It's not at all that I'm sure it's right. It seems possible, maybe even likely, that Hersh is being fooled by a bullshitter or even a foreign agent. He presumably published it on a brand new Substack because every more reputable outlet refused. But despite this, I think it's good to discuss its strengths and weaknesses. Many people (possibly including you) think it's better that we ignore it, but I think this is more likely to cause problems in the long term. I think it's interesting and useful to look at why our reactions are so different.

Re: Blowing Holes in Seymour Hersh's Pipe Dream

#184

Post by bananapub »

sschueller wrote: post #172
layer8 wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not agitated, but I believe it would be incredibly unwise for the US to have done this, in particular regarding the trust relationship with Germany. It’s also naive to think that who did it wouldn’t come out sooner or later. Those things have a way to not stay secret.

The US was tapping Angela Merkel's phone. IMO that is as bad for the relationship as blowing up the pipeline. I don't think there is much trust there, just a we have to work together because of NATO and the 50k US troops on Germany's soil.

er...no, tapping every phone of value in the world is not as bad as secretly bombing something.

you can trivially know this by comparing the US's response to e.g. every hack china and russia have ever done leading to mean words and maybe economic sanctions, vs the US literally invading two countries - which had nothing to do with the person who did the bombings - after 11/9.

Re: Blowing Holes in Seymour Hersh's Pipe Dream

#185

Post by erentz »

drewcoo wrote: post #161
alienicecream wrote: post #144

Can someone explain why some people here are so agitated over a claim that the US did it? Is it hard to believe that US intelligence would do something like this? Besides, if you hate Russia then it's a good thing right?

It's not about any of the details at all, really. It's about questioning the mainstream media narrative. Mainstream media is politically affiliated. So questioning it becomes a political act. Once it gets political, people lose all reason, form up into tribes, and things get rough.

Hersh didn't just question some narrative. He presented a fanciful story as fact that is full of holes and does not stand up to scrutiny. Those who are motivated to see the US blamed for it seem to be uninterested in whether his story actually is true or not. The truth of what happened and how it happened doesn't seem to matter. They believe the US did it, so they believe Hersh's story.

It's frustrating because having a theory that the US did it isn't unreasonable, and could be discussed. My initial reaction was that the US probably did it, it was only later after more details came out and really thinking it through I came to realize it wouldn't make sense. Though if they did it certainly would not have occurred in the fanciful way Hersh presented. I do not know who did it, while I could put a good theory together why Russia did it and can see they had some motivation, I could also make a good Hershesque story about how some criminal environmentalist group from Germany did it. Or why Poland did it. Or Sweden.

EDIT: Actually when you think about it, with the alternative Yamal pipeline through Poland, and Poland's distrust of Germany. Poland had plenty of motivation! Much more than the US. They have the explosives, they can whip together a few tech divers for an easy 80-100m dive, and they have easy access to the Baltic. But motivation and opportunity is not enough.

Re: Blowing Holes in Seymour Hersh's Pipe Dream

#186

Post by bananapub »

nkurz wrote: post #135
koheripbal wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> anonymous officials. ... this is the standard for journalism on these topics Unfortunately, it's also standard for planted false stories. It's notable that Hersh won the Nobel prize for producing photographic evidence of war crimes. None of his anonymously sourced articles has ever been confirmed true

> None of his anonymously sourced articles has ever been confirmed true While not "confirmed true", I think this piece shows that later evidence strongly supported Hersh's anonymous claims in this case: https://www.rootclaim.com/analysis/Who-carried-out-the-chemi... It's an interesting style of analysis. You'll need to click on "Show more" below each section to see their actual evidence and reasoning.

it's a useful heuristic of mine to massively distrust anyone who makes silly claims like assigning probabilities at 1 decimal point to things like this:

> 1 Opposition: Opposition forces in Syria (Liwa al-Islam) carried out the chemical attack. 96.4%

> 2 Syrian army: The Syrian army carried out the chemical attack. 3.6%

though it helps when they also explain the process with nonsense like:

> The few prior instances of chemical attacks against civilian targets contain factors that make them poor comparisons to the attack in Syria, leaving motivation as the primary factor. An analysis of the motivating factors behind such an attack results in the Syrian army being twice as likely to launch such an attack compared to an Opposition group, i.e. 67%-33%.

Re: Blowing Holes in Seymour Hersh's Pipe Dream

#187

Post by nkurz »

heyda wrote: post #177
AlanYx wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks. That sounds like it rules out the Norwegian P-8 claim.

Doesn't really rule out the P-8, apparently Norway has had P-8's since 2021, in order for an aircraft to be 'fully operational' you have to do training/exercises, fly the aircraft. If the Norwegian Air Force wanted to have the P-8 fully operational by Jan 30 2023, they had to have been flying sorties before then. https://www.arctictoday.com/norway-takes-delivery-of-boeing-...

In confirmation, here's a press release saying that they have been making training flights with their P8's since June 22, with plans to make 2 flights a week: https://www-forsvaret-no.translate.goog/aktuelt-og-presse/ak...

Re: Blowing Holes in Seymour Hersh's Pipe Dream

#188

Post by oh_sigh »

mc32 wrote: post #163
throwaway4good wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does the bombs have to go off immediately when the plane drops the signalling device? If you got through setting all this up, I am sure you can also figure out how to delay the explosion so there would be no obvious connection to a plane flying over.

Maybe to ensure a "bysailing" ship isn't accidentally damaged? Presumably a plan could detect a ship if it was near target and do a go around?

The pipeline is 80m underwater - a ship could be sailing right over and not even realize an explosion happened under it.

Re: Blowing Holes in Seymour Hersh's Pipe Dream

#189

Post by cheese_van »

layer8 wrote: post #166
alienicecream wrote: post #144

Can someone explain why some people here are so agitated over a claim that the US did it? Is it hard to believe that US intelligence would do something like this? Besides, if you hate Russia then it's a good thing right?

Not agitated, but I believe it would be incredibly unwise for the US to have done this, in particular regarding the trust relationship with Germany. It’s also naive to think that who did it wouldn’t come out sooner or later. Those things have a way to not stay secret.

Poor trust in Germany of American intent has been ongoing for some time. The US has done much to repair it, although the quiet diplomacy has been more effective than the public diplomacy. The preservation of this trust, despite what conspiracy seekers believe, would strongly militate against this event - its benefit would in no way be perceived in USG circles as greater than the cost.

Re: Blowing Holes in Seymour Hersh's Pipe Dream

#190

Post by vidoc »

InTheArena wrote: post #180
pphysch wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What steps has the USA taken to ensure the truth came out? Please be specific. It's been months. > anti-Russian forces in Syria All-time euphemism for AQ/ISIS affiliates like HTS.

No. There were pro-democratic forces.. forces that were basically abandoned by the USA and other, and quickly exterminated following Obama’s capitulation to Putin in 2013.

> There were pro-democratic forces.

I would strongly suggest you to read a bit about the ideology of the Al-Nusra Front group.

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