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You think he made up My Lai and Abu Ghraib?
Blowing holes in Seymour Hersh’s pipe dream
251–260 of 439 posts
Re: Blowing holes in Seymour Hersh’s pipe dream
#252Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't know about you, but I find these "pro-West" side to be quite specious in their arguments. What idiot really believes that Russia of all people would want to kill their own golden goose ? The argument these geniuses are implicitly making is that either Russians (or more euphemistically "Putin") is a raging lunatic, or that their readers so utterly dim-witted that they'll believe any shit that they'll spin. OTO…
> What idiot really believes that Russia of all people would want to kill their own golden goose ? Putin killed his own golden goose by invading Ukraine. Starting this war has been a disaster for Russia's economic future. Putin either doesn't care about that, or drastically miscalculated. Blowing up the pipeline would be consistent with either mindset.
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Re: Blowing holes in Seymour Hersh’s pipe dream
#253Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think Russians can articulate a logical reason for the war: in their perception, Ukraine was becoming unacceptably close to the West/NATO and they took a gamble to prevent it. Whether the gamble will pay off, we'll see. But I can follow the logic - risk for a chance at upside. What's the upside of blowing up your own pipeline and then denying it?
I mean, I can tell a just-so-story as well. It's just that, like your explanation, it involves Putin making what seems to me to be a dumb decision. Some parts of game theory emphasizes ostentatious signaling that you can't turn back (e.g. 'win the game of chicken by clearly throwing your steering wheel out of the car before the game starts, so the other person KNOWS you can't turn' line of reasoning, which is stupid…
Would a coup struggle to get the goodwill of Europe? Kinda feels like they'd top themselves up on European goodwill just by, you know, removing Putin.
Re: Blowing holes in Seymour Hersh’s pipe dream
#254Earlier quoted context omitted.
(FWIW, I think the most likely suspect is the one that doesn't usually get mentioned, that Germany blew it up to demonstrate their resolve regarding Russian sanctions) This is very unlikely, the german government simply never would have the balls to do anything remotely drastic. But they likely would close their eyes, if someone else would do it.
Funny, as a Pole my 1st reaction was "damn our spooks finally did a good job". I was (and still am) very surprised nobody was even considering Poland as a perpetrator.
I know, right. Historical beefs with both Germany and Russia, a history of competent intelligence organizations, a quality military, and obvious current motivations. Yet, every time I bring up Poland as an option, usually I just get ignored.
The time I do get a response, it is usually some story about how only the US has the capability, which is total BS.
Re: Blowing holes in Seymour Hersh’s pipe dream
#255Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think you've picked up the argument being made there, which is that, being a pipeline, the Norwegian Navy wasn't constrained to one particular spot to disable it: it runs seven hundred and fifty miles under the Baltic Sea. The author of this post is saying Hersh doesn't know what a pipeline, not that the USG doesn't. Try another paragraph. Let's interrogate it. For instance: why is the Norwegian Navy allocati…
Instead of getting lost in minutia, can you explain why Biden, Nuland, Blinken and the rest of the neocon and lib imperialist gang would go on record about getting rid of NS1 and NS2 and then deny they had anything to do with it?
Biden is literally on video promising that these pipelines would be destroyed, so there is that.
Re: Blowing holes in Seymour Hersh’s pipe dream
#256Earlier quoted context omitted.
America blowing up the pipeline doesn't pass the sniff test?
Not for me. I would not expect something as bold from admin that let last week ballon hysteria happen
Why would one assume that the administration made any decisions at all about this? Besides, both the balloon funtime and the destruction of valuable energy infrastructure are stupid and dangerous. Doing one stupid dangerous thing doesn't preclude doing another.
Re: Blowing holes in Seymour Hersh’s pipe dream
#257I didn't read Hersh's essay, I did read this and found it logical. BUT independently from these two writeups, the thing that doesn't make any sense is the idea that Russian would blow up their own pipeline. It is an asset they fully control. The idea that they damaged their own asset "to show the world they are serious" or whatever is about as likely as "to threaten Alice, Bob shot off his own foot." Is it possible?…
Doesn’t matter. This isn’t a Boolean data type. There are more possible explanations/actors than Russia or USA. And it’s possible that the USA did it even if Hearsh’s article is factually flawed and if his source lied. I’m not convinced if Hearsh’s narrative is true or not.
Re: Blowing holes in Seymour Hersh’s pipe dream
#258Earlier quoted context omitted.
> What idiot really believes that Russia of all people would want to kill their own golden goose ? Putin killed his own golden goose by invading Ukraine. Starting this war has been a disaster for Russia's economic future. Putin either doesn't care about that, or drastically miscalculated. Blowing up the pipeline would be consistent with either mindset.
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> Putin was not going to tolerate a NATO member a few minutes of rocket time from Moscow.
But ... that's already there and has been for a long time. And now two more neighbors have pledged to join.
If the intent was really to stop or reduce the neighboring countries who are NATO members, it hasn't really worked out that well.
Re: Blowing holes in Seymour Hersh’s pipe dream
#259If someone was feeding Hersh false information why would they reference the Alta class? Assuming it was some Intel op or some insider, did they just google some Norwegian navy ships that could plausibly fit the picture? Or did Hersh draw that connection himself? Hersh has been criticized for listening to cranks. Maybe some Intel officer (or adjacent gov/military worker) heard some rumours internally but there was com…
If it were false, it would be Hersh's first false story. He broke My Lai and Abu Ghraib. He's one of the most accomplished journalists in history.
Hersh wrote an article that broke through on Abu Gharib after several other outlets and the Red Cross had already been raising the alarm. His article was important and impactful but "breaking" is really overstating his impact there..
Edited to add a timeline rather than the wall of text;
* June 2023, Amnesty International calls out Abu Gharib as the site where US troops are holding Iraqis without charge in questionable conditions and reports on a riot there that resulted in the death of at least 1 prisoner.
* July 2023, Amnesty reports further after interviewing several prisoners of Abu Gharib that coalition forces are torturing prisoners using prolonged sleep deprivation, prolonged restraint in painful positions -- sometimes combined with exposure to loud music, prolonged hooding and exposure to bright lights.
Amnesty would go on to write dozens more reports about the conditions in the prisons there.
* November 2003, AP writes an article about the terrible conditions faced by prisoners in the largest camps including reports of uprising and shootings at Abu Gharib.
* January 2004, Darby blows the whistle and provides a CD full of images of torture to US Army criminal investigators.
* January 2004, based on Red Cross reports from their inspectors in Iraq, Army commissions Taguba Report to investigate the rampant reports of torture and inhumane conditions in Iraqi prisons. Report was completed in February and found tons of torture.
* February 2004, Amnesty reports on further torture within Iraqi prisons naming specific victims, techniques, and prisons.
* Late April, 2004 First pictures of torture start being released among hints of a secret Army Report.
* April 27, 2004, 60 Minutes publishes report detailing the abuse and publishes several pictures from Darby's disc. Dan Rather names several soldiers who the Army had been quietly court martialing. They had received the report / pictures ~3/4 weeks earlier.
* April 30, 2004, Hersh's New Yorker piece comes out with more details.
Re: Blowing holes in Seymour Hersh’s pipe dream
#260Earlier quoted context omitted.
There’s a very straightforward and plausible rationale for Russia (specifically, Putin) to do it: coup-proofing by forced commitment to not turning the oil back on, like breaking your own steering wheel in a game of chicken and throwing it out the window. There are presumably elites in Russia who would like to see the war end and go back to business-as-usual so they can get their assets and incomes back, and blowing…
That is the strongest case, but I'm still confused by the seemingly conflicting claim that Putin is susceptible to a coup but only if there's a pipeline. Don't Russian elites have nearly as much to lose from this war continuing with or without a pipeline? What exactly would the pipeline change in the these elites calculus, willingness or ability to stage a successful coup? The pipeline repair cost estimates are much…
The remaining pipelines for Western Europe go through Belarus and Ukraine.
https://www.naturalgasintel.com/ukraine-warns-of-gazprom-pre...
https://coffeeordie.com/russia-relies-on-ukrainian-pipelines
The Russia - Ukraine - Slovakia / Poland route is not reliable.
https://www.eurasiareview.com/04022023-russia-energy-profile...
> In May 2022, Ukraine suspended operations at the Sokhranivka measuring station and the Novopskov compressor station, which are part of the Soyuz and Brotherhood pipeline system, because of interference by Russian forces.
https://www.offshore-technology.com/news/ukraine-cease-russi...
> In a press statement, the firm said: “Moreover, the interference of the occupying forces in technical processes and changes in the modes of operation of GTS facilities, including unauthorised gas offtakes from the gas transit flows, endangered the stability and safety of the entire Ukrainian gas transportation system.”
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From a layperson trying to channel Russian leadership, removing Nord stream would mean that the only way for Western Europe to get natural gas is through stability in Ukraine and an easing of tensions between Ukraine and Russia. Russian leadership obviously has their preferred way of accomplishing this.
My crystal ball also says that even after the war ends in the favor of Ukraine, that gas pipeline will not be available because of the tensions and the... lets call it "unreliable partnership" that exists ( https://www.naturalgasintel.com/ukraine-warns-of-gazprom-pre... )
Note that the gas pipeline through Belarus to Poland has also been turned off. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yamal–Europe_pipeline
> On 26 April 2022, Gazprom announced it would stop delivering natural gas to Poland via the Yamal–Europe pipeline, as well as to Bulgaria, as both countries had rejected Russia's demand that payments for gas be made in Russian rubles - a demand allegedly constituting breach of contract.
Without the Nord Stream, Yamal, Soyuz/Brotherhood; Southern Europe (Greece, Romania, Italy) are being tempted with gas supplies from Russia by way of Turkey. Russia is additionally trying to tempt Turkey into being its energy hub ( https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/turkeysource/turkey-ca... ) with promises of cheap gas, free money (transit fees for the pipeline), and a dependence on Russia for that part of the economy.