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Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

cnn.com

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Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#611

Post by nbman102 »

oneshtein wrote: post #585
pelasaco wrote: post #556

Earlier quoted context omitted.

just to be honest, the Pipelines explosion, had "Russia" written all over it, except after investigation, and a possible culprit, i.e not Russia, then nobody wanted to discuss about it anymore. I think the hysteria is too high, people are thirsty for War, looks like..

Delivery of Russian gas was stopped by Russia in violation of contract. European gas companies demands $20 billion in compensation. Nobody had incentive to blow up empty pipes except Russia. Of course, Russians used false flag as usual, to blame Ukraine, but Ukraine doesn't hide successful attacks on Russian infrastructure, because Ukraine has legal right to defend itself.

That is a very abbreviated history. There are two pipelines, NS-1 and NS-2, both of which have two pipes each. NS-1 was operational until a turbine had to be repaired in Canada. The bureaucratic process to allow the repair was arduous, but finally it got done and chancellor Scholz did a photo-op in front of the repaired turbine.

Then the Russians played coy and came up with counter-bureaucratic reasons why the repaired turbine could not be installed. Presumably to put pressure on Germany, which was afraid of the 2022/2023 winter at the time.

Then two pipes of NS-1 and one pipe of NS-2 were blown up. Since no gas was flowing at the time, Russia had no reason to blow up its bargaining chip. Ukraine or the U.S. did have a reason.

Russia also delivered gas to Austria through a pipeline that goes through Ukraine and for which Ukraine collected transit fees until this year. Russia didn't shut down or blow up that pipeline.

From the point of view of the U.S. and Ukraine it does not make sense to blow up the Austrian pipeline because Austria is neutral anyway, so just let Ukraine collect the transit fees.

Germany of course must be pressured to be the second largest financial and weapons supporter for Ukraine, so hey, let's blow up the pipeline of our "ally".

Apart from Hersh's "the U.S. did it" theory, the Wall Street Journal recently blamed it on Zalushny. No other theories have emerged, but rest assured that if there were a credible Russia theory the Western press would shout it from the rooftops.

Putin has offered multiple times to either open the remaining pipe of NS-2 or to route gas via Turkey:

https://www.dw.com/en/putin-offers-europe-gas-through-nord-s...

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#612

Post by valval »

euroderf wrote: post #73

So what's the solution ? Assign a surveillance UAV to every Russian ship parked "without a good reason" over a cable ? It would be expensive, but doable, and create a reserve of vehicles for wartime use.

Well, since Russia has nothing to gain from such actions, you might want to assign surveillance on some other parties in case. But yes, I suppose surveillance might act as some form of deterrence.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#613

Post by instig007 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #392
geniusplanmate wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. They already do, because those are old, garbage ships 2. It's not exactly in the interests of NATO to have those ships start spilling tons of oil in the North Atlantic The problem of that "shadow fleet" is precisely that those are old, uninsured vessels that cause environmental risks.

> not exactly in the interests of NATO to have those ships start spilling tons of oil in the North Atlantic Since when did engine troubles cause an oil spill?

since the times ocean waves decided to wreck ships that can't turn and navigate in storms without their prime mover.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#614

Post by probably_wrong »

oneshtein wrote: post #585
pelasaco wrote: post #556

Earlier quoted context omitted.

just to be honest, the Pipelines explosion, had "Russia" written all over it, except after investigation, and a possible culprit, i.e not Russia, then nobody wanted to discuss about it anymore. I think the hysteria is too high, people are thirsty for War, looks like..

Delivery of Russian gas was stopped by Russia in violation of contract. European gas companies demands $20 billion in compensation. Nobody had incentive to blow up empty pipes except Russia. Of course, Russians used false flag as usual, to blame Ukraine, but Ukraine doesn't hide successful attacks on Russian infrastructure, because Ukraine has legal right to defend itself.

While a false flag operation cannot be ruled out, I don't think the case is as clear-cut as you suggest.

> Nobody had incentive to blow up empty pipes except Russia.

I disagree: Russian gas was the one leverage Russia had over Germany. Blowing the pipeline ensured that Germany wouldn't be able to get out of the conflict quietly - "Germany still receiving Russian gas" would not receive as much condemnation as "Germany repairs Russian gas pipeline".

> Ukraine doesn't hide successful attacks on Russian infrastructure, because Ukraine has legal right to defend itself.

True, but Ukraine doesn't have a legal right to sabotage the infrastructure of its allies. I live in Germany and I can tell you: that first winter was pretty bad for everyone, with plenty headlines about people who could no longer afford their heating costs. If it had been known that it was Ukraine's doing, popular support for the war would have sunk a lot.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#615

Post by KptMarchewa »

oneshtein wrote: post #589
nkrisc wrote: post #537

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This would be more concerning if Russia had any tanks left. Are you suggesting Russia has a full invasion force they’re not using in Ukraine? Or to liberate their own occupied territory?

RF refurbishes about 1300 tanks a year. It's more than enough to conquer part of Europe and then exchange it for Ukraine.

They probably do, but they send them immediately to the frontlines. There are people who track RU storage and refurbishment sites.

https://x.com/Jonpy99/status/1856776568057565284/photo/1

There's no secret real russian army just waiting to invade some another country, or just chilling in Urals. If russia did not have nuclear weapons, road to moscow would be open.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#616

Post by [deleted] »

benterix wrote: post #566
pelasaco wrote: post #556

Earlier quoted context omitted.

just to be honest, the Pipelines explosion, had "Russia" written all over it, except after investigation, and a possible culprit, i.e not Russia, then nobody wanted to discuss about it anymore. I think the hysteria is too high, people are thirsty for War, looks like..

> people are thirsty for War, looks like.. Nobody in the West wants any war. The usual tactics of Putin is to do what he wants whether on his or foreign soil, using poisoning etc. in a way that everybody knows it's him but he will politely deny. It's a kind of a silly game, the GRU could just have put a bullet in Lytvynenko's head but they choose a slow death to show off.

[deleted]

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#617

Post by KptMarchewa »

trhway wrote: post #424
carabiner wrote: post #420

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A disruption in communications can mean only one thing: invasion.

yes. What Russia does currently is probing and testing - what it takes to disrupt all the necessary cables simultaneously to create communication breakdown and a lot of chaos, what resources and time it takes to repair (and thus planning the options on blocking those repair resources, etc.) It takes tanks half-a-day to cross the Baltic states to reach the sea. That is the time Russia wants to buy. Once Russian forces…

>It takes tanks half-a-day to cross the Baltic states to reach the sea.

And what happens if they actually go for that distance?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Voznesensk

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#618

Post by dotancohen »

esarbe wrote: post #598
vasco wrote: post #567

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish I lived in a world where it's so easy to know who is good and who is evil and to pinpoint them so well.

It is easy; nations that attack other nations unprovoked are "evil" (at fault). Ukraine has never infringed on Russia's sovereignty or territorial integrity before it was attacked. Therefor this war is entirely Russia's fault. The world is mostly shades of gray. But this case it black and white.

[flagged]

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#619

Post by nbman102 »

Etheryte wrote: post #242
staplung wrote: post #63

It's worth mentioning that cable breakages happen quite often; globally about 200 times per year [1] and the article itself mentions that just last year, two other cables and a gas pipeline were taken out by an anchor. The Gulf of Finland is evidently quite shallow. From what I understand, cable repair ships are likely to use ROVs for parts of repair jobs but only when the water is shallow so hopefully they can figur…

This is a misleading framing. The two cables last year were not taken out by an anchor as an accident, it was literally a ship putting down its anchor just before the cable and then dragging it over the cable. In other words, sabotage. There's no point in trying to color any of this with rose tinted glasses when it's clear who's done it and why.

If this wasn't an accident, given the recent Biden escalation that allows ATACMS strikes in Kursk in could mean two things:

1) Russia hastily retaliated, which is out of character. You can accuse Russia of many things, but not of retaliating instantly (against the West, in Ukraine they probably do).

2) False flag in order to drum up pro-war sentiment in the West.

If Biden escalates in the last weeks of his presidency, presumably to make it more difficult for Trump to negotiate, why would Russia take the bait and escalate? It does not make any sense.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#620

Post by valval »

ocatzzz wrote: post #129
stackskipton wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those discussions are had all the time. One of downside of this bear is bear strapped with explosives that could kill us all if bear gets angry enough. Also, once you are 12 miles offshore, technically you are in international waters and thus cannot be stopped by any Navy except your own unless there is UN Sanctions. If NATO Countries decided to violate that, it obviously opens up massive can of worms that could impa…

You are evidently unaware of UNCLOS and the adoption of many of its provisions into customary international law

> customary international law

If only there was such thing.

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