Interesting that the pipeline in the middle of Ukraine, right in the hotspots of a war - remains intact and well, but this one, at the bottom of the sea - is blown away.
That's a great point, and therefore leads me to believe it was a pro-Ukranian force because if it were Russia, they would have blown it up inside Ukraine so they could then blame Ukraine for it. Putin really is not that bright, so it is unlikely he would think it through any further than that.
Russia could just turn off the taps instead of blowing it up... Russia spent billions building these pipes to bypass transit fees through other countries.
This is not a mystery. The US has the most to gain from this: increase Europe's energy dependence on the US by literally forcing Europe to not use cheap Russian energy
> Against: Doesn't seem like they could pull it off
This is very wrong. My brother is a technical diver, and after the blast I had a long chat with him about what it would do to achieve this. After going over the location, the estimated amount of explosives needed to break the pipes, and the depth, he came to the conclusion that he could have done it with 2 friends and a budget of ~10k€.
This was before these new pictures that paint a picture of a more powerful blast than he assumed, but it is still well within the capability of a bunch of very determined activists. This absolutely didn't need to be a state actor.
I came out of the discussion with a newfound appreciation just how fragile a lot of our billion-euro infrastructure is, and how easy it would be to disrupt.
> [Russia] Against: It looks a lot like a glass cannon to me. Meaning, Europe will now change their behavior to remove dependence on Russian energy.
Europe was _already_ working about as hard as they could on removing their dependence on Russia though.
Another way to see this would be that around now might be the last chance for something like this to hurt Europe and still have time to put political pressure on afterwards.
If this had been done in the middle of winter, Europe would treat it as an attack and would be on their guard, but now Russia can play political games in the background to destabilize Europe or at least reduce Europe's will to help Ukraine.
For Russia, in the against you should add that they mostly owned the pipeline, they could have switch it off without destroying it and destroying it means not being able to use it to sell oil to Western europe against. I can't see any way it would make sense to them, even accounting bad calculation like the Ukraine invasion.
Another thing for Russia, showing that they can and are not afraid to attack such infrastructure of EU countries. It's safe because it's "their" pipeline and cheap if they don't think they would've resumed operation in the future anyway.
My best guess is that it was Russia for internal political reasons aka to remove the ability of Russia to back out and resume business as usual after some concessions.
The Russian government not being a monolith, there must be factions who’d like to stop fucking around in Ukraine and get back to printing money pumping gas to Europe. The peace incentive gets much weaker with the destruction of Nord Stream.
I'm surprised any video footage at all was released, given the political tensions around this event. This looks like the most comprehensive version of the video (possibly the earliest released, one of the earlier and less cut than others):
That's very thick steel. Either a whole lot of explosives or some kind of shaped charge/explosively formed penetrator (widely used in oil drilling industry to blow holes in down-well pipe to allow oil flow) must have been used, with possible further damage caused by depressurization of the pipe.
As far as who did it and why? Russia seemed to be pushing Europe for a deal whereby if they went along with the annexation of the eastern provinces of Ukraine they'd open up gas supplies and end the looming energy crisis Europe faces, and a working Nordstream / Nordstream 2 pipeline was necessary for that strategy, so blowing up the pipeline derailed that strategy for months at least.
As to motive on the USA side, several officials in state and energy seem to view this as a 'tremendous opportunity' to shift European gas purchases away from Russian pipelines and towards US LNG tankers (price differential there), not sure how the Qatar gas output is affected.
Europe of course would have been better off pushing a lot harder for wind/solar/storage over the past two decades and getting off the Russian, American and Middle East fossil fuel teat that way, but to quote Jeremey Irons in Margin Call, "That is spilt milk under the bridge". So now what?
The US already sells all of the LNG to Europe that either side has the capacity to handle. It will be faster to repair the pipe than build out new LNG capacity. I don’t see how the US has anything to benefit from blowing up the pipe to inflate energy prices in Europe as it’s a significant drag on the global economy which has far broader impacts on the US economy than slowly and incrementally increasing LNG shipments would.
Furthermore Russia already has 1 pipe “down for maintenance,” so clearly limiting capacity is a huge bargaining chip for them.
I think it’s also worth considering Russia may have internal detractors from their current policies and blowing up a pipe removes it from the equation. It may have even been a warning to those internal detractors: “don’t speak up or we can take all the pipes off the table as bargaining chips.”
Russia benefits from the pipes being a high stakes game far more than the US.
But who knows. The CIA has done dumber things. I just don’t see the incentives for the US especially considering even if we could ship more LNG (it would take years) that would increase energy costs here. The Biden administration has to LOVE being isolated from the madness of Europes gas market at the moment, especially considering the elections and looming winter.
To me, it looks like the end of the pipe are bending outward. Meaning that the explosion must have come from inside the pipe. But, it's not a very good video and is pretty hard to tell.
One strand of the Nordstream 2 pipeline is still functional, and Russia offered to send gas via that one recently. Just as a counterpoint to everyone claiming that Russia has no motive because they would harm themselves. This attack didn't remove all pipeline capacity, only 3 out of 4 strands of the two pipelines. So it did not remove the ability for Russia to sell gas to Germany.
Like no attacker has ever self-harmed to cast doubt and to make it look like they were also a victim rather than the attacker. These self inflicted wounds are not meant to be fatal (counter-productive)
One thing that puzzles me - there are thousands of satellites 24/7, CIA has their own, NSA has their own, Navy, Air Force and so on. And all other neighbors around that incident site should be monitoring everything possible. On a very strategically important pipeline for whole continent.
Yet nobody saw anything, there are no past records going few hours back of some ship sailing to those spots? I mean US can spot very shallow speed boats of cocaine smugglers for a long time, so they use submarines from what I gathered.
One explanation would be that submarine, but - if I would be doing marine defense, I would be pinging / doing some other equivalent of radar checks very frequently. But maybe this is really difficult to do due ie shape of sea bottom, reach of such pings, animal protections, just pure costs etc.
I know about this because I got a NYTimes email push alert and I saw it all over the news subsequently. But that was then, this is now - what is there to report?
Reed stated the United States added a Trojan horse to gas pipeline control software that the Soviet Union obtained from a company in Canada.[1] According to Reed, when the components were deployed on a Trans-Siberian gas pipeline, the Trojan horse led to a huge explosion.[1] He wrote: "The pipeline software that was to run the pumps, turbines and valves was programmed to go haywire, to reset pump speeds and valve settings to produce pressures far beyond those acceptable to the pipeline joints and welds. The result was the most monumental non-nuclear explosion and fire ever seen from space."[1]
What people fail to see is that this is an opportunity (albeit forced) to accelerate the shift away from fossil fuels to renewables. To slow and hopefully reverse the effects of carbon emissions we need to massively invest in new wind and hydro projects, energy storage technologies, and tighten energy efficiency rules.
Russia has committed so many own goals in this war that the fact that it is against Russia's interests to blow up Nord Stream actually increases the probability that they did it.
> Western leaders have stopped short of directly accusing Russia
I'm going to stop short of directly accusing anyone, but I will say that any motive for Russia to eliminate their economic leverage against a powerful NATO nation escapes me, whereas eliminating that leverage is in the apparent interest of every NATO member nation that wants to see Russia weakened, except Germany. Accusing Russia of this particular act of destruction doesn't make any sense.
None of the comments so far offer the most obvious motive for Russia to blow the pipeline: For Russia to show that it could, and it would. That the pipeline nominally benefits Russia is useful ambiguity (that many here seem to have fallen for).
There is no shortage of undersea infrastructure vulnerable to such attacks, not least bringing gas from Norway to the EU - look at exactly where the pipeline was blown. It is part of a pattern of strategic terror.
>" the most obvious motive for Russia to blow the pipeline: For Russia to show that it could, and it would. That the pipeline nominally benefits Russia is useful ambiguity."
I don't follow this reasoning. The kind of expertise required to detonate a bomb underwater is likely something any developed country with a reasonably equipped navy/intelligence agency could pull off. Unlike something like Stuxnet, this seems rudimentary in comparison. As dysfunctional and diminished as Russia may be today, I don't think anyone assumed this was something they couldn't do.
I still want to know where the USS Jimmy Carter was right before this happened. Undersea espionage and sabotage is one of the specified missions for that boat.
There was no gas flowing through the pipeline anyway.
Ukraine is already winning the war.
European states are already looking to buy gas from anywhere but Russia
And finally, there is a huge risk involved for the US. If any evidence ever surfaces, the US may lose the trust of most of its allies. I don't see why taking this risk would be justified.
So the Russians used their equivalent of navy seals to lay bombs and blow out a huge section so it would be ruined? I assume all that saltwater will destroy it in short order?
> Western leaders have stopped short of directly accusing Russia but the EU has previously accused Russia of using its gas supplies as a weapon against the West over its support for Ukraine.
I like the commenters trying to make sense of this event. Has any of the events in Europe up to this point made sense? One of Putin's goals is to fracture NATO, sowing this chaos furthers that goal. I don't think Europe has enough LNG terminals to accept more from the US, even if they could.
i'd love to see a map of the US backed pipeline going from Qatar to Germany that just so happens to go through all of the countries the US was fighting "terrorism" in while also getting caught funding those same terrorists
[+] [-] akmarinov|3 years ago|reply
Now looking at Turk Stream
[+] [-] lake_vincent|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] treis|3 years ago|reply
Russia
For: Plunge Europe into an energy crisis to force concessions in Ukraine
Against: It looks a lot like a glass cannon to me. Meaning, Europe will now change their behavior to remove dependence on Russian energy.
USA
For: They've been against the Nords from the beginning and could pull something like this off
Against: Big escalation, huge potential blow back from Europe, and economic fallout is bad for the midterm elections
Ukraine
For: Removes a large source of Russian leverage over Europe
Against: Doesn't seem like they could pull it off and it risks the support from Europe they do have
Random European Country
For: Lots of them don't like the dependence on Russian energy and many of them have the means
Against: Huge escalation with Russia and risks discord amongst the EU
[+] [-] EarthIsHome|3 years ago|reply
This is not a mystery. The US has the most to gain from this: increase Europe's energy dependence on the US by literally forcing Europe to not use cheap Russian energy
[+] [-] Tuna-Fish|3 years ago|reply
This is very wrong. My brother is a technical diver, and after the blast I had a long chat with him about what it would do to achieve this. After going over the location, the estimated amount of explosives needed to break the pipes, and the depth, he came to the conclusion that he could have done it with 2 friends and a budget of ~10k€.
This was before these new pictures that paint a picture of a more powerful blast than he assumed, but it is still well within the capability of a bunch of very determined activists. This absolutely didn't need to be a state actor.
I came out of the discussion with a newfound appreciation just how fragile a lot of our billion-euro infrastructure is, and how easy it would be to disrupt.
[+] [-] kadoban|3 years ago|reply
Europe was _already_ working about as hard as they could on removing their dependence on Russia though.
Another way to see this would be that around now might be the last chance for something like this to hurt Europe and still have time to put political pressure on afterwards.
If this had been done in the middle of winter, Europe would treat it as an attack and would be on their guard, but now Russia can play political games in the background to destabilize Europe or at least reduce Europe's will to help Ukraine.
[+] [-] marcinzm|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mikece|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] poulpy123|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dtech|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] latchkey|3 years ago|reply
https://thelawdogfiles.com/2022/09/nordstream.html
[+] [-] AbrahamParangi|3 years ago|reply
The Russian government not being a monolith, there must be factions who’d like to stop fucking around in Ukraine and get back to printing money pumping gas to Europe. The peace incentive gets much weaker with the destruction of Nord Stream.
[+] [-] saiya-jin|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] stjohnswarts|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] photochemsyn|3 years ago|reply
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2vbkFzQBo6w
That's very thick steel. Either a whole lot of explosives or some kind of shaped charge/explosively formed penetrator (widely used in oil drilling industry to blow holes in down-well pipe to allow oil flow) must have been used, with possible further damage caused by depressurization of the pipe.
As far as who did it and why? Russia seemed to be pushing Europe for a deal whereby if they went along with the annexation of the eastern provinces of Ukraine they'd open up gas supplies and end the looming energy crisis Europe faces, and a working Nordstream / Nordstream 2 pipeline was necessary for that strategy, so blowing up the pipeline derailed that strategy for months at least.
As to motive on the USA side, several officials in state and energy seem to view this as a 'tremendous opportunity' to shift European gas purchases away from Russian pipelines and towards US LNG tankers (price differential there), not sure how the Qatar gas output is affected.
Europe of course would have been better off pushing a lot harder for wind/solar/storage over the past two decades and getting off the Russian, American and Middle East fossil fuel teat that way, but to quote Jeremey Irons in Margin Call, "That is spilt milk under the bridge". So now what?
[+] [-] schmichael|3 years ago|reply
Furthermore Russia already has 1 pipe “down for maintenance,” so clearly limiting capacity is a huge bargaining chip for them.
I think it’s also worth considering Russia may have internal detractors from their current policies and blowing up a pipe removes it from the equation. It may have even been a warning to those internal detractors: “don’t speak up or we can take all the pipes off the table as bargaining chips.”
Russia benefits from the pipes being a high stakes game far more than the US.
But who knows. The CIA has done dumber things. I just don’t see the incentives for the US especially considering even if we could ship more LNG (it would take years) that would increase energy costs here. The Biden administration has to LOVE being isolated from the madness of Europes gas market at the moment, especially considering the elections and looming winter.
[+] [-] Balgair|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fabian2k|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cced|3 years ago|reply
Ok? You’re stating that they don’t not have motive, so what’s the motive? Why would Russia throw away part of it’s cards? What’s the play?
[+] [-] dylan604|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] xiphias2|3 years ago|reply
Also I don't believe Russia has the technical ability to pull it off so professionally without strong proof being found by US.
Also even if we Europeans think it was the US we can't do much about it as we depend on US.
[+] [-] saiya-jin|3 years ago|reply
Yet nobody saw anything, there are no past records going few hours back of some ship sailing to those spots? I mean US can spot very shallow speed boats of cocaine smugglers for a long time, so they use submarines from what I gathered.
One explanation would be that submarine, but - if I would be doing marine defense, I would be pinging / doing some other equivalent of radar checks very frequently. But maybe this is really difficult to do due ie shape of sea bottom, reach of such pings, animal protections, just pure costs etc.
[+] [-] azinman2|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] HelloMcFly|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 2OEH8eoCRo0|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vicnov|3 years ago|reply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/At_the_Abyss
Reed stated the United States added a Trojan horse to gas pipeline control software that the Soviet Union obtained from a company in Canada.[1] According to Reed, when the components were deployed on a Trans-Siberian gas pipeline, the Trojan horse led to a huge explosion.[1] He wrote: "The pipeline software that was to run the pumps, turbines and valves was programmed to go haywire, to reset pump speeds and valve settings to produce pressures far beyond those acceptable to the pipeline joints and welds. The result was the most monumental non-nuclear explosion and fire ever seen from space."[1]
Also US has been against NS for a while https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/biden-meet-german-chancello...
Also interesting how US media tries to damage control https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ESG14_DsUIA
[+] [-] terran57|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jsw97|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] JasonFruit|3 years ago|reply
I'm going to stop short of directly accusing anyone, but I will say that any motive for Russia to eliminate their economic leverage against a powerful NATO nation escapes me, whereas eliminating that leverage is in the apparent interest of every NATO member nation that wants to see Russia weakened, except Germany. Accusing Russia of this particular act of destruction doesn't make any sense.
[+] [-] somewhereoutth|3 years ago|reply
There is no shortage of undersea infrastructure vulnerable to such attacks, not least bringing gas from Norway to the EU - look at exactly where the pipeline was blown. It is part of a pattern of strategic terror.
[+] [-] BitwiseFool|3 years ago|reply
I don't follow this reasoning. The kind of expertise required to detonate a bomb underwater is likely something any developed country with a reasonably equipped navy/intelligence agency could pull off. Unlike something like Stuxnet, this seems rudimentary in comparison. As dysfunctional and diminished as Russia may be today, I don't think anyone assumed this was something they couldn't do.
[+] [-] mikece|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Deganta|3 years ago|reply
There was no gas flowing through the pipeline anyway.
Ukraine is already winning the war.
European states are already looking to buy gas from anywhere but Russia
And finally, there is a huge risk involved for the US. If any evidence ever surfaces, the US may lose the trust of most of its allies. I don't see why taking this risk would be justified.
[+] [-] eli|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kranke155|3 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] stjohnswarts|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 2OEH8eoCRo0|3 years ago|reply
I like the commenters trying to make sense of this event. Has any of the events in Europe up to this point made sense? One of Putin's goals is to fracture NATO, sowing this chaos furthers that goal. I don't think Europe has enough LNG terminals to accept more from the US, even if they could.
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/dozens-lng-laden-shi...
[+] [-] KingOfCoders|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] w1nst0nsm1th|3 years ago|reply
CIA ~paid troll~ damage control officer here...
Russia have done it because... You know... it must be Russia.
That's so obvious it's impossible to rationaly explain it otherwise.
[+] [-] LaleoDJ|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] JediLuke|3 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] badinsie|3 years ago|reply