Veteran American journalist Seymour Hersh set social media and newsrooms around the globe alight when he reported on his Substack Thursday that the US government blew up the pipelines built to carry cheap Russian energy to Germany and Western European states — Nord Stream 1 and 2..Citing an unnamed source, the 85-year-old Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist claims that US deep-sea divers planted mines along the pipelines that were later detonated remotely, doing so under the cover of a NATO maritime exercise called BALTOPS 22..The series of explosions that levelled Nord Stream 1 and 2 in September were considered deliberate. While many suspected US involvement, no culprit was unequivocally identified..Hersh — who made international headlines more than five decades ago after exposing the My Lai massacre of Vietnamese civilians by US troops — writes that US President Joe Biden’s decision to sabotage the pipelines came after more than nine months of “highly secret back and forth debate inside Washington’s national security community.”.“For much of that time, the issue was not whether to do the mission, but how to get it done with no overt clue as to who was responsible,” writes Hersh..As further highlighted by Hersh, Nord Stream 1 was “dangerous enough” in the eyes of NATO and Washington, however Nord Stream 2, which was completed in September 2021, would double the amount of cheap gas made available to Western Europe, therefore “Washington was afraid countries like Germany would be reluctant to supply Ukraine with the money and weapons it needed to defeat Russia.”.Without the pipelines, Europe would have no choice but to end its reliance on Moscow and, as a result, Russia would lose billions of dollars that could have been allocated to its war efforts..In February last year, Biden warned there would be action taken toward Nord Stream 2 if Russia invaded Ukraine..Speaking at a joint news conference with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Biden said, "If Russia invades, again, then there will be no longer a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it.”.When asked how he would do that, he responded, "I promise you we will be able to do it.".As per Hersh’s report, White House spokesperson Adrienne Watson said his claims are “complete fiction." Central Intelligence Agency spokesperson Tammy Thorp also called the allegations “completely and utterly false.”
