Try to find this story in any North American outlet and you will be frustrated. .Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Seymour Hersh — who spent his career exposing the lies and corruption within both the public and private sectors — contends the United States blew up the Nord Stream pipelines. The pipelines were owned by Germany. The liquid natural gas (LNG) that ran through it was owned by Russia. .If the U.S. destroyed the pipelines it's arguably an act of war against three entities: Germany, Russia and NATO. It is also economic and environmental terrorism. Lots of greenhouse gas was created by all that LNG in the water. And it is the inevitable fulfillment of U.S. President Joe Biden’s irresponsible and unruly foreign policy. .Hersh based his reporting on the revelations of a source who said U.S. Navy divers planted the explosives during a NATO exercise. “Last June, the navy divers, operating under the cover of a widely publicized mid-summer NATO exercise known as BALTOPS 22, planted the remotely-triggered explosives that, three months later, destroyed three of the four Nord Stream pipelines, according to a source with direct knowledge of the operational planning,” Hersh wrote on Substack Wednesday. .Read the story. I use the descriptive word "legendary" sparingly, but Hersh's reporting has been legendary. His latest story is so detailed it's difficult to imagine a journalist of Hersh’s credibility would run with this without knowing it is true. .I believe it is. .This is one of the biggest stories of the decade and yet few media outlets in North America are bothering to talk about it. .Fox News’ Tucker Carlson, who hosts the most popular cable news show on television, talked about Nord Stream during his Wednesday night monologue. He said nothing about it Thursday night. .Few other North American media outlets have covered the story — especially in Canada. But you can read all about in the U.K. and India. .One of the few people to cover the story in North America was my colleague Reid Small who detailed the grave allegations in a Western Standard story. .I would compare the action to the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand on June 28, 1914. That proved to be the precipitating event of the First World War, a single mad act that set-in motion a series of reactions from intractable alliance systems. Within five weeks, Europe was marching to the cataclysm of the Great War, which caused the deaths of millions and ruined economies. .But the armaments industries came out alright. .The assassination was covered by newspapers throughout the globe, but no one guessed it would plunge the world into war. .Of course, the Biden administration denied the story, calling it “utterly false and complete fiction.” .Biden has been claiming the Russians destroyed the pipeline. But this cover story never made a hint of sense because Russia wants to sell its LNG to Germany — unlike our own Prime Minister Trudeau who couldn’t see a business case — and if they had wanted to stop selling it to Germany the Russians could have merely shut off the tap. .Ironically, at the time the pipelines sank to the bottom of the Baltic Sea, NATO issued a statement that condemned the “deliberate, reckless” sabotage. .This is how bizarre our world has become: Bald faced lies and denial. .As I’ve said before, since the end of the Cold War, NATO has been an organization in search of a mission. Its decision to expand its grasp to virtually every nation in Europe has been self-defeating and provocative. If it is now engaged in the clandestine destruction Russia’s energy sector and Europe’s access to that energy, all the while waging a proxy war against Valdimir Putin, it is heading for catastrophe. .As a military officer, I was a hawk throughout my professional life, but watching journalists cheerleading our march to nuclear war with Russia has challenged my convictions and convinced me that de-escalation of a conflict and seeking peace is definitely the preferred option right now.
