Blowing Holes in Seymour Hersh's Pipe Dream

Good piece, and I think he points out some clear problems with the exact events that Hersh describes. I think the lack of a verifiable path for either the ship carrying divers or for the plane that supposedly dropped off the sonobuoy do make it less likely that Hersh&#x27;s version actually happened. The author&#x27;s conclusion is that this is because Hersh&#x27;s source was making things up, but I think it&#x27;s also compatible with someone who heard about the plan but didn&#x27;t fully understand it. Or possibly, heard about it before it was finalized. Hopefully more details will come out.<p>His closing question is &quot;Why leave one of the two Nord Stream 2 pipelines intact&quot;? I haven&#x27;t seen it discussed much, but apparently there actually were 4 leaks, with one pipeline being damaged twice. One possible explanation would be that this was a mistake in the execution by whoever did this, with one pipeline somehow getting two explosives planted. Here&#x27;s a Sept 22 article about the discover of the 4th leak: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.reuters.com&#x2F;business&#x2F;energy&#x2F;fourth-leak-found-nord-stream-pipelines-swedish-coast-guard-says-2022-09-29&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.reuters.com&#x2F;business&#x2F;energy&#x2F;fourth-leak-found-no...</a>

For anyone interested, there&#x27;s more to the accusation of Stoltenberg&#x27;s involvement with intelligence from a young age than the author of this article implies by dismissing it as ridiculous on its face.[1] Whether or not you find the linked narrative convincing is up to you, however.<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.patreon.com&#x2F;posts&#x2F;unlocked-young-78471711" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.patreon.com&#x2F;posts&#x2F;unlocked-young-78471711</a>

I actually was drawn into reading this much more than the original article. I found myself going into skim mode with the original Hersh article. So ironically, I actually learned more about Hersh&#x27;s claims reading this article than the original.<p>I&#x27;ve worked with a bunch of old people of late. And I&#x27;m saying that from the reference point of 52. It&#x27;s hard. I don&#x27;t want to be an ageist. But I regularly see how hard it is to grow older. To do so gracefully scares the heck out of me. Some things are in your control, but it&#x27;s increasingly a journey where the constitution of yourself slips out of your control. Some 85 year olds (Hersh&#x27;s current age) are still sharp as a tack, but even then, the fight to still feel relevant is an uphill battle. It is hard for me to not be suspicious much of Hersh&#x27;s vector here isn&#x27;t hugely influenced by advancing years.

Can someone explain why some people here are so agitated over a claim that the US did it? Is it hard to believe that US intelligence would do something like this? Besides, if you hate Russia then it&#x27;s a good thing right?

I agree with his assessment that Hersh&#x27;s story is so detailed and that it&#x27;s a red flag. It was what I felt when reading it. Feeling something doesn&#x27;t make it true of course.<p>But ironically, I think there&#x27;s quite a bit of circumstantial evidence to make at least the jist of Hersh&#x27;s story correct. The big thing for me is the near complete media silence. You&#x27;d think blowing up a huge piece of civilian infrastructure would stir up a bigger frenzy, but no. If we really did not know and it was plausibly Russia, it would get talked about a lot more.

While the Seymour Hersh story seems unbelievable to me, so does the initial explanation that was being thrown around, that Russia did this as sabotage, e.g., <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.washingtonpost.com&#x2F;world&#x2F;2022&#x2F;09&#x2F;28&#x2F;nord-stream-russia-methane-leak-baltic-sea&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.washingtonpost.com&#x2F;world&#x2F;2022&#x2F;09&#x2F;28&#x2F;nord-stream-...</a>.<p>The utter stupidity of that idea is along the sames lines as rhetoric, also present in OP, that Russia &quot;weaponized&quot; its gas pipelines. (To use that language, nearly anything can be a &quot;weapon.&quot;) I&#x27;m going to just go out on a limb here and say that I won&#x27;t take seriously anything that doesn&#x27;t immediately address how insane those initial accusations, of Russian sabotage of its own pipelines, were.

There may be an incorrect statement regarding the Norwegian P-8 in the linked article.<p>The author states that that &quot;they won’t enter into active service until later this year&quot;, but the source the author links to doesn&#x27;t actually make that claim. All it says is that the P-3s will keep flying until sometime in 2023, when the &quot;P-8 is ready to take over&quot;. I don&#x27;t think that implies that Norway doesn&#x27;t already have some P-8s in active operation.

When the evidence is thin, it&#x27;s best to avoid committing to a belief either way, despite the temptation.<p>Related Paul Graham essay, &quot;Keep your identity small&quot;: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.paulgraham.com&#x2F;identity.html" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.paulgraham.com&#x2F;identity.html</a>

I regret that Hersh&#x27;s reporting relied on anonymous officials. That&#x27;s not a dig on Hersh - this is the standard for journalism on these topics. As a standard it creates a deniability to any story that comes out e.g. &quot;they probably made it up&quot;, &quot;the source doesn&#x27;t know what they are talking about&quot;, &quot;the source is influencing the journalist for their own ends&quot;.<p>I think Hersh&#x27;s article is interesting and useful however. There are specific details that journalists can dig into in the future to find validating hard facts. This may ultimately press a government to cop up to involvement over time, once enough evidence has mounted. That&#x27;s not to say there aren&#x27;t possible false leads and inaccuracies in his report.<p>For the linked article - it commits far more journalistic sins than Hersh&#x27;s article - in an attempt to take it down. Through continued use of insinuation, analogies, and strawmen the author makes the strongest possible case that there&#x27;s not merit to Hersh&#x27;s argument - but for me it comes across as Sophomoric.<p>In terms of who destroyed the pipeline it is clear that the United States, United Kingdom and Ukraine had strong motives - and the US and UK capability. It&#x27;s difficult to read commentary that dismisses these motivations out of hand as outrageous. Or at least, I&#x27;m coming in with priors that significantly diverge from these commentators.

Well, somebody blew up that pipeline. And the list of possible suspects is very short. Germany, Denmark and Sweden have not yet blamed Russia.

The main problem with Hersh&#x27;s claims is why the US&#x2F;Norway would keep one of the two new NS2 lines intact? That line alone is big enough to meet Germany&#x27;s domestic demands and according to Nord Stream AG one of the other lines received so little damage that they can fix it in a year or less.

Wow...what a brilliant piece of propaganda.<p>&quot;I am unsure as to why all the intelligence officials in the initial planning meetings for the mission felt that the only possible way to sabotage the pipeline would be at the short section directly bordering Russia, instead of the large section in more favorable waters.&quot;<p>I can think of one reason; to make it look more likely that Russia did it.<p>And why oh why would Norway help??? I&#x27;ll give you 263 billion reasons...<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.bloomberg.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;articles&#x2F;2023-01-16&#x2F;norway-s-gas-bonanza-set-to-boost-already-gigantic-oil-fund" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.bloomberg.com&#x2F;news&#x2F;articles&#x2F;2023-01-16&#x2F;norway-s-...</a><p>But no where doe the writer mention why Russia would do this to themselves.

It does seem like what happened is that Hersh got a legitimate source (probably in the US or Norwegian intelligence community) who was willing to talk about an existing plan for this kind of operation, and then spun it into a story just declaring that it happened that way.<p>In point of fact probably every major player in the region had a plan like this. Nord Stream 2 was a huge football for everyone with interest. We just don&#x27;t know who did it. Maybe we never will. But reporting on a plan doesn&#x27;t tell us much of anything.<p>My own opinion: I think it probably wasn&#x27;t the US, simply because the Biden folks are being so cautious in so many other ways. I mean, you know this kind of thing will eventually get out. Why blow up a gas line but not sent ATACMS? Just doesn&#x27;t make strategic sense. If we wanted to roll the dice and push harder there are <i>so</i> many more effective ways to do it. I still think the &quot;Putin did it to silence internal dissent&quot; theory sounds best. Could also be more hawkish European governments trying to keep the Germans from waffling.<p>Edit to note: the fact that the two replies are immediately jumping back into the essentially false[1] &quot;Biden said he would blow up Nord Stream 2&quot; canard in response tells us how uninformative Hersh&#x27;s story turns out to be. It&#x27;s not proof of anything.<p>[1] It was a statement in the press conference before the war started about possible consequences and responses. The context was sanctions and international condemnation, literally no one at the time, even the most Russophilic pundits and anti-imperialist tankies, interpreted this as a military threat.

To the people are saying &quot;oh this is just nitpicking&quot;, it&#x27;s not. Hersh&#x27;s claims are extraordinary[0], and require if not extraordinary evidence, at least evidence that&#x27;s not sloppy as hell.<p>Given the subject matter it&#x27;s completely reasonable that he could only have anonymous sources. But when you have anonymous sources then their information has to line up with reality. If it doesn&#x27;t then you&#x27;re either getting played or dealing with someone who has kind of lost it and maybe is exaggerating&#x2F;misinterpreting information that they _do_ have access to. Getting basic claims wrong like the kind of boats involved, or the location of the attack, or the equipment required is disqualifying enough to disregard other more salacious claims.<p>That all said: the US may very well have been behind it, but Hersh does nothing to prove that in his original article in light of the inconsistencies.<p>[0] Not so extraordinary that we would blow up a pipeline, but that Biden would pull the silly &quot;I&#x27;m-not-covert-actioning&quot; word game. It&#x27;s stupid and wouldn&#x27;t shield him from accountability any more than just telling DevGru&#x2F;DO(or whatever the abbreviation is now) not to tell gang of 8.

It is interesting why this article is not banned from HN after Seymour Hersh&#x27;s article was banned. :)

I don’t care either way who blew up the pipeline but to me the biggest glaring reason why I don’t think it’s the US is because Russia did not retaliate in any meaningful way.<p>Us peons are clueless about what happened but Russia knows and they would know if it was them. If it wasn’t them then it’s obvious who did It and escalating the war would be justified. The fact this didn’t happen to me suggests it was Russia all along.

Cui prodest? That&#x27;s the only question that matters, the one people writing articles like this want you to ignore.

Wrt. the claim about BALTOPS, <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;sfn.nato.int&#x2F;newsroom&#x2F;news-archive&#x2F;2022&#x2F;lasting-mine-countermeasures-partnerships-built-during-baltops-22" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;sfn.nato.int&#x2F;newsroom&#x2F;news-archive&#x2F;2022&#x2F;lasting-mine...</a> seems relevant:<p>&gt; Lasting Mine Countermeasures partnerships built during BALTOPS 22 &gt; Experimentation on new types of unmanned underwater vehicles were also tested off the coast of Bornholm Island, Denmark during the exercise.<p>Them having used mines in prior BALTOPS exercises doesn&#x27;t necessarily preclude what Seymour noted. BALTOPS 22 _does_ seem to have been more mine-focused than usual, according to the article.

If this guy wants me to believe him he needs to stop insulting Hersh. I appreciate the deep dive (get it) of this piece, and I appreciate his calling out what he believes to be bullshit. But I DO NOT appreciate the ad hominem attacks on Hersh.

Hersh&#x27;s story sounds reasonable, but my question is who in this situation would leak it?<p>Vietnam had thousands of kids drafted straight out of high school witnessing a massacre that might want to get something off their chest. Here you&#x27;ve got an elite strike team of military specialists hand picked for the mission to serve God and Country. What on earth would anybody involved here have to gain by leaking any of this, beyond a court martial and a bunch of strife for those you supposedly serve?

Other discussion on this is at <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=34821872#34825139" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=34821872#34825139</a>

The reality is that we truly live in a post-truth world. Maybe we always have.<p>When it comes to Ukraine, that means you can&#x27;t trust anything. Any piece you read will have the taint of Ukrainian, American, or Russian propaganda.<p>I gave up on trying to figure out what is really going on in this scenario a while back.<p>Something is going on. There&#x27;s definitely some deeper exchange happening. But I&#x27;ll probably never know what.

As long as this story remains uncofirmed by another party I&#x27;ll continue to hold reservations. Still inconvlusive.

Here in Central Europe there is a general tacit understanding that &quot;of course it was the Americans&quot;. It just doesn&#x27;t make sense to the people that Russia did it... what would it gain from this?

Some of the most prolific bull-shitters on the planet are people who claim to have been part of some secret military operation and have inside knowledge in great detail, hinting that they played a major role in the planning and execution. Anyone who served in the military knows this because these elaborate confabulations are the jam of a certain kind of military person. Seymour Hersh is older than my father (85). My father doesn&#x27;t suffer from any brain diseases but he has definitely declined in mental acuity. Has Mr. Hersh considered retiring? Or can he back up his claims?<p>I say this as someone who wouldn&#x27;t be surprised if America was involved

After years and years of dubious, &quot;anonymous sources&quot; literally making up claims, I have come to doubt the truthfulness of nearly anyone who claims something from an anonymous sources.<p>Even if it is from a well regarded journalist. This is a consequence of how far the profession has fallen.

Of course that it&#x27;s from Oliver Alexander. Apart from the NAFO minions and from that Paul Massaro lunatic one couldn&#x27;t have found a less impartial source. Give me Jihadi Julian (who&#x27;s also pro-Ukraine) one thousand times over this guy.

people always doubt Hersh but he&#x27;s rarely wrong, and he has incredible sources.<p>Btw, the US&#x2F;NATO sabotaging that pipeline isn&#x27;t exactly a crazy idea.

While interesting, the author appears to be nitpicking. It does not really refute Hersh&#x27;s story, because these minor inconsistencies appear in any news article, including the NYT.<p>It is irrelevant whether Hersh gets all details right, the important thing is whether his source is correct on the big picture or not.<p>It seems to me that the veracity of Hersh&#x27;s claims cannot be decided by textual analysis, but rather by another investigative reporter who would travel for months to Florida, Norway, etc. and try to dig into the story. But who will finance that? Who would dare that?

This text doesn’t really disproof the Hersh story beyond nitpicking some details and incorrect use of technical languages. (Admittedly it would be hard to disprove; and it is the accuser that has the burden of proof.)<p>However the big issue is the complete shutdown of media coverage and that the governments of Denmark, Sweden, and Germany all keep their investigations secret.

Sure, there are probably some holes&#x2F;slight inaccuracies in Hersh&#x27;s story. This particular &quot;debunking&quot; is mostly nitpicking. The tweet about the minesweeper path is a head-scratcher, because it sure looks like the boat slowed down&#x2F;loitered near both blast sites.<p>It is interesting that the White House, CIA, State Department, and establishment media class all found the need to promptly respond to what they characterized as a &quot;blog post&quot; and &quot;conspiracy theory&quot; from a &quot;discredited former journalist&quot;. Thousands of such speculations are published every day on the internet, and the government does not find the need to respond.<p>It is also interesting that none of the above government organizations volunteered an alternative explanation for who bombed their ally&#x27;s critical infrastructure. You would think that the #1 intelligence service in the world would be able to offer some explanation on the matter, almost half a year later, to quell the speculation.

The sheer number of rhetorical fallacies employed in the opening of this &quot;takedown&quot; inclines me to believe that Hersh&#x27;s reporting is a largely accurate and truthful account.<p>For example, stating that you could write &quot;an entire post on the reasons why sounds entirely made up by someone with no real grasp of what that suggestion would actually technically entail&quot; is a clear-cut <i>appeal to ridicule</i>[1] fallacy with no further elaboration.<p>[1]: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Appeal_to_ridicule" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Appeal_to_ridicule</a>

If the US did blow it up, then good work.<p>It reduces Putin’s energy blackmail ability by just taking some of it off the table. It was kind of like shooting the hostage.<p>I would not even consider it a scandal. It’s all Europe’s fault for making themselves energy dependents on a dictator.

There was a P8 dropping a sonar bouy a few hours before the blast. Monkeywerx on YouTube has a few videos on that. Then there&#x27;s Biden explicitly stating it would be no more and they would end it, also on YouTube.

It’s interesting to me that dang overrode community moderation of this story [1] yesterday. Without having first even read it. A story that was based on an unverified anonymous source, by a discredited journalist, and which as we see now contained provably made up parts.<p>Because dang overrode moderation, that literal fake news (fake as in actually made up) was allowed to hover on the front page for a long time and given a legitimacy it didn’t deserve. It was able to be seen by a very large audience over a very long time.<p>Sadly an article that counters to that fake news makes it to the front page for a brief moment and after 3 hours is no on the 5th page.<p>So many of those people that saw the first will never see the second and get the wrong idea. It’s the old story about a lie can travel halfway around the world before the truth puts on its shoes. Sadly to me that it was Hacker News that decided to actively help spread the lie.<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=34707305" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=34707305</a>