A few days ago we learned that US spy agencies knew in advance of plans by Ukraine to bomb the Nord Stream pipeline. Today there's more. We not only knew about it, we warned Ukraine not to do it:
The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency warned the Ukrainian government not to attack the Nord Stream gas pipelines last summer after it obtained detailed information about a Ukrainian plot to destroy a main energy connection between Russia and Europe, officials familiar with the exchange said.
The message, delivered by CIA officials in June, followed a tip the CIA received from the military intelligence service of the Netherlands, these officials said.
....The CIA then received information that Ukraine had called off the original plan, according to a U.S. official....At a meeting with a European counterpart in October [after the bombing], CIA Director William Burns told his counterpart that available evidence didn’t point to Russia. When asked if it was Ukraine, he said, “I hope not,” according to an official present at the meeting.
The CIA thought Ukraine had given up on the plan after the warning, but apparently they only delayed it. This was certainly ballsy behavior from a country that desperately needed billions of dollars in military aid from the US for its war with Russia.
"This was certainly ballsy behavior . . . "
I think the word you're looking for is "testicularity."
There's also still no evidence Ukraine actually did it, either.
People talking about them doing it isn't evidence they did it,
There's evidence, it's just isn't of high quality, or very compelling.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Nord_Stream_pipeline_sabotage#Involvement_by_Ukraine
Good for them. The only good Russians and dead ones. Blow up the rest of it.
So you're saying because we didn't let them run their own war of self-defense we should just not aid them and let all of our geo-strategic priorities in Europe (and probably Asia) evaporate? This is the same mentality that thinks we are entitled to be the chief of staff of the IDF too.
I hope the new cancer drugs are working, but your takes have been terrible lately. Like, you used to write for Mother Jones and you're now "fuck workers go back to the office"?
Seems like a lot of grumpy old man yells at cloud takes.
It's been real these last 20+ years, and you used to have me on your blogroll way back when, but I'm done. Another one bites the dust.
Only Josh managed to not lose his fucking mind of the original netroots.
Josh has Bernie derangement syndrome.
I don't think it was as risky as all that. And in any case, seems like it was a bet that paid off pretty well.
If Nordstream had been left alone, Germany might well have crippled UA's defense. German government is substantially more infiltrated by Russia than ours; there was a serious risk there.
Destroying it clarified matters for all players in a fairly decisive fashion.
Yeah. I'm more than willing to cut Ukraine a lot of slack here. I say they should feel perfectly justified wrecking any and all Russian infrastructure they can get their hands on unless and until Russia stops bombing Ukrainian hospitals, apartment buildings, etc. and leaves Ukraine the fuck alone.
Plus-one.
As an added advantage, Europe is moving faster towards replaciung oil'n'gas with renewable power. This, however, could encourage monkeywrenching everywhere...
Isn't the only source for this a document leaked by a pro-Russian actor? There's a good chance he'll retire to his dacha in Russia like the woman who accused Biden of sexual assault.
Most of the docs have been accurate and there evidence it was Ukraine if not that the US warned them
Two Russian POWs, one describes how he was captured because he couldn't go forward because he would be shot, and couldn't retreat because he would be shot so he stayed in place hoping the Ukrainians would take him prisoner,
https://twitter.com/wartranslated/status/1668555889429684224
the second describes how it was his job to shoot anyone retreating.
Not convinced. Ukraine throughout has been extremely efficient, of necessity, using their limited weapons to degrade Russia’s warfighting capability. I don’t see that bombing the Nordstream pipelines hinders Russia’s military operations. It does seem that it would be stupid for Russia to destroy it, but it wouldn’t be the only stupid decision by Putin …
I wonder why the CIA warned them not to do this. When you've been invaded by a nuclear-armed bully, it seems to me that going after the bully's economic infrastructure is fair game.
Pretty simple. Because Ukraine has to act like the "good guys" in a movie to smooth the path to support. And in this case it hurt Germany at a time when they were still pretty wobbly about allowing things like tanks to be sent.
Of course Ukraine prefers to act like a country at war which any state would sensibly do. Hence why they blew up Dugina with a car bomb and bombed the cafe where the war blogger influencer was giving a speech.
Ukraine did what now?
Just because it benefits Ukraine, or was done by those friendly to Ukraine, doesn't mean it was Ukraine who did things.