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I don’t think it’s rocket science. - Condoleeza Rice [2014]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btk_Ldd3NF0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btk_Ldd3NF0 - Biden &

by wsc981 4y ago

I don’t think it’s rocket science. - Condoleeza Rice [2014]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btk_Ldd3NF0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btk_Ldd3NF0 - Biden & Schulz [2022]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OS4O8rGRLf8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OS4O8rGRLf8 - US warns German port of crushing sanctions [2020]: https://www.dw.com/en/nord-stream-2-us-senators-threaten-german-port-with-crushing-sanctions/a-54473119 https://www.dw.com/en/nord-stream-2-us-senators-threaten-ger...

phtrivier 4y ago
Oh, it's no rocket science that the USA have been against the pipeline for a while, that they have been pressuring Germany to reduce dependency on Russia for strategic reason, and that they have a vested interest in the pipeline going away (since they are themselves selling gas to replace it.) Which just makes them _one_ of the many parties that have an intereset in blowing up the pipeline. Again, it's really tempting to jump to this conclusion, not at all unreasonnable or unrealistic, it's just that there _are_ alternatives, and we're still in the mist about that. It's not rocket science, it's much worse: it's geopolitics. At least in rocket science, you have launches as a "moment of truth" (rocket up / rocket not up.) We love it in HN because it's both very hard to do and very simple to interpret. Politics ? The exact opposite. Very simple to lie / deceit / build narrative, hardly impossible to get a clear answer on anything - you can always add a "rail in the pool" and build a "credible" alternative narrative. (My personnal "favorite guess", which is really nothing than that, would be that Ukraine would have done it with some light support (trainging ? intelligence ?) from the USA, while Germany was just "looking the other way". This would provide a "win" for Ukraine, "plausible deniability" for the USA, and "one negoctiation chip less" for Russia to put pressure on Germany - sometimes, constraints are liberating. Pure speculation. No data. I won't feel bad if it ends up being wrong. Would feel better if the war could just stop tomorrow.) I suppose the closest thing we have to an "arbitrer of truth" will be the Nordics-based investigation ? Sweden is not in NATO yet, Norway and Denmark do not seem particularly hawkish (but I could be wrong), yet they don't have friendly ties to Russia, it's weird stuff happening "close to home"... who knows ? Knowing this is not exactly in my circle of control. I'm more interested in how we're going to make EU neither "Russian-gas dependant", nor "US-gas dependant", nor "Middle-East-gas dependant".

by wsc981 4y ago

phtrivier 4y ago

Oh, it's no rocket science that the USA have been against the pipeline for a while, that they have been pressuring Germany to reduce dependency on Russia for strategic reason, and that they have a vested interest in the pipeline going away (since they are themselves selling gas to replace it.) Which just makes them _one_ of the many parties that have an intereset in blowing up the pipeline. Again, it's really tempting to jump to this conclusion, not at all unreasonnable or unrealistic, it's just that there _are_ alternatives, and we're still in the mist about that. It's not rocket science, it's much worse: it's geopolitics. At least in rocket science, you have launches as a "moment of truth" (rocket up / rocket not up.) We love it in HN because it's both very hard to do and very simple to interpret. Politics ? The exact opposite. Very simple to lie / deceit / build narrative, hardly impossible to get a clear answer on anything - you can always add a "rail in the pool" and build a "credible" alternative narrative. (My personnal "favorite guess", which is really nothing than that, would be that Ukraine would have done it with some light support (trainging ? intelligence ?) from the USA, while Germany was just "looking the other way". This would provide a "win" for Ukraine, "plausible deniability" for the USA, and "one negoctiation chip less" for Russia to put pressure on Germany - sometimes, constraints are liberating. Pure speculation. No data. I won't feel bad if it ends up being wrong. Would feel better if the war could just stop tomorrow.) I suppose the closest thing we have to an "arbitrer of truth" will be the Nordics-based investigation ? Sweden is not in NATO yet, Norway and Denmark do not seem particularly hawkish (but I could be wrong), yet they don't have friendly ties to Russia, it's weird stuff happening "close to home"... who knows ? Knowing this is not exactly in my circle of control. I'm more interested in how we're going to make EU neither "Russian-gas dependant", nor "US-gas dependant", nor "Middle-East-gas dependant".