WATCH: Sy Hersh on CN Live! — ‘American Sabotage’

Seymour Hersh joined CN Live! on Friday to discuss his investigation into the U.S. sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines.

The most accomplished investigative reporter of the past five decades was CN Live!‘s guest on Friday, talking about his report on the covert U.S. operation to blow up the pipelines bringing gas from Russia to Germany; the war in Ukraine, and the state of journalism.

Investigative reporter Seymour Hersh says a friend has told him that all he’s done is to “deconstruct the obvious.” It was obvious because there was logically only one possible suspect for the destruction of three of the four major Nord Stream 1 & 2 pipelines under the Baltic Sea on Sept. 26 last year.

President Joe Biden, with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz by his side at a White House press conference, said in February 2022, that if Russia invades Ukraine “there will no longer be a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it.” Asked by a reporter how the U.S. could do that given that it was controlled by Germany, Biden said: “I promise you we will be able to do it.”

In January 2022, U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland said: “If Russia invades Ukraine, one way or another Nord Stream 2 will not move forward.”

On the day of the explosion Radek Sikorski, a former Polish foreign minister and husband of the arch neoconservative writer Anne Applebaum, tweeted a photo of the explosion, writing “Thank you, USA.”

Four days after the explosion, which caused the largest emission of methane gas into the atmosphere in history, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said: “It’s a tremendous opportunity to once and for all remove the dependence on Russian energy and thus to take away from Vladimir Putin the weaponization of energy as a means of advancing his imperial designs.”

Earlier this month the neoconservative Nuland told a U.S. Senate hearing that: “I am, and I think the administration is very gratified to know that Nord Stream 2 … is a hunk of metal at the bottom of the sea.”

Instead, the U.S. blamed Moscow, saying it was weaponizing gas to gain leverage over Germany and other European countries dependent on cheap Russian gas.

But all Russia had to do was turn off the valve, not destroy pipelines worth more than $11 billion that is 51 percent owned by Russian state-owned company Gazprom. The other 49 percent is owned by a consortium of German, Dutch and French companies. Russia has announced that it will repair the pipeline that the U.S. says it blew up.

The destruction of the pipelines opened financial opportunities for Norway. On the very next day it opened its own gas pipeline to Poland. Since the explosion, the United States has increased much more expensive Liquified Natural Gas exports to Germany and other parts of Europe. Germany was 50 percent dependent on Russian gas and the sabotage has hurt German business and citizens, trying to heat their homes.

The obvious has become more concrete with the reporting of Sy Hersh, who has sketched out the details of how the U.S. and Norway carried out the covert operation to destroy Nord Stream 1 & 2.

The plan was cooked up, according to Hersh, in September 2021, months before Russia entered the war in Ukraine, and planning continued throughout the period in which the U.S. said it wanted to stop Russia’s intervention.

Under cover of a NATO exercise in the Baltic Sea, U.S. Navy divers out of Panama City, Florida planted C-4 explosives on the pipelines in June 2022. Hersh reports that Biden did not want the detonation to occur so soon after the exercise, fearing it would point to NATO’s guilt. Instead the explosives were set off on Sept. 26, 2022 when a Norwegian plane dropped a device into the sea that sent audio signals to set them off, according to Hersh, citing “a source with direct knowledge of the operational planning.”

Hersh reports that the plot was driven by Nuland, U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Joe Biden himself. It was run by the Central Intelligence Agency. The Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the State and Treasury Departments were also involved.

The United States has been angry about Europe buying Russian gas since it began in 1973 under Willy Brandt’s Ostpolitk. Even before that John F. Kennedy got NATO to ban German exports of pipes to the Soviet Union. The U.S. has for decades tried to stop Russian gas to Europe. So this would not be the first time the C.I.A. led an operation to blow up a Russian pipeline. The Washington Post reported in 2004:

In January 1982, President Ronald Reagan approved a CIA plan to sabotage the economy of the Soviet Union through covert transfers of technology that contained hidden malfunctions, including software that later triggered a huge explosion in a Siberian natural gas pipeline, according to a new memoir by a Reagan White House official.

Thomas C. Reed, a former Air Force secretary who was serving in the National Security Council at the time, describes the episode in “At the Abyss: An Insider’s History of the Cold War,” … Reed writes that the pipeline explosion was just one example of “cold-eyed economic warfare” against the Soviet Union that the CIA carried out under Director William J. Casey during the final years of the Cold War.

At the time, the United States was attempting to block Western Europe from importing Soviet natural gas. There were also signs that the Soviets were trying to steal a wide variety of Western technology. Then, a KGB insider revealed the specific shopping list and the CIA slipped the flawed software to the Soviets in a way they would not detect it.”

Sy Hersh brings a history of breaking some of the biggest stories in the annals of American journalism. Among his major scoops were the My Lai massacre in 1969, for which he won a Pulitzer; a 1974 exposure of C.I.A. domestic spying on hundreds of thousands of U.S. leftists and anti-war activists, which led to the Church Committee investigation of U.S. intelligence abuses; and the torture at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq in 2004.

Seymour Hersh at the 2004 Letelier-Moffitt Human Rights Award (Institute for Policy Studies/Wikimedia Commons)

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49 comments for “WATCH: Sy Hersh on CN Live! — ‘American Sabotage’

  1. Robert B. Livingston
    February 19, 2023 at 10:54

    If only Mr. Hersh’s anonymous source would come forward and reveal themself!

    What courage that would take! How many lives might that save?

  2. Vera Gottlieb
    February 19, 2023 at 10:47

    America…stop crapping on the world. The stench you spread all over the globe is more than nauseating.

  3. Donald Duck
    February 19, 2023 at 08:27

    Are these are the initial steps in the coming nuclear war of NATO against the Russian Federation? Do the Americans and their allies/minions actually know what the are doing? Don’t they know that the Russians are armed to the teeth with state of the art nukes? The whole of the west has been targeted and is unstoppable?

    But apparently Russia is to be broken up and the West will roll-over them. Yeah right. This is just lunatic thinking.

  4. Masud Awan
    February 19, 2023 at 07:45

    Plausible deniability the US government demands that this story be leaked through Hersh in a non-mainstream news outlet.

  5. Mary Hysmith
    February 18, 2023 at 13:46

    Mr. Hersh. Nuland, Sullivan, and Blinken have long relationships with Hilliary Clinton. I have read that Nuland is Clinton’s closest friend. In my opinion, Clinton has never gotten over losing the 2016 election. In her efforts to mentally rationalize that loss, she blames Putin. She still has some devotees who support her in this belief. I know another who has a theory that Nuland has a personal hatred towards Putin and Russians related to her grandparents being Trotskyites who were driven out of Russia by Stalin. I have no idea as to Sullivan and Blinken other than neither is very bright.

    • Masud Awan
      February 19, 2023 at 08:51

      And she also could not see her mantra of ‘Assad must go’ coming to fruition – again because of Putin. And that had implications for Israel too – regime change in Syria was originally an Israeli demand, to block the rout of Iranian support reaching Hezballah. Therefore Nuland’s grudge against Putin had multiple reasons.

  6. February 18, 2023 at 11:43

    A combination of various views and critiques of Hersh’s dictum:

    hxxps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34821872&ref=upstract.com

  7. Raymond Sullivan
    February 18, 2023 at 11:12

    I called my congressman, Kevin Mullin from San Mateo, CA. I talked with someone at his office and asked them to look at the story, do an investigation. I told them if it is true they should remove the president and the people who worked on this from office. I think these people, responsible for making this decision, are going to start World War III.

    • Valerie
      February 18, 2023 at 16:58

      And when do you expect an answer?

  8. Randal Marlin
    February 18, 2023 at 09:29

    The most valuable takeaway for me from the interview was when Hersh revealed how he would start his investigations. “Always start at the bottom “- the grunts in the army, the workers on the pipeline, because when you get to the top you are talking to people conditioned to thinking about how information they give will affect their careers. In other words, you don’t get reliable information. The low-level workers talk a lot to each other, and you can get a consistent picture from talking to them. So when Hersh refers 12 times in his article to “a source” or “the source” it need not be the same person.

  9. February 18, 2023 at 07:34

    Dear Senators Rubio and Scott and Congressman Posey,

    I am writing to you to express my opposition to the war in Ukraine and the further delivery of arms and
    funding of Ukraine in the present conflict with Russia. It is my hope that you will vote against further
    funding of the war as my elected representatives. I have voted for each of you in each election since
    I returned to Florida in 2014, after 4 years of living and working in Germany. As soon as the U.S. stops
    funding the war and supplying arms, Ukraine will no longer be able to continue the war and a settlement
    will end it. This war could and should have been avoided. Ukraine was never capable of winning. Ukraine
    started the war with at least a 2-1 disadvantage in the number of troops. After one year of war, the Russian
    advantage has grown to 5-1, possibly as much as 10-1. The only result of this conflict is the slaughter of
    hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians and tens of thousands of Russians. Half of the army that Ukraine
    started the war with are already dead or wounded. Once the other half is killed, Ukraine will be finished,
    leaving a million dead. Funding or supplying arms to facilitate such carnage ought to be considered war
    crimes. The U.S. should call for an immediate cease-fire and accept any terms that Russia requires to
    end the fighting.

    I have long been a student of history and have devoted much of my studies toward military history. I have
    always held a particular interest in both WW1 and WW2. I have also had a strong interest in Russian history
    and Russian authors. I have studied the present conflict in detail and have reached several conclusions about the causes and effects. One of my conclusions is that the U.S. and NATO provoked Russia into this war and bears responsibility for the outcome. This is of course contrary to the propaganda which is widely spread by the U.S. and European press, on behalf of the CIA, the White House and the leaders of most NATO countries. That propaganda establishes Ukraine as the victim of unprovoked Russian aggression. The simple fact is that the U.S. and NATO provoked Russia into this conflict through various actions over the past 10-15 years.

    The actions of the U.S. in Ukraine and toward Russia have been well documented by John J. Mearsheimer, Col. Douglas MacGregor and Scott Ritter. Each of these men has extensive military experience and knowledge of U.S. foreign policy. I am that you also have years of expertise in both areas. Quite simply, the U.S. was for a time the world’s only superpower. That time has passed into a phase where the U.S. exists now in a tri-polar world, along with Russia and China. The U.S. must now co-exist with two other major powers with nuclear arsenals large enough to destroy the entire planet. As John Mearsheimer explains, in a tri-polar world, we must ideally obtain parity with the other two powers. Failing that, we should be aligned with at least one of the other two nations. The losing scenario would be where we are isolated with the other two powers aligned against us. This is the grave situation that our incompetent President has
    led us into.

    Joe Biden has been a complete disaster since the day he was sworn in as President. He immediately
    cancelled a major new oil pipeline and took a series of measures intended to curtail oil and gas exploration
    and production. As you well know, the U.S. was energy independent up until that point and now must import
    oil that we could readily produce in the U.S. These malicious acts decreased the supply of oil on the world
    market, driving energy prices higher around the world. The sudden spike in energy prices naturally led to
    global hyperinflation. In my lifetime, I have never seen a more destructive act by a U.S. President that
    caused so much disruption and suffering around the world. And for absolutely no tangible benefit. The
    Biden Regime then added insult to injury by provoking Russia into taking military action against Ukraine.
    (Though this began around 2014 via a U.S. sponsored replacement of a pro-Russian leader to a U.S. puppet.) The next step of this insane administration was to place sanctions on Russia to prevent sales of Russian gas and oil to Europe. This further spiked the price of gas and oil, leading to further global inflation while crushing the economies of European countries. The sanctions failed to choke Russia’s economy as intended while rising inflation did great damage to Europe, the U.S. and other parts of the world. Anyone with retirement savings lost 25-40% of the value of their retirement funds in the first two years of Biden’s term.

    This is an administration that must be contained. That job falls to the Senate and House. The main
    limit that can be placed on the White House is through spending authorizations. This is also a President
    who is personally involved in corruption in Ukraine through his son’s business dealings, empowered by
    his former role as V.P. and now as President. This needs to be exposed to sunlight by House if not Senate
    committees. The fact that Biden is himself compromised presents a great danger to our nation and the world. If he is cornered and found to have committed crimes, what kind of desperate act may he take to distract from being held to account? What kinds of desperate acts may be taken by members of his administration who resist being removed from power along with him?

    The answer to those questions in part is the bombing of the Nordstream pipelines. No country other than
    the U.S. had the means, motive and intent to destroy the pipelines. Both President Biden and Victoria Nuland stated emphatically that the U.S. had the means to prevent the pipelines from being used and would do so. Both did so in advance of the bombings. Nuland gloated over the results of the destruction before the U.S. Senate and Secretary of State Anthony Blinken endorsed the remarkable ‘opportunity’ that the destruction of German and Russian owned critical infrastructure had provided. This was an act of war against a NATO ally that was conducted with no public Congressional authorization. If Congress was informed of the plan in advance, the citizens have a right to know that. The White House has weakly denied any knowledge or involvement. The only public statement from investigation by Sweden was that the bombing was clearly sabotage. There is no other plausible explanation other than the one offered by Seymour Hersh that the Biden Regime carried out the bombing operation.

    • Lisa Larsen
      February 18, 2023 at 18:50

      Outstanding letter!! I greatly commend you for writing and sending it. And thanks for sharing, may it serve as an inspiration to others.

      • James White
        February 19, 2023 at 02:42

        Thank you Ms. Larsen for your comments. (The paste disrupted the text format, unfortunately.) I don’t do protest marches, but I do let my elected representatives know that I observe their actions and hold them accountable. This President is lying directly in the face of every U.S. and European citizen. None of the leaders of European countries has shown the courage to separate themselves from his deception. That makes each of them complicit in perpetrating yet another massive lie. Biden is saying to the world that he can lie whenever he wants, then laugh about it and there is not a damn thing anyone can do about it. The Western press reveals itself also to be complicit in mass deception. Each of us can bear witness to the Biden Regime’s Psychological Operations and demand accountability. This is nothing less than Totalitarianism being imposed on the U.S. Europe and beyond. The people must reclaim their power.

  10. Dennis
    February 18, 2023 at 05:54

    I’ve now listened to 2 interviews with Hersh. I don’t doubt what he says and writes about are true.
    Nonetheless I think he is a difficult interview; cautious for sources, avoids answering questions directly,
    seems evasive. In this interview the topic is NS 2, but he diverts to talk about anything but.
    So, much respect to the man and his history, but I find him difficult to listen to.

  11. RWood
    February 18, 2023 at 00:08

    More to come…

  12. YesXorNo
    February 17, 2023 at 22:13

    Mr Hersh,

    Your lament of the status of USA journalism is shared by many. This is why you were wrong thinking that “nobody is going to watch this”. I’m one of the 6.3 K who’ve watched it. As you noted, a million persons accessed your article. There is a market for good investigative reporting and its only being served by the independent media, including Consortium News.

    • herbert davis
      February 18, 2023 at 11:36

      me too…fantastic!

  13. TRogers
    February 17, 2023 at 19:48

    It seems to me the arrogant aggression of the Neocons (e.g. Blinken, Nulland, Sullivan) toward the Russians is quite similar to their arrogant aggression toward the Palestinians. Both are predicated upon an alleged “unprovoked aggression” which was in fact massively provoked. They both utilize demonization of an entire culture. And they both involve thoroughly blanketing America’s corporate media with lies.

    And, as discussed in today’s excellent episode of The Duran, their motives are ideological to such a degree that they are disconnected from reality.
    Hope strategy at Munich Security Conference
    hXXps://rumble.com/v29x2jw-hope-strategy-at-munich-security-conference.html

    Thank you Mr. Hersh and Consortium News!

  14. Otto
    February 17, 2023 at 19:00

    Hersh’s writing may be fluent but his speech is unlistenable which makes me wonder how he can think and write cogently.

    • Joseph Tracy
      February 18, 2023 at 11:12

      His speech is usually articulately sharp . He sounded like he had had a few drinks. He was in a reminiscing mood. Being human. Reminding us that ‘on the record’ sources or not, the mainstream media kills or ignores whatever does not fit the narrative. He has so many anecdotes and experiences it is hard to sort through. But I . for one, enjoyed this glimpse into that side of this amazing journalist.
      What he does not address is the degree to which the intelligence and military are actually directly working in media or( as per twitter files, google and facebook )censoring the opposition media. This for the same reason he was glad Lauria explained the US determination to bring Russia into direct war with Ukraine. Another attempt to duplicate the Mujahadin’s war with Russia. He is tired of hate mail from all directions, tired of pissant state stenographers who never did the ground up research in their lives to report an important story, but getting published with know-nothing articles about Hersch’s latest exposure of US madness.

  15. Robert Emmett
    February 17, 2023 at 16:07

    It’s one thing to be dumb. It’s another to be scary dumb with your hands at the wheels of power.

    It’s hard to shake the feeling from those clips of Biden, Blinken & Nuland that they’re acting out some bizarre fantasy that they think will prove to the world how smart & clever they are.

    I take Hersh at his word that there are still good reporters at places like the Times. And I can certainly believe that the bizness side has infected the news side such that the primary obstruction keeping important stories from a wider public comes largely from editors. But then how do you explain the thousands of bogus Russiagate stories from everywhere over, what, a three to four year period?

    And why then aren’t more of the good & smart reporters leaving MSM & to form their own independent consortia such as CN to get important news stories to the public in a timely way (if there are still people in those organizations who believe in that sort of thing)?

    Otherwise how will there ever be enough pushback to change these dumb & deadly policies? One Sy Hersh at a time?

    But I must admit I feel naïve even asking these questions, even at my age which stems back to witnessing Ruby kill Oswald on live TV as a schoolchild saddened by the death of JFK.

    • TRogers
      February 17, 2023 at 20:16

      It’s my estimate that especially in the area of foreign affairs all the independent thinking reporters have either been fired or fled the corporate media. Those remaining have decided to settle for being actors, for whatever personal reasons.

      Fortunately, there is a growing number of independent daily news outlets on the internet. Here are some that I find to be reliably good quality.

      Print Websites

      Classic news on all topics
      Consortium News
      hXXps://consortiumnews.com/

      The Empire around the world
      The GrayZone
      hXXps://thegrayzone.com/

      Zionism in Palestine
      Mondoweiss
      hXXps://mondoweiss.net/

      Talk Websites

      Standard format news
      Redacted News
      hXXps://rumble.com/c/Redacted

      Standard format news
      Kim Iverson
      hXXps://rumble.com/KimIversen

      Long format news
      Glenn Greenwald
      hXXps://rumble.com/c/GGreenwald

      News with salty humor
      Jimmy Dore
      hXXps://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=jimmy+dore

      Deep dive on Ukraine
      The Duran
      hXXps://rumble.com/c/theduran

      When trying to introduce a friend or family member to reality, there may be an outlet or two on this list that would fit their personality.

      • Sharon
        February 18, 2023 at 09:52

        moon of alabama dot org is very worthwhile reading too.
        Thank you for your list.

        • TRogers
          February 18, 2023 at 19:57

          Thank you for your addition.

  16. c
    February 17, 2023 at 15:53

    Mr. Hersh said it was a bad mark against Putin that he started the war, and he expressed regret that U.S. policy in Ukraine had united Russians behind Putin. Actually Russians might be grateful to him for saving Russia from total collapse from shock therapy under Yeltsin, and for protecting Russia from a vicious neo-Nazi regime with NATO backing on the border.

    • rosemerry
      February 18, 2023 at 13:56

      Nobody has ever convinced me that after all those years Russia had any alternative to “invade”. All the media comments of “unjustified, unprovoked brutal attack” after 8 years of Ukrainian continuing the violence of the 2014 overthrow of the elected government and the Maidan attacks, were lies. Then the goading by the west for months as the Russians built up troops ON THEIR SIDE of the border late in 2021. Nobody reported (except Russia) the increased Uke attacks on the LPR and DPR which preceded the final start of the SMO. Russia was ready for the obvious provocation, and had detailed the steps needed for her to feel security, which the NATO moves for years had made impossible to guarantee.These demands at the end of 2021 were NOT unreasonable but were scoffed at and ignored. It seems any attacks on anyone by the USA and its puppets are acceptable, but Russia has no rights to any security or even acceptance as a sovereign land,while Ukraine suddenly becomes a perfect democracy and peaceful neighbour!

  17. Art Costa
    February 17, 2023 at 14:56

    Limited hangout reporting.

  18. Afdal
    February 17, 2023 at 14:29

    Sey definitely tends to ramble a bit, but I enjoyed every one of his stories.

  19. Nelson Betancourt
    February 17, 2023 at 13:46

    The more I hear Sy Hersh speaking in various programas, the more doubts I have about this story. He disassembles and avoids answering the questions while trying to lead the conversation in other directions. I am not denying that what he uncovered is true. I am just questioning his geopolitical understanding of the situation or his apparent ignorance about what set off this Russian special ops in the first place. Maybe it is his way to not give too much information, after all, he says he has more to write about this story. Nevertheless, some of his responses are not cogent.

    • Valerie
      February 17, 2023 at 16:11

      I agree with that. He deflected on occasion.

    • peter tusinski
      February 17, 2023 at 16:35

      I agree totally, very disappointing way of deflecting any real answers to enlighten us as to the true facts. Too much BS.

    • IJ Scambling
      February 17, 2023 at 18:00

      Criticism of Hersh seems based on either his deeper ignorance of the geopolitical complexities or on reporting his source’s ignorance, which leaves him (them) essentially in support of US intentions to derail Russia on its way to taking on China. According to this view there are holes in his pipeline narrative suggesting he’s mostly self-serving and not thorough enough.

      See Pepe Escobar and link to John Helmer.

      “For all its meticulous reporting, the inescapable feeling remains that what Hersh’s narrative indicts is the Biden combo terror gambit, and never the overall U.S. plan to provoke Russia into a proxy war with NATO using Ukraine as cannon fodder.

      “Moreover, Hersh’s source may be eminently flawed. He – or she – said, according to Hersh, that Russia “failed to respond” to the pipeline terror attack because “maybe they want the capability to do the same things the U.S. did”.

      xttps://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/escobar-nord-stream-terror-attack-plot-thickens

      • IJ Scambling
        February 18, 2023 at 15:41

        I took a second listen and realized I had been having trouble with the depth of perspective Hersh was providing. What seemed rambling or divergent at first turned out not to be with the second time around. Further, on the critique I mention from Pepe, it seems unsatisfactory to slam a person for what he didn’t say, and who knows what he will say with the “more to come.” It’a also difficult to think Hersh is not critical of a NEO administration given his critique of the pipeline stupidity (dumb, dumb, stupid) and knowledge of the inflexible nature of bureaucracy (when was the last time a four star was reprimanded), and his history of going after weak and bullshit leadership. Very interesting, all of what he said. Thanks CN.

    • Mary
      February 17, 2023 at 23:19

      It started in 2014 when US organized a coup in Ukraine (Nuland was there at that time), so they put their puppet as a president of Ukraine. Then ethnic Russians living in the Eastern Ukraine got killed by shelling. More than 100 kids died. More than 30 people including teenagers were burnt alive in Odessa, Ukraine , by Ukrainian nationalists in 2014. A few burnt and beaten survivors were imprisoned.

    • Doug
      February 18, 2023 at 12:14

      totally agree

  20. Randal Marlin
    February 17, 2023 at 12:19

    I’m appending a letter I wrote to the Canadian newspaper, The Globe and Mail, (not published so far, though sent February 13) in case you could ask Hersh about how he came in contact with his source.
    To the Editor
    The Globe and Mail

    Re Eric Reguly “We need the truth behind Nord Stream pipeline explosion” (The Globe and Mail, B4, Feb. 13).
    1. President Biden asserted emphatically, pre-invasion, “If Russia invades…there will be no longer a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it.” Russia invaded. There was an end to it. Are we to believe that the U.S. had no hand in this?
    2. On the matter of anonymous sources, it would be of some help to know whether Seymour Hersh initiated contact with his source or whether it was the other way around. The late Canadian diplomat, Sidney Freifeld, recognized the occasional need to protect sources, but argued that the reader should be informed as much as possible, while still protecting the source, about motives the source might have for providing the information.

  21. Larry Gates
    February 17, 2023 at 11:36

    Pepe Escobar says this is important but there is a sense in which Hersh ha been played by the insider who was his anonymous source. What we have here is a limited hangout. Only part of the story has been leaked. On purpose. To let people rage about a fraction of the story as a way to hide a much larger story.

    • jonabark
      February 18, 2023 at 13:24

      No evidence for this, and Pepe, who does a lot of good work, has no alternative story that covers the facts like this. There is a big tendency now to ascribe all covert actions to the UK, but that makes little sense in this case since they could not do this without US approval, and it really hinges on Biden’s desire to turn the fortunes of the empire around with this war. He wants credit and boasted of it ahead of time. He shows the power of the empire to have it both ways: “We will do it” … “Russia did it” and have people believe the unbelievable. It’s a pattern with Biden: I bullied Ukraine away from Burisma’s crimes… Burisma hired Hunter because he is so smart.
      Also, why the hell would the CIA release a false story claiming credit for an act of war to the most famous investigative journalist in the world. How would this further their interests? Do they want Russia to target some US piece of infrastructure versus UK infrastructure? The US and UK are functionally a single entity , a fact that has doubtless not escaped Russian attention. Or does the deep state want to show that they can boast about something and deny it at the same time while further eroding the credibility of their critics and the meaning of objective truth. That is part of the result , but was it intended? Are insider sources sympathetic to Hersch that conniving without him catching on? I personally think that unlikely. Nevertheless we are deep in bizarro-land.
      This is Orwellian stuff and there is a human psychology behind it that has a provable history with Trump and Biden as the latest exemplars of its ascendance. It is a narcissism that wants to be able to say anything , true or not and have it become truth because you said it, and yet be able later to completely deny you ever said it and have that be the new truth along with whatever new truth you assert as the replacement. It is the kind of mind we encounter with the Caesars, Stalin, Hitler, Reagan, Tony Blair, Allen Dulles. Megalomaniacal totalitarianism playacting as nationalism.

  22. IJ Scambling
    February 17, 2023 at 09:58

    It’s typical to praise excellent writing here at CN, so it’s good to take a second look at the beautifully clear and correct prose in this pipeline piece, with its brilliant ending words:

    “The only flaw was the decision to do it.”

    xttps://seymourhersh.substack.com/p/how-america-took-out-the-nord-stream

  23. Kevin Kvisle
    February 16, 2023 at 21:45

    They said rhey would. They planted the explosives. Mainstream news is saying nothing. We cannot deny our worldview has been built on a owck of lies that most people cling to.

    I feel liberated. Thank you Consortium.

    • Ian Rutherford
      February 17, 2023 at 01:35

      There were also reports of the UK’s mad lizzie ‘it’s done’ truss personally authorising the bombing of Nordstream.

      Seymour Hersh’s source might be one of the cia’s canines currently on lease to mi6 on a mission to distract attention from lizzie.

      After all, she is known for her nothing short of a sworn declaration of readiness to press the nuclear button against Russia.

  24. Terry49
    February 16, 2023 at 19:19

    Looking forward to the interview with Sy Hersh on CN tomorrow. Now if only CNN, as well as other MSM outlets, would conduct their own interview with Hersh. Unfortunately, that would be expecting too much from a corporate media outlet like CNN, as the last thing they want is for the American people to hear a viewpoint which is different from the status quo.

  25. John Woodford
    February 16, 2023 at 18:42

    One of the legion of journalistic tools in the corporate media, Ross Douthat of the NY Times, attempts in today’s paper to malign and undercut Hersh’s reporting without a smidgeon of evidence to the contrary.

  26. Olga Blount
    February 16, 2023 at 18:41

    Could you please ask Mr. Hersh to explain what does he mean, saying that Stoltenberg worked with the US intelligence since Vietnam. As far as I know Stoltenberg is 63 and during Vietnam war was still too young… If he means Norway, not Stoltenberg, then this sentence needs correction.

    • Marko
      February 16, 2023 at 22:57

      Commonly reported about Stoltenberg :

      “The son of a former defense and foreign minister, he lived for several years as a child in Belgrade, where he learned to speak Serbian.

      As a teenager in the 1970s, Stoltenberg admitted to having thrown rocks at the U.S. Embassy to protest against the Vietnam War.”

      Given the family background, it’s not hard to imagine him acting as an infiltrator/squeeler in the midst of anti-war groups , even at such a young age. I suspect Hersh has the “deets” , as Toria Nuland might say.

    • Markus
      February 19, 2023 at 09:21

      Stoltenberg Jr. has always been very supportive of NATO and the US, his only participation in an anti-war movement was simply to gain popular support, since the Vietnam War was highly disliked by the Norwegian population, this solely to further his political career as he prepared to become the future leader of the Norwegian Labor Party. The Norwegian Labor Party has a history of supporting the US and NATO in all their endeavours, and this was also one of the reasons why many of the former members of that party left to form their own party “Socialist Left” which was formed on Anti – NATO atmosphere. After the Norwegian Labor Party suffered an electoral defeat under his leadershipin 2007, 4 years later Stoltenberg jr. saw an opportunity to secure his political future in the US/NATO military establishment by sending Norwegian F-16s to bomb Syria, which resulted in him becoming the Secretary of NATO later on.

  27. Valerie
    February 16, 2023 at 16:40

    Marvellous. This should not be missed.
    (Meanwhile Jumpin’ Joe Flash – it’s a gas gas gas, is waffling on about balloons.)

  28. Robin Gibson
    February 16, 2023 at 16:27

    Thank-you Seymour Hersh!!

  29. KeepEarthCool
    February 16, 2023 at 16:11

    Yes, please. I’d like an email notification if you would, please. Thanks.

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