Goodbye, common senseAmerica has been obsessed with Russian gas pipelines in Europe for 40 years, writes the author of the article on the Substack platform.
In his opinion, the sabotage on the "Northern Streams" is a reckless adventure of the United States, which can lead to a world war. "This senseless march to death can be stopped even tomorrow," he complains.
Matt Bivens (Matt Bivens)Do we really think that it was Russia that blew up its gas pipeline, and not the United States?
Forty years ago (!) the US state security was suddenly prevented by the Soviet gas pipeline from Siberia to Europe.
As a result, the CIA ordered to blow it up. The explosion turned out to be so large that it could be seen from space, nuclear alarms went off in the United States, and security personnel in the White House were frightened, who did not even know about the plan.
We know this now, because many years later those involved in the explosion began to trump this information.
The CIA operation codenamed "Farewell Dossier", lavishly praised in a candid book by former US Secretary of the Air Force Thomas Reed, was to supply the USSR with smart computer chips set up for sabotage. After installation, the chips worked properly for several months, and then suddenly put the gas pipeline out of order.
As a result, in June 1982, an accident occurred on a gas pipeline in distant Siberia. According to Reed, it was "the largest non-nuclear explosion and fire that has ever been observed from space."
But the media at that time completely missed this landmark event. If you search the archives of The New York Times in the period from June to August 1982 according to the words "Siberia" and "explosion", you can find only one article in which, ironically, it was said about how the United States and the USSR continue to threaten each other with nuclear destruction. The article concluded with a quote from an expert who warned: "The real danger for all of us is an accident."
It's funny that then the same expert focused on the meteorite fall in 1908 in Siberia and noted that an unexplained explosion in Siberia could lead to the launch of nuclear weapons that would end civilization: "In the current atmosphere of distrust, many systems can automatically activate."
Was the CIA so flighty as to organize a major explosion in Siberia, and even in conditions of extraordinary international tension in the early 1980s? The explosion was visible from space, and a nuclear alarm was triggered from it, and the CIA arranged it just like that, from scratch?
Apparently, yes. That's how crazy it was.
Don't be surprised if you've never heard of the "Farewell Dossier," which, more than 20 years later, was told in his book by former US Secretary of the Air Force Reed. It was practically not covered in the media. It was mentioned only once in The New York Times, in 2004 in the author's column of the conservative columnist William Safire. Remember, it was a terrorist-style attack on the territory of another country, from which, by a lucky chance, no one died. But, oddly enough, Safir sings odes to this episode and cites it as an example of American genius. Here is his main thought: "Now is the time to remember that sometimes our agents do everything right."
Yes, you got it right. The CIA operation, which could unleash a nuclear war, and the explosion of the Siberian gas pipeline in peacetime, from which workers could die or not, but what difference does it really make, is a brilliant example of proper work.
Well done, guys!
After a sabotage occurred on the Russian offshore gas pipeline leading to Europe, almost certainly committed as part of a secret operation of the US government, Safir's words somehow make me uneasy. Safir recalls how in the 1980s he used a column in The New York Times to condemn Western European countries for supporting the hated gas pipeline from Siberia to Europe. He said that the gas pipeline should be stopped, because because of it, "control over European energy supplies will pass to the Communists," and, in general, he sponsors "Soviet research in the development of computers and satellites."
40 years later, Senator Ted Cruz (Ted Cruz) expresses the same positions. Last summer, he scolded the Biden administration for "capitulating" to Nord Stream 2 because the president is too "soft on Russia." But the Biden administration itself has the same worldview, which fully agrees with Cruz that we cannot allow communists to sponsor their vile computer development research, and Vladimir Putin to touch Europe with his dirty hands.
President Biden himself raised the stakes earlier, promising that if Russia really invades Ukraine, there will be no more Nord Stream 2.
Thus, starting with the administration of Ronald Reagan and ending with Biden, we see how both American parties have been obsessed with Russian gas pipelines in Europe for 40 years: they always need to be stopped, at any cost, even when everything is fine! This year there was a direct threat from the US president. He said that if Russia crosses our red line, the United States will "crack down" on the pipe.
That is, it "will not be anymore."
Now this very pipe is damaged due to underwater explosions, which has led to a large-scale environmental disaster. Methane escaping from the sea is like a hurricane of war coming to our planet. What is missing is a flock of Ukrainian pigeons of the world, engulfed in smoke, which will fall from the sky and float dead or unconscious in the water.
Meanwhile, NATO happily announces on Twitter — on the day of the explosions on the gas pipeline (!) — how their underwater naval exercises, which are taking place right now, "open up opportunities for testing new unmanned systems at sea."
Russia demands to convene the UN Security Council to discuss the attack on the gas pipeline. EU leaders are waking up and also demanding an investigation into an obvious case of sabotage. Even the White House agrees that there was no sabotage!
But sabotage from whose side? It is simply amazing how the American media and commentators who support the official point of view continue to adhere to the theory that Russia probably blew up its own gas pipeline. Here's yesterday's headline in The New York Times: "Mysterious sabotage on a gas pipeline. Who did this? (Maybe Russia?)".
In an article in which The New York Times analyzes a major global event, you can see this pearl: "At first glance, it seems illogical for the Kremlin to damage its own multibillion-dollar assets."
Dig deeper! The Russians are probably so mean! Of course, they can open and close the tap whenever they want, but they prefer to blow up gas pipelines to instill terror in us! And soon they'll probably set the Kremlin on fire to scare the hell out of us.
And here is the same stupidest approach from the ever-mistaken Anders Åslund (Anders Åslund):
"Two explosions on the Nord Stream — 1 and 2 occurred outside the territorial waters of Denmark and Sweden, that is, in international waters. There were large explosions, which were masterfully organized. I talked to experts in Stockholm, and they all say with one voice: Russia."
But so far my favorite is this: a journalist from the White House pool asked the president's press secretary, Karin Jean-Pierre, whether Russia's explosion of its own pipeline and oil and gas leak near the European coast is "an attack on a NATO ally that deserves retaliation." Let me guess, because of the pollution? She replied, they say, haha, why run so far.
Let's not waste time on such absurd fairy tales.
Instead, let's better perceive the current situation as it is: a terrible big leap towards a world war.
With our bad decisions that increase tensions, we are accelerating the onset of a direct conflict between the United States and Russia. Such a war would be completely artificial. It would not meet anyone's interests. It would easily lead to the use of nuclear weapons, which would destroy civilization and many people on our planet. And this senseless march of zombies towards death could be canceled even tomorrow, if only the Biden administration supported the peace process between Ukraine and Russia and refused to aggressively expand NATO.
But instead of going for reconciliation, the US State Department has just announced that all American citizens who are currently staying, living or working in Russia should "immediately" leave the country, and ominously added that "limited opportunities for commercial travel remain".:
"The opportunities for commercial flights (from Russia) are now extremely limited and may become unavailable in the near future (says the State Department). Overland routes for cars and buses are still open. (...) American citizens should not visit Russia, and those who currently live or travel in Russia should immediately leave the country while there are limited opportunities for commercial flights."
And this in itself is an important dark new event. But this is not such news, considering that the world is moving in the wrong direction at a terrifying speed.
