It changes the nature of the bargaining chip. It certainly seems to reduce their options. But that may be useful to them somehow (if it's sabotage, and done by the Russians). Sort of a double down, "the only way out is to go deeper into the crisis" kind of thinking.

I don't know. It does seem like it would be counterproductive to the Russians. But maybe they don't want to get into a negotiation against the rest of the Western world. Maybe Putin likes to try to present stark options of (1) threaten to use nukes, and/or (2) freezing Western Europe with fewer available options to remedy that cold winter, as a way of trying to raise the stakes and bluff his way out of this.

But if the Russians no longer have the option of turning the gas back on, doesn't that remove their bargaining chip?

Why?

Means and motivation.

What's the motivation?

$$$$

There is no place else they can sell that gas, so I'm not sure why they want to sabotage that.

Nordstream 1 has 2 detonations and the next day the new pipeline from Denmark to Poland opens up.

The next day a new pipeline opens

Former Polish Defense Minister say's US blew up Russian Gas Pipelines

Der Spiegel Magazine say's US Forces were behind it

CIA informed Germans ahead of time

Biden say's if Russia invades Ukraine there will no longer be a Nordstream , We will bring an end to it.

Reporter says But how will you

Biden says I promise you, we will be able to do that

Denmark said it will host US Forces on it's territory

The new Baltic Pipeline opens on Oct 1, 3 months earlier.

The US did this !

g_lev wrote:

That pipe, although shut down, was full of pressurized gas. I can't imagine it would be that easy to insert some kind of device into a pressurized pipe in such a way that it could crawl a few hundred miles then explode.

JacobB1111 wrote:

Russia did it specifically to get people to buy into this BS narrative. Russia thrives on chaos. This is chaos.

So we’ve gone from a proxy war to real war?

I think the US did it.

That's somewhat an insult to Ukrainians. It's very much a real war to them, and while they're getting tons of help, they are very much fighting in their own, direct interest, not the interest of some external influence.

Seal Team 6

Sorry, I meant the US. Wouldn’t a strike on infrastructure coming directly from us be a declaration of war?

Hmm. I still don't see a clear motivation for the U.S. There is indirect motivation, but I don't see a strong risk-reward equation. The U.S. is already "winning" the battle for strong EU commitment against Russia. I don't see a clear motivation for sabotaging U.S. partners and strong allies in order to "help them" stay committed.

My theory is internal Gazprom conflict, amounting to internal Russian conflict.

So far in 2022, we've had several suspicious fatalities at Gazprom including the "Director of Transport." I put it at roughly a half dozen high level people with ties to Gazprom. Could be oligarch backlash, "You want to fuck with us? Fine."

Also I'd assume that the larger Gazprom sphere of support and maintenance contractors have the technical chops to pull off sabotage of their own pipeline.

This self-sabotage logic is probematic. But *every* rationale is problematic.

Seal Team 6

The US did this !