Feb 10, 2023·edited Feb 10, 2023Liked by Oliver Alexander
Great read.
Hersh claims the flight that dropped the sonar buoy was several hours before the explosions on the 26th but the first explosion was at 2:00am so any flight must be on the 25th.
Had it in my notes, but somehow forgot to add it in. I have edited the post now.
Hersh both claims that the flight was on the 26th, but also: "A few hours later, the high-powered C4 explosives were triggered and three of the four pipelines were put out of commission."
These can't both be true given the time of the explosion.
This individual also noted that NS2 still being operable conveniently increases Russia’s power AND potentially leads to the highest windfall profits…how convenient for Putin!
That video shows a plane over the site at 2:08 am. Explosion was at 2:03 am. Hersh says the explosives were triggered a few hours later not immediately.
The replay of the approach in the video started at 00:46:45. Planes were already heading towards the area including a refuelling plane *before* the blast. As I have said, I doubt any plane and ship that was involved in a covert operation would have *any* transponders turned on. Whether it was a Norwegian P-8 or a US P-8 is a moot point as "rolling codes" prevents ID.
Perhaps it is intentional obfuscation to protect the source. A minor detail that doesn't take away from the meat and bones: that the United States was responsible for what happened.
Or maybe Pulitzer-winning Hersh was taken for a ride. Only time will tell.
In offshore drilling the subsea blow out preventer (BOP) can be controlled at much deeper locations and a more complex set of regulation modes using acoustic signals, than a detonation command.
It would be extremely worrying if whales, man made marine noise, earthquakes etc. could interfere with the well control of the several dozens deep water hydrocarbon wells under construction at any given time.
I choose to believe military technology is minimum at par with commercial offshore drilling.
Regarding Stoltenberg, apparently he was even a US skeptic in his youth:)
"Stoltenberg participated in protest rallies against the U.S. war in Vietnam in the 1970s.[156] In 2011, Stoltenberg said "We sang the chorus, ‘Singing Norway, Norway out of Nato.' It was a hit."[156]"
To the conspiracist, every obstacle standing in the way of their theories can instead be reinterpreted as evidence that they were in fact right all along!!!
Given that his dad was later Norwegian Defense Minister, starting in 1979, and Foreign Minister about a decade later, Jens didn't need to "build a cover."
But if I'd have to guess, I'd lean towards him being employed by Putin. Too many Norwegian politicians are actively sabotaging our country. E.g. the resistance against nuclear power is ridiculous.
The main problem with your article is that it is essentially a "he doesn't use the jargon that I would use as someone who knows something about this so it's all made up".
If you've done confirmation of real reports, you would know that you can't analyze things this way. The question you have to ask yourself is: could I imagine a non-technical journalist speaking to a source with actual knowledge of these events writing up their account in this way?
So, like take this section, for example:
"The US Air Force officials reportedly proposed “dropping bombs with delayed fuses that could be set off remotely”. One could write an entire post on the reasons why sounds entirely made up by someone with no real grasp of what that suggestion would actually technically entail."
The actual question is, what would the Air Force suggest and could Hersh have written up what his source told him that they might have proposed in the way that he did?
Because you don't do this type of analysis, the article just doesn't debunk Hersh's and I'm not even convinced that anything in Hersh's article is true. The only really interesting fact in your article is about Jen Stoltenberg, which does decrease the credibility of the article.
"The actual question is, what would the Air Force suggest and could Hersh have written up what his source told him that they might have proposed in the way that he did?"
As Oliver points out, Hersh had no problem elaborating on how sonobuoys work (including speaking with an expert) and threw in the non-credible explanation that the Navy had to match the C4's salinity to avoid Russian detection.
The fact of the matter is this: the US Air Force bit does not at all make sense. That's not to people who work at Lockheed and have rocket science degrees, that's to people with a casual understanding of the US military. That point, in and of it self, diminishes Hersh's credibility. If Hersh wants to prove us all wrong, he is more than welcome to ask his source and elaborate.
There is no slam dunk of Hersh's account of his source in this snow job and it has not addressed actual evidence that support the account of Hersh's source.
The first mistake made by Oliver is to assume Hersh's source had "direct access to every step". So the distinction between Alta class and near equivalent Oksøy-Class mine hunter is trivial and not relevant.
A second mistake made by Oliver is the presumption that any ship in a covert operation would have its Automatic Identification System Switched on.
A third mistake made by Oliver is that any aircraft would have its ADS-B or any other ID system turned on.
A fourth mistake is to introduce irrelevant dive time/decompression information. There is nothing about the dive times and ship involved excludes the dives that would be required.
There is evidence of two aircraft, one of which was a refuelling aircraft. The aircraft that is presumed to have dropped a bouy or otherwise activated the explosives had "rolling codes" and the type and ownership of the aircraft could no be established. There is nothing to rule out a Norwegian P-8 as a completely fitted out P-8 may not have been required.
There was a tracking of two aircraft according to this source on the date and within the time window. It can't be ignored.
That aircraft flew over the site at 03:10 CEST, an hour after the explosion.
"A second mistake made by Oliver is the presumption that any ship in a covert operation would have its Automatic Identification System Switched on.
A third mistake made by Oliver is that any aircraft would have its ADS-B or any other ID system turned on."
The entire story Hersh is trying to build is that BALTOPS22 was a cover for the divers and that a "routine P-8 flight" was the cover for the sonobouy drop. Both would be pointless if they did that.
A prior covert aircraft without transponders turned on dropping sonar buoy's isn't excluded as a possibility. It may have presented a routine flight plan on the ground.
The whole point of using an overt operation like BALTOPS22 as cover is that a covert operation could be better masked amongst all of the activity. There were specialised exercises related to mining/demining *within* BALTOPS22. Your argument is that because there is are overt exercises then an act of war during those exercises would have been more convenient and it is pointless running a covert operation concurrent with the exercises?
Further, there is a wild presumption that a person with oversight would have insight into the minutia of how the operation was conducted. There is also the matter of when the source became informed. So distinction between Alta class vs Oksøy-Class is an example of Fisking.
Should an Oksøy class ship have been substituted after the source became aware of the plan it really makes no difference.
The soundness of Hersch's sources statements isn't contradicted on the basis of open source information.
According to Hersch only the Norwegians were involved. How come that neither the german, nor the danish, swedish or any other military present notice an unmarked airplane
The Norwegian air force does NOT patrol the Baltic, but if we still imagine they did on this occasion while using a non-operational plane, it would not at all be routine, nor would the P8 need a tanker, and nor would it return to base on a north-western path, instead flying north.
As Oliver makes clear, any ship could perform this task better that the P8.
I am no expert but even if the aircraft had turned off any and all transponders, shouldnt the German, Norwegian, Swedish and Polish radar detect the aircraft?
Yeah but then this would imply that all of those nations, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and even Russia would know of the flight and have the radar data.
And none of the are releasing their data.
Which would then imply that they are all in on it, a giant conspiracy.
This goes against Hersh's claim that only USA and Norway knew.
And it would imply that even Russia was on board with it.
Rachael Maddow is making $30 million dollars a year.
Doesn't make economic sense to be a journalist, but it makes GOOD economic sense to be a propagandist. Pretty obvious.
Seymour Hersh is 85, he's got a LONG LIFE ahead of him (!!!), guess he decided to sell out and start working for the Ruskies by lying for them... He's got a LONG record of being a real journalist, but I'm sure since he has 1 up to 10 years left to life (realistically), I'm sure he just decided to sell out all his principles.
I mean, that's what would have to be happening, RIGHT? The US government is SO CREDIBLE now..
There is no mention of the swedish navy movements in Hershes story. There you could have fabricated some story about sending divers from swedish war ships and then the moves toward Kaliningrad was the cover. That could maybe be plausible. But that would also draw attention towards russia.
Evenes is a commercial airport so really hard to operate out of if you’re masking the ADS-B.
The aircraft were grounded in June when this was supposedly planned as the logistics supply hadn’t been sorted out. Was a POL issue as the US navy manual calls for oils and lubricants which aren’t commercially available in Europe and each supply had to be verified.
Great read.
Hersh claims the flight that dropped the sonar buoy was several hours before the explosions on the 26th but the first explosion was at 2:00am so any flight must be on the 25th.
Thanks,
Had it in my notes, but somehow forgot to add it in. I have edited the post now.
Hersh both claims that the flight was on the 26th, but also: "A few hours later, the high-powered C4 explosives were triggered and three of the four pipelines were put out of commission."
These can't both be true given the time of the explosion.
This individual also noted that NS2 still being operable conveniently increases Russia’s power AND potentially leads to the highest windfall profits…how convenient for Putin!
https://genefrenkle.substack.com/p/putin-obviously-blew-up-nord-stream
False if this true
https://youtu.be/Jfpw9I01J0o?t=770
That video shows a plane over the site at 2:08 am. Explosion was at 2:03 am. Hersh says the explosives were triggered a few hours later not immediately.
It actually flew over at 03:08 CEST.
Yeah I saw local time as UTC+1 but forgot about summertime
The replay of the approach in the video started at 00:46:45. Planes were already heading towards the area including a refuelling plane *before* the blast. As I have said, I doubt any plane and ship that was involved in a covert operation would have *any* transponders turned on. Whether it was a Norwegian P-8 or a US P-8 is a moot point as "rolling codes" prevents ID.
First explosion was at 00:03 UTC = 02:03 CEST
Flight in video was after explosion at 00:46 UTC = 02:46 CEST and over NS at 01:08 UTC = 03:08 CEST
Ok, DST, +2. Did the P-8 and refueler taken off before the blast or was it sent to surveil after? I expect someone has saved the flight history.
According to this it was a US P-8 so is this the same plane and why would it switch to "rolling codes"?
It would be a conspiracy theory to suggest it was on some other unknown mission.
https://twitter.com/thenewarea51/status/1576077207910305792?s=20&t=prgAIotGI5iCAXgGrrMPBA
According to Seymour Hersh, the plane was supposed to be a Norwegian Navy P-8.
BTW, Norwegian P-8s are in the Airforce.
The reason it does matter is that Hersh is very specific on the nations' plane.
Perhaps it is intentional obfuscation to protect the source. A minor detail that doesn't take away from the meat and bones: that the United States was responsible for what happened.
Or maybe Pulitzer-winning Hersh was taken for a ride. Only time will tell.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
How does a video about a US P-8 confirm Hersh's story about a Norwegian Navy P-8?
Oh I love a good bullshit teardown, excellent read.
Very pragmatic and convincing analysis.
In offshore drilling the subsea blow out preventer (BOP) can be controlled at much deeper locations and a more complex set of regulation modes using acoustic signals, than a detonation command.
It would be extremely worrying if whales, man made marine noise, earthquakes etc. could interfere with the well control of the several dozens deep water hydrocarbon wells under construction at any given time.
I choose to believe military technology is minimum at par with commercial offshore drilling.
Here is a good exploration of Putin’s motives:
https://genefrenkle.substack.com/p/putin-obviously-blew-up-nord-stream
Regarding Stoltenberg, apparently he was even a US skeptic in his youth:)
"Stoltenberg participated in protest rallies against the U.S. war in Vietnam in the 1970s.[156] In 2011, Stoltenberg said "We sang the chorus, ‘Singing Norway, Norway out of Nato.' It was a hit."[156]"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jens_Stoltenberg#Controversies
As a teenage CIA asset, he was already building his cover!
To the conspiracist, every obstacle standing in the way of their theories can instead be reinterpreted as evidence that they were in fact right all along!!!
Given that his dad was later Norwegian Defense Minister, starting in 1979, and Foreign Minister about a decade later, Jens didn't need to "build a cover."
Here's my full take, based on Sy's original, this piece by Alexander, Jeff St. Clair's thoughts, and what I grokked from comments in Mark Ames' Radio War Nerd interview of Hersh. https://socraticgadfly.blogspot.com/2023/02/is-sy-hersh-right-about-nordstream.html
Stoltenberg is a tool -- always has been.
But if I'd have to guess, I'd lean towards him being employed by Putin. Too many Norwegian politicians are actively sabotaging our country. E.g. the resistance against nuclear power is ridiculous.
The main problem with your article is that it is essentially a "he doesn't use the jargon that I would use as someone who knows something about this so it's all made up".
If you've done confirmation of real reports, you would know that you can't analyze things this way. The question you have to ask yourself is: could I imagine a non-technical journalist speaking to a source with actual knowledge of these events writing up their account in this way?
So, like take this section, for example:
"The US Air Force officials reportedly proposed “dropping bombs with delayed fuses that could be set off remotely”. One could write an entire post on the reasons why sounds entirely made up by someone with no real grasp of what that suggestion would actually technically entail."
The actual question is, what would the Air Force suggest and could Hersh have written up what his source told him that they might have proposed in the way that he did?
Because you don't do this type of analysis, the article just doesn't debunk Hersh's and I'm not even convinced that anything in Hersh's article is true. The only really interesting fact in your article is about Jen Stoltenberg, which does decrease the credibility of the article.
"The actual question is, what would the Air Force suggest and could Hersh have written up what his source told him that they might have proposed in the way that he did?"
As Oliver points out, Hersh had no problem elaborating on how sonobuoys work (including speaking with an expert) and threw in the non-credible explanation that the Navy had to match the C4's salinity to avoid Russian detection.
The fact of the matter is this: the US Air Force bit does not at all make sense. That's not to people who work at Lockheed and have rocket science degrees, that's to people with a casual understanding of the US military. That point, in and of it self, diminishes Hersh's credibility. If Hersh wants to prove us all wrong, he is more than welcome to ask his source and elaborate.
Here is a good exploration of Putin’s motives:
https://genefrenkle.substack.com/p/putin-obviously-blew-up-nord-stream
There is no slam dunk of Hersh's account of his source in this snow job and it has not addressed actual evidence that support the account of Hersh's source.
The first mistake made by Oliver is to assume Hersh's source had "direct access to every step". So the distinction between Alta class and near equivalent Oksøy-Class mine hunter is trivial and not relevant.
A second mistake made by Oliver is the presumption that any ship in a covert operation would have its Automatic Identification System Switched on.
A third mistake made by Oliver is that any aircraft would have its ADS-B or any other ID system turned on.
A fourth mistake is to introduce irrelevant dive time/decompression information. There is nothing about the dive times and ship involved excludes the dives that would be required.
There is evidence of two aircraft, one of which was a refuelling aircraft. The aircraft that is presumed to have dropped a bouy or otherwise activated the explosives had "rolling codes" and the type and ownership of the aircraft could no be established. There is nothing to rule out a Norwegian P-8 as a completely fitted out P-8 may not have been required.
There was a tracking of two aircraft according to this source on the date and within the time window. It can't be ignored.
https://youtu.be/Jfpw9I01J0o?t=770
The rest of Oliver's snow job is subjective or irrelevant drivel.
That aircraft flew over the site at 03:10 CEST, an hour after the explosion.
"A second mistake made by Oliver is the presumption that any ship in a covert operation would have its Automatic Identification System Switched on.
A third mistake made by Oliver is that any aircraft would have its ADS-B or any other ID system turned on."
The entire story Hersh is trying to build is that BALTOPS22 was a cover for the divers and that a "routine P-8 flight" was the cover for the sonobouy drop. Both would be pointless if they did that.
A prior covert aircraft without transponders turned on dropping sonar buoy's isn't excluded as a possibility. It may have presented a routine flight plan on the ground.
The whole point of using an overt operation like BALTOPS22 as cover is that a covert operation could be better masked amongst all of the activity. There were specialised exercises related to mining/demining *within* BALTOPS22. Your argument is that because there is are overt exercises then an act of war during those exercises would have been more convenient and it is pointless running a covert operation concurrent with the exercises?
Further, there is a wild presumption that a person with oversight would have insight into the minutia of how the operation was conducted. There is also the matter of when the source became informed. So distinction between Alta class vs Oksøy-Class is an example of Fisking.
Should an Oksøy class ship have been substituted after the source became aware of the plan it really makes no difference.
The soundness of Hersch's sources statements isn't contradicted on the basis of open source information.
According to Hersch only the Norwegians were involved. How come that neither the german, nor the danish, swedish or any other military present notice an unmarked airplane
The Norwegian air force does NOT patrol the Baltic, but if we still imagine they did on this occasion while using a non-operational plane, it would not at all be routine, nor would the P8 need a tanker, and nor would it return to base on a north-western path, instead flying north.
As Oliver makes clear, any ship could perform this task better that the P8.
I am no expert but even if the aircraft had turned off any and all transponders, shouldnt the German, Norwegian, Swedish and Polish radar detect the aircraft?
Maybe even Russia and the Baltic states?
Sure, but his point is that such a plane wouldn’t show up on a public flight database, not that it would be invisible.
“Debunkings” like this are really an exercise of sophistry because it is impossible to prove a negative with limited public information.
Yeah but then this would imply that all of those nations, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and even Russia would know of the flight and have the radar data.
And none of the are releasing their data.
Which would then imply that they are all in on it, a giant conspiracy.
This goes against Hersh's claim that only USA and Norway knew.
And it would imply that even Russia was on board with it.
Your information is lacking enough investigation https://sonar21.com/independent-evidence-confirms-key-part-of-sy-hershs-report-on-the-attack-on-nord-stream-2/
It in no way confirms that a Norwegian Navy P-8 dropped a sonobouy.
Addressed above, it arrives an hour later and is some distance from at least one of the explosions.
It’s a US Navy P8, so why does Hersh have the claim that the as yet non-operational Norwegian ones were involved?
What matters is Jew-run US did it.
Quite the edgy 4chan sperg we have here, isn't it?
Funny how many of the supporters of Putin's "De-Nazification" campaign are Nazis, isn't it?
Keep up the De-Nazification campaign, Nazi!!!
De-nazify yourself, please.
An apologist of the empire and her terrorism
Well Julian Assange is going to die in prison.
Rachael Maddow is making $30 million dollars a year.
Doesn't make economic sense to be a journalist, but it makes GOOD economic sense to be a propagandist. Pretty obvious.
Seymour Hersh is 85, he's got a LONG LIFE ahead of him (!!!), guess he decided to sell out and start working for the Ruskies by lying for them... He's got a LONG record of being a real journalist, but I'm sure since he has 1 up to 10 years left to life (realistically), I'm sure he just decided to sell out all his principles.
I mean, that's what would have to be happening, RIGHT? The US government is SO CREDIBLE now..
your own analysis is littered with faulty assumptions and false extrapolations
I couldn't agree more.
Name just two then if you even can.
There is no mention of the swedish navy movements in Hershes story. There you could have fabricated some story about sending divers from swedish war ships and then the moves toward Kaliningrad was the cover. That could maybe be plausible. But that would also draw attention towards russia.
tbf, Sweden isn't in NATO (yet). I doubt the US would have let them participate in such a highly classified op.
I understand rigth that the sonarbuoy would have to trigger a timer as the bombs went off at different times? prolly not hard to do but why?
Evenes is a commercial airport so really hard to operate out of if you’re masking the ADS-B.
The aircraft were grounded in June when this was supposedly planned as the logistics supply hadn’t been sorted out. Was a POL issue as the US navy manual calls for oils and lubricants which aren’t commercially available in Europe and each supply had to be verified.
ur doin gods work son
Can I call you Sherlock Clancy? :-) You got a shout out from Military & History on Youtube so I jumped over here to read your article. Epic detail.
Why are lying about who you already decided blew up the pipeline months ago? You’re one of the crackpot “russian blew up their own pipeline” people.
https://twitter.com/oalexanderdk/status/1575074138590306304
Could have been famously bad Russian maintenance.
https://thelawdogfiles.com/2022/09/nordstream.html
That really seems like the most obvious and sensible explanation. No wonder everyone ignores it.