German Prosecutors: Ukraine Behind Nord Stream Destruction
News comes as Russia launched one of its largest aerial attacks on Kyiv in the 52-month war.
Ukrainian “state authorities” ordered the destruction of the Nord Stream gas pipelines, German prosecutors said Thursday. “German prosecutors have accused Ukrainian ‘state authorities’ of ordering the 2022 explosives attack on the Nord Stream gas pipelines linking Russia with Europe,” British newspaper The Guardian reported.
The prosecutors accused a group of divers, led by a Ukrainian army officer, of carrying out the deep-sea operation near the Danish coast. The news comes days after a German court indicted a Ukrainian national for the pipeline blast. The BBC reported Thursday that a suspect, currently in German custody, has been “accused of leading a team of seven accomplices in an operation to destroy three of the four Nord Stream gas pipelines.”
The disclosure could potentially derail ties between the two countries. Since President Trump scaled back U.S. commitment, Germany has emerged as Ukraine’s biggest military backer in its ongoing war with Russia.
The blast severed the 760-mile Baltic Sea pipeline, Russia’s primary natural gas supply line to Western Europe. Russia and Germany spent around $20 billion on the joint pipeline project. Before the war in Ukraine began in February 2022, Russian exports accounted for more than 55 percent of Germany’s total gas demand.
Germany’s state-run DW TV reported:
Ukrainian state authorities were behind the 2022 sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipelines linking Russia with Europe, German prosecutors said on Thursday.
In a statement detailing the charges brought against suspect Serhii K. on Wednesday, prosecutors said that he and six accomplices had acted “on the orders of state authorities in Ukraine.”
According to prosecutors, K., now 50, was an “officer in the Ukrainian army” at the time of the operation, and his accomplices were also “military personnel.”
Prosecutors said the plan was to “destroy the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines” with the objective of “permanently halting gas supplies via the pipelines and preventing Russia from using the revenue from natural gas trade to finance its war efforts.”
The escalation comes at a highly inopportune time for President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. On Wednesday night, Russia launched one of its largest aerial attacks on Kyiv in the 52-month war.
“Russia launched hundreds of drones and dozens of missiles at Ukraine’s capital Kyiv in the early hours on Thursday, killing at least 21 people, wounding scores more and damaging around 130 buildings in one of the biggest attacks of the war,” Reuters reported. “Multiple explosions shook central Kyiv and reverberated across the capital throughout the night as thousands of residents rushed to bomb shelters and underground metro stations. Huge columns of smoke filled the skyline.”
The pipeline’s destruction unleashed an energy crisis that Germany is still fighting to overcome. President Donald Trump was the leading, if not the lone, voice warning Berlin about its fatal reliance on Russian gas. “Germany, as far as I’m concerned, is captive to Russia because it’s getting so much of its energy from Russia,” he warned during the 2018 NATO summit. Germany pays “billions of dollars to Russia, and we have to defend them against Russia,” he added, referring to the Nord Stream.
Much to the delight of mainstream media, German officials mocked the U.S. president to his face. “Trump accused Germany of becoming ‘totally dependent’ on Russian energy at the U.N. The Germans just smirked,” The Washington Post observed on September 25, 2018, referring to a German delegation to the Trump White House.
In 2021, President Joe Biden waived U.S. objections to the Russo-German pipeline, reversing the Trump administration’s opposition to the project over security concerns. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz returned the favor by endorsing Biden in the 2024 election.
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Who is surprised?
On another note, it’s always been about freedom and very much the Scots who never gave up and came to America ….
https://washingtonstand.com/article/fiery-scots-especially-their-presbyterian-ministers-were-key-to-the-american-revolution
Those Scots are long gone. Scotland is now woke.
Well damn. What now?
And we’re to believe those Ukrainian divers had no help from the CIA and/or British Intelligence coordinating with those “state authorities” ?
If Ukraine did blow the pipeline, they were just following orders from the UK.
They were just helping Germany implement their green new deal by reducing the amount of hydrocarbons they could burn. Germany is very green after all. All the best Euro countries are.
By the way. Why are defending Germany against the Russian bear while Germany is one of Russia’s best customers for natural gas? Thus just doesn’t add up does it?
Actually, the pipelines’ destruction has exposed the folly of the Green New Deal. Wind and solar have led to Germany’s rapid deindustrialization, especially with the prospective closure of 4 VW plants employing 100,000 workers. Industry cannot rely on high-priced intermittent power, and moves to locations with cheaper steady power.
Are we supposed to believe the Germans?
This whole event was coordinated through the likes of Victoria Nuland, Hillary Clinton with the tacit approval of Biteme. Biden declared they would do this from the lecturn of a press conference (as if he really knew what was happening) as did Nuland in a congressional committee hearing. The sail boat theory is bogus and I still believe this was really performed by covert US individuals.
“Since President Trump scaled back U.S. commitment, Germany has emerged as Ukraine’s biggest military backer in its ongoing war with Russia.”
So what do you think – is this more or less embarrassing than Jews who voted for Mamdani?
Good for them! Economic strike against Putin. If the Germans hadn’t made themselves dependent on it, they would have had no problems.
I haz some questions.
If this operation had been directed by any actor other than Ukraine, it would be a crime. But since when is a combatant at war with an enemy restricted from attacking the enemy’s infrastructure and sources of revenue (aka “generators of war-making capability”)? Is not economics part of warfare? So how does this become a “crime”? Are all violent destructive acts during wartime now “crimes,” or only some? if that latter, who gets to decide what attacks are crimes and which facilities are valid targets? Is this something that can be determined in advance, so that a combatant can avoid committing a “crime”? Can persons acting at the direction of a state claim the state wasn’t given adequate notice that an attack on a Russian asset would be considered a crime?
Meh, Ukraine can do whatever they’re big enough to do so long as they’re willing to accept the consequences. It’s war and denying the enemy economic resources seems totes fine to me. Anyone who objects should ensure their Nation doesn’t go to war. There was an awful lot of media and Ukrainian supporters pearl clutching when the Russians were being framed (poorly) for this. Germany in particular was livid. Now that the Germans are convinced it wasn’t Russia but Ukraine all along …might be interesting. I do recall when Russia was denying Ukrainian exports in Black Sea there was similar pearl clutching and lots of condemnation of Russia seeking to shrink Ukrainian revenue as if they were supposed to sit back and not seek to disrupt the economy of their enemy.
But Dave asks a good question. If the Germans are now saying that this was done by the Ukrainian government then how can they be prosecuting the doers? Surely, as agents of a government at war, having carried out a legitimate act of war against its enemy, they have committed no crime.
That gaslighting attempt about ‘The Ruskis did it’ was one of the most abjectly retarded things we’ve been fed during this war. I know Russian technology lags the West, but I’m pretty sure they have this thing called a ‘valve.’
My feelings on this also.
Russia invaded Ukraine, the nations are at war. Russia is financing this through oil/gas sales primarily to Europe and this pipeline was half owned by Russia.
Seems like a legitimate military target.
Not a civilian criminal offense.
And once again, Trump was spot-on. Not only did he highlight German dependence on Russian gas, but the absurdity of Germany letting themselves become so economically dependent on an adversary that NATO defends them against. It’s almost like German ‘leadership’ has been actively trying to destroy the country from within. Maybe don’t elect Commies to lead non-Commie countries?
Another way to put this
“America under Democrats does not follow up open red lines and threats made if you saw the destruction of this pipeline Biden promised and assumed Biden had some sort of capability of turning red lines and threats into reality you are deluded; but Ukraine struck a legitimate target in war time”
There I summarized the article.
A pity it wasn’t us because there are only so many red lines before America loses her power to deter I was really hoping that for once a Democrat enforced his red line.