- DRAFT -
The year 2022
The first (indirect) publicly voiced UK´s conclusion to take both pipelines down had to be likely done after strategists realized (003) that Russian energy flows to EU is a serious threat to UK´s own energy security and that the removal of the threat is necessary; (003). The statement mentions all Russian energy exports to Europe. Compare that again to the position of the USA which stated that it understands that Germany does not have own energy resources and needs to import them. The USA therefore has never put sanctions against Nord Stream AG (NS1) but was opposing over-reliance of its ally Germany on one exporter. So for the USA only the Nord Stream 2 AG was an issue.
Slowly, the focus of UK went from opposition against Nord Stream 2 to opposition against all Russian hydrocarbon exports. All legal means to block Nord Stream from within EU ended after Brexit, the UK had no leverage against Germany like US having its army protecting its ally. The only means left was a physical removal of the threat (003).
During January 2022 along worsening security situation in Ukraine a political battle over Russian Nordstream 2 pipeline started. Allies started to think that commissioning Nordstream could be used as a leverage against Russia. (161).
JANUARY 2022
The year started with important announcement. On January, 1 2022 - Russian president Putin said that "Nord Stream 2 link ready to calm gas prices".
In Germany on January, 4 2022 the CEO of Uniper, the importer of Russian gas, clarified that "Nord Stream 2 go-ahead could come in mid-2022". On January, 6 2022 a poll was released: "A majority of Germans are in favor of the Russian Baltic Sea pipeline Nord Stream 2 starting operations."
The first to counter were British politicians. On Thursday January, 6 2022 in a debate UK´s Foreign secretary Liz Truss proclaimed: "I have been very clear about our position on Nord Stream 2. More broadly, we need to reduce dependence on Russian gas. On the discussions taking place in various formats, we cannot have a situation in which Russian aggression is rewarded in any way." and "It is clear that we need to reduce Europe’s dependency on Russian gas." In the same discussion she specified that: "Britain remains opposed to Nord Stream 2, and I am working with allies and partners to highlight the strategic risks of this project. I believe that the best way to challenge Russia is from a position of strength. We have to be clear that there would be severe consequences if there were to be an incursion into Ukraine, and we have to reduce European strategic dependency on Russia. That is how we will succeed."
The same day the USA has expressed their policy preferences toward the project.
On February, 16 2022 an article with name "Energy crunch: How the UK could play crucial role if Russia turned off gas taps to Europe" discussed how the UK could become a hub for LNG imports to EU. "The UK could send North Sea gas directly to Europe, through its pipelines, and then replenish its own gas network with LNG imported from the US, Qatar or other suppliers. There are a couple of important reasons why the UK would end up as a supplier (or rather the pipeline) of last resort."
On February, 23 2022 - Defence Secretary Ben Wallace tells military personnel that Vladimir Putin has gone "full tonto" over Ukraine and left himself with "no friends". The British army "kicked the backside of Tsar Nicholas I in 1853 in Crimea", he adds, and "can always do it again".
On February, 27 2022 - British foreign minister Liz Truss said she would press for further measures against Russia, particularly in cutting off their oil and gas supplies, at a meeting with her counterparts in the G7 group of rich nations. "The real objective is to degrade the Russian economy because what we know is Putin’s war machine is funded by revenues from oil and gas." (163)
Note that if it will be proven that the rogue state actor, the perpetrator was the UK, then these statements could be seen as significant part of evidence. They could also help to define "objectives" of the illegal act which could shift from Sabotage to a Terrorist Act or Armed Attack (046).
In March, 2 2022 - UK gov study "Geopolitical implications of Nord Stream 2" (163) and TONY BLAIR INSTITUTE FOR GLOBAL CHANGE released paper "Cutting the Cord: Ending Europe’s Energy Dependency on Russia". Concluding is a statement that such a plan requires urgent coordination between the EU and its partners to lay out both short-term measures and a longer strategic vision for greater energy security.
Sanctions were imposed against Nordstream 2, but not against the first Nord Stream company. It was never subject to any sanctions as it was actively delivering Russian gas to Europe through Germany based on long term agreements under fixed price. The UK seen that as an obstacle to own energy security but there were also other motives raging from geo-political to personal.
In 17 March 2022 - Boris Johnson stated that: "We need to wean the West off Russian oil and gas to punish Putin’s war machine"
There were many studies of the issue. The Institute for Government (IfG) said the security of the UK’s physical supply will “likely hold up” following possible Russian gas export disruptions to the EU, even without measures from the strategy, due to diversity of supply.
During this time active measures were taken to mitigate future impact of the mission. Initially perceived as a threat to energy security, the UK's opposition to Nord Stream 2 ultimately bolstered its efforts to become a net energy exporter. (027).
17 May 2022 - EU energy security: Implications for the UK stated that: "Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has stimulated UK and EU cooperation on the security of energy supply." and that "there is insufficient LNG import capacity within the EU, but spare capacity in the UK as well as capacity on the pipelines from the UK to mainland Europe". (041)
What followed was several months of diplomatic bashing (002) by Johnson and Truss stressing dangers of reliance on Russian energy exports. On April,6 2022 - Truss statement was that "We're going further to cripple Putin’s war machine" (163).
Truss was stressing the objective that "We need to ... degrade the Russian economy" (163). But Boris Johnson said that "we can’t close down use of Russian oil and gas overnight".
So Johnson made several trips to meet with LNG exporters. He was in talk to Middle East exporters to ramp up their exports to the whole Europe in case of Russian ones are lower (002). It could be assumed that the UK´s plan to forcefully rewire European energy imports along its own strategic objectives was already taking shape. This would be along the 2021 policy of: "Shaping the open international order" (2021 - Global Britain in a Competitive Age: the Integrated Review of Security, Defence, Development and Foreign Policy).
The statement "We have got to make sure we have substitute supply." had to be made on behalf of allies as the UK had minimal exposure. The UK government also warned its companies to divest in advance from Russian markets. (040). On 13 March 2022 - British finance minister Rishi Sunak called on more British companies on Sunday to wind down their existing investments in Russia. It looks like the UK, US based oil/gas majors companies started the exit from Russia. The UK was very active in pursuing its companies to leave RU market and said insurers not to cooperate with Nord Stream projects.
In March 2022 a new UK energy strategy was approved. It included building international support to reduce Russian energy revenues, providing a key EU entry point for non-Russian supplies of gas. "We are examining our infrastructure to ensure gas flows efficiently between the UK, Europe and the global market through our interconnectors and LNG terminals and promote gas infrastructure to be hydrogen-ready" which was later part of the failed idealism by Leyen "RePowerEU". In a video here Prime Minister Boris Johnson said why it’s vital that we invest in renewable energy and end the West’s reliance on Putin’s oil and gas. That is also a position the EU accepts later when covering up for the UK.
In April 2022 Liz Truss was ready to try and "beat global aggressors at their own game" so she set out her plan to reconfigure the UK’s foreign policy suggesting EU could go further still – with a ban on imports of oil and gas; hydrocarbons make up a third of the Russian economy.
All available data show that plans were developed in incremental steps and the UK positioned itself to gain from the event along the development of Ukrainian-Russian conflict. The Istanbul peace talks were shredded after Boris Johnson personally interfered, the criticality increased in lock-steps with other world events.
Event in the summer 2022 hinted to an improved relations, rapprochement between Russia and Germany seemed possible. Joseph Borrell, the EU’s chief diplomat, on acknowledged that certain political factions in the bloc wanted the EU to drop its support for Ukraine, push Kyiv into a ceasefire and abandon sanctions against Russia to ease economic pressure on European countries.
Britain's Boris Johnson Warns Against Attempts To 'Renormalize' Relations With Russia. Russia was making pro-active steps, as a part of negotiations it withdrew its forces from the area around Kiev but then the Butcha incident happened. The UK was again the most vocal against any reproachment with Russia.
In may Russian sanctions prohibit Gazprom from using Yamal-Europe for gas transit via Poland. Options to import Russian gas were slowly narrowing.
In June 8 June 2022 Angela Merkel in the interview about the deal with USA about not granting Nord Stream 2 AG the needed certification as a soft-power for not entering Ukraine: "But it wasn't an easy decision... "The thesis at the time was that once Nord Stream 2 is operational, Putin will stop supplying gas through Ukraine or even attack it."... The West ensured that gas was routed through Ukraine anyway, and she continued to receive transit fees. Merkel pointed out that Russia then attacked Ukraine on February 24, when gas was not yet routed through Nord Stream 2 . "In this sense, gas was not a weapon," Merkel said." This statement further confirms that the Biden - Scholz (as a new German Chancellor who did not need to honour Merkel´s agreement) re-signing the this so called "Merkel´s deal" in February was supposed to act as a "leverage against Russia" to deter them from entering Ukraine not for destroying physically both Nordstream 1 and 2 twin pipelines.
The commitment was of a temporary nation because would the investment be completely stopped due to political pressure Gazprom could demand at the arbitration court the full compensation for investment going bad, potential ISDS claims under the Energy Charter Treaty. The words of German environment minister Svenja Schulze from last February give a clue. “We also run the risk of ending up in international arbitration courts with compensation claims if we stop the project”.
Further developments were shadowing legal progress on two important cases the Unbundling of gas exporter and pipeline operator and the Swiss court delayed the bankruptcy but only for half a year. Attempts To 'Renormalize' Relations With Russia were curbed but not forever. The time was ticking and weather conditions make dives in winter more risky. There was not much time left.
These two pro-Gazprom court decisions accelerated the urgency of knocking both Nordstream twin pipelines as it was more and more obvious that at some point they will be relaunched. More than that the problem with returning Turbines, issue in which the delay in commissioning was caused partly by Canada and partly by the UK´s Siemens office not delivering INCOTERMS documents (171).
The complex operation was carefully prepared in advance, with a final decision had to be made by Liz Truss after she assumed the role of Prime Minister. The long term planning was confirmed on 28th of September by Jens Stoltenberg. He was also stressing the day before that this other issue is outside from Ukrainian conflict and that this "escalation beyond Ukraine... we need to ensure that this doesn’t evolve into a full-fledged war in Europe". Jens Stoltenberg was incremental in the cover-up, one of the reasons was to keep NATO together: "...is the importance of the transatlantic bond, North America and Europe standing together, and American leadership". Preparations could be traced to many events described in these following posts: here, here, here and here.
The post points that the window of opportunity to lay explosives was after the Yearly maintenance 10 day long check-up in July as the internal/external examination would have revealed charges. The plan included the post explosion management through AFF event in NY and through meetings at UN and in Norfolk. The NATO Baltops exercise has been conducted in June, before the maintenance which disqualifies it. Hersh´s claim is invalid also because NATO as an organization has not been considered a suspect. This is confirmed bz the SWE main investigator´s statement that just one state is the main suspect and it was not Russia, not USA and not pro-Ukrainian group.
In June the plan leaked, was intercepted or a UK submarine/minisub/un-manned drone could have been found near pipelines. True reason is unknown but some data exist. It is known that the USA (CIA) gave to allies strategic warning.
Several suitable news were identified which supports this sequences and cross-reference. Either it originates through work of CIA itself or suspected action was identified by intelligence services. If the possible claim that a pre-plan feasibility approach has been conducted near Bornholm during the Baltops then the CIA warning due to timing and US-UK, NATO-UK and GER-UK meetings on Navy level could make sense. The navy data would have been assessed, studied and conclusions drawn.
Note that EU also studied vulnerabilities of its infrastructure and organized on Bornholm a seminar discussing undersea vulnerabilities. It was requested by EU, The Subcommittee on Security and Defence (SEDE) which is a subcommittee of the Committee on Foreign Affairs. It is responsible for the European security and defence policy (ESDP). It cooperated with Norwegian Institute for International Affairs, Oslo, Norway. The study identified undersea explosives, military grade drones, submersibles and un/manned submarines as a means of attack and notices that preventing such attack is difficult and requires coordination. IT specifically warned against malicious activities under the threshold of Armed conflict. The lead author Christian Bueger - Professor of International Relations specialised in maritime security and ocean governance at University of Copenhagen - later after the attack stated that: "A first option is that the attacks could have been carried out as an underwater operation using advanced submarine technology... This implies that we are looking at a state and its navy. Although the attacks took place outside the territorial waters of the Nato members Denmark and Sweden, they could be interpreted as an act of war."
Was this some kind of soft politics warning? Was this some soft diplomatic politics message?
During June Russia obviously also noticed some suspicious actions and sent there a warship and plane to check it out. It made intrusion into Danish Territorial zone which Danes protested against.
The analysis of legal implications concerning attacks on pipelines shows that only Nordstream sections in Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZs) of third countries could be attacked as they provide less legal protection versus those is exporter´s Territorial zone or Importer´s Territorial zone (TZs) (032, 154, 164 165, 209, 210). Interestingly it was the UK´s government which was studying the case already in 2017, a Rishi Sunak´s paper which made it to NATO cycles (051). Other Russian pipelines are traversing directly through states which are paid transport fees. The only section where legal uncertainty in care of non-accidental damages exists is the area in Baltic sea, jurisdiction in EEZ is unclear as has been proven after Sweden and Denmark closed their preliminary investigations.
In August German politicians demanded reopening Nordstream pipelines to ease German economic troubles.
Legally Nordstream could be reopened. Turbines issue stalled Nord Stream 1 but the Nord Stream 2 had a good chance to get the postponed certification so the energy would flow again.
The time was running short before winter would come for deep divers to knock it out.
***
(Part 3 - draft for now)
Because the truth matters.
Please consider supporting my work with a donation.
Every bit helps keep this mission alive!
