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Originally Posted by afc wimbledon
Russia has plenty of land pipelines to supply Germany, blowing the pipelines did nothing to alter its ability to supply Europe, it did increase the price of Natural Gas and so make Russia some extra money though
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The gas that flowed overland from Russia to Europe was through Ukraine, so hardly a secure delivery method for them at this point.
You're also unreasonably dismissing the benefits to the US of getting rid of Nord Stream. You can go back and read plenty of articles pre-2022 on why Nord Stream was a strategic problem for the US and why they wanted to stop it. It's not like those reasons disappeared.
Furthermore, there is a big difference between a pipeline that can just be turned back on again and no pipeline at all. Germany might have had a different political calculus a couple of months back when they were complaining about US price gouging on gas if it had been possible to just open the taps again. It certainly would have given them leverage in negotiations with the US and made their complaints more than just hapless pleas from a now-captured market. The same leverage gained by the US in energy pricing extends to other relations between the two countries now. The whole fear regarding Nord Stream was that Russia would be able to exert influence on Germany and Europe via energy supply. Of course the US can now do the same.
I also think the concept of risks involved for the US in blowing it up is somewhat exaggerated. What are the risks really? What consequences would they actually suffer? Everyone knows that 20 years ago they orchestrated a massive lie, even bringing a prop into the UN to make the theatrics more convincing, to get countries to support them in an illegal invasion that ended up with a million dead Iraqis. I don't really see them having suffered any consequences for that. It seems an awful lot like influential American industries did pretty well out of that invasion while the US has never suffered any consequences even after the lies became transparent to the world. Sure, an action like blowing up a pipeline if it were public at the time would potentially cause a public uproar in Europe that would cause political pressure against the US, but if it could be obfuscated a for even a couple of years I don't really see what consequences they're going to suffer. I'm sure lots of people would view it as Azure does anyways, that it was the right thing to do.
They don't recognize the ICC. They have veto power in the security council. They now have Europe more dependent on them for energy. They are the principal actors of NATO. The list goes on... If they did do it, they're not going to suffer any consequences for it, because whoever did it has only increased American influence by doing so.
None of us know who did it. Maybe it was Ukraine, Russia, the US, or someone else, but I find your arguments that it categorically was not the US really unconvincing.