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It is becoming increasingly difficult to maintain the West’s unsubstantiated narrative that Russia sabotaged the Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines. Now, even some German officials are beginning to admit that there is no evidence to blame Moscow for the crime. Indeed, as the question about the real culprit remains, at some point Berlin will have to investigate the possibility of sabotage by countries it considers as “allies”.
German Prosecutor General Peter Frank during an interview with Die Welt newspaper on February 4 stated that there is no evidence to blame Russia for the destruction of the Nord Stream gas pipelines in September last year. According to him, the investigation is still ongoing, but so far nothing has been found to blame Russia.
“It currently has not been proven (…) The investigation is ongoing (…) We are currently evaluating all this forensically. [The suspicion] that there had been a foreign sabotage act [in this case], has so far not been substantiated”, he said during the interview.
As we can see, the prosecutor seems to be skeptical about the very possibility of foreign sabotage, which seems irrational, since several experts indicate that the explosions in the two gas pipelines did not occur spontaneously or due to a mere malfunction, but by deliberate interference. This has been confirmed even by Western authorities, such as the Swedish government, which conducted unilateral investigations in November and concluded that sabotage had taken place, although it has not said anything about which country would be the saboteur.
A few days before Frank’s interview, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz had refused to comment on the investigation, claiming that he would wait for concrete evidence to be obtained before making any public statements. At the time, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova criticized Scholz’s omission, stating that his lack of transparency on the matter made it appear that “Berlin has something to hide”.
Zakharova’s words indicate a suspicion on the part of the Russians that the Germans could be somehow wanting to forge evidence against Russia to please their NATO partners. Another possibility is that they are preparing a narrative to claim that there was not any sabotage, as the prosecutor seems to have suggested when he said that no evidence of a foreign operation was found so far.
These maneuvers on the part of the German government would be happening because of the absolute impossibility of blaming the Russians for the attack. On the 1st of February, The Times published a report stating that the German investigators are “open to theories that a Western state carried out the bombing with the aim of blaming it on Russia”. Obviously, no Berlin official has confirmed this, but it is possible that this information has leaked and that now the Germans are trying to justify themselves to the West through this statement by Peter Frank, alleging the lack of evidence of foreign attack (Western or Russian).
In fact, this constant repetition of mistakes only undermines the credibility of the German government. Rather than denying that sabotage took place, the best thing to do would be to simply admit that it did happen, and the responsibility was not Russia’s, but some other country’s. If concrete evidence is found that a Western state destroyed the pipelines, Berlin should admit this and publicly condemn the aggressor country, reacting by imposing coercive measures, sanctions and breaking diplomatic relations – just as it certainly would do if Russia were responsible.
It must be remembered that experienced military experts, such as Donald Trump’s ex advisor Colonel Douglas Macgregor, suggested that the US and UK were responsible for the attack. According to Macgregor, only these two countries have naval forces capable of carrying out this type of sabotage. He categorically states that the Russians were not involved in the case, considering the way the operation was carried out.
“You have to look at who are the state actors that have the capability to do this. And that means the [UK’s] Royal Navy and the United States’ Navy (…) I think that’s pretty clear (…) The Russians did not do this”, Douglas Macgregor said in early October.
Admitting that Russia is not involved is an important step, but it is still insufficient. The German government, if it really wants to defend its sovereignty, must continue the investigations, and admit what already seems clear to all specialists: Berlin was the target of sabotage planned by its own “allies”.
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Lucas Leiroz is a researcher in Social Sciences at the Rural Federal University of Rio de Janeiro; geopolitical consultant. You can follow Lucas on Twitter and Telegram.
Featured image is from InfoBrics
