Could you please stop posting unsubstantive and/or flamebait comments to HN? You've unfortunately been doing this repeatedly (e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34151395). It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for. We're trying for something different here.
But is it really? The EU can just respond with: "no". And while that would hurt the economy of the EU it would also hurt the economy of the US. I do not really see any reason for the EU to say yes to this unless the EU gets something in return.
Nord Stream AG is a Swiss holding company. Try a little harder next time. And the Russians have only been hostile towards the far-right controlled Ukrainian government (which murdered over 10k of its own Russian-speaking civilians in the Eastern oblasts before February 2022), not Germany.
> What is Germany getting in return for having Nordstream 2 blown up by the US/allies?
Nothing, because that didn’t happen. (Most likely, Russia blew up the not-being-used pipe as a capacity demonstration aimed at Baltic Pipe, to raise the perceived cost by government decisionmakers of continuing support for Ukraine; they probably also juice the propaganda about the US being behind it, to promote internal strife in the West between the people that can be influenced by that propaganda and their governments.)
> Besides 10x energy prices and its industrial economic base set back 10 years.
Since NS2 wasn’t being used, that didn’t happen as a result of it being destroyed, either.
But that doesn't say that America or anyone else was behind it either.
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence after all.
Theres no conclusive proof that any particular party was behind it, but given that a single pipe was left (something America wouldn't do if it was looking to take out Germanys capacity to use Russian gas) the only obvious conclusion was that it was Russia.
Of course it doesn't say that explicitly-- are you unfamiliar with the purpose that the Washington Post serves?
You think because one pipeline survived that it was intentional? After all of the US disasters in the Middle East you somehow still believe in its omnipotence?
And one pipeline surviving means little when the new pipelines that were destroyed had much better economics for Russia (and Germany, for that matter).
We have no public evidence yet to know with absolute certainty who is responsible. But an honest assessment of the motives, benefits, costs, not to mention blatant declarations of Biden and State Department flunkies make it 99% clear who was responsible. Whether the British pulled the trigger or some other errand boy is of little consequence.
> We have no public evidence yet to know with absolute certainty who is responsible.
correct.
> But an honest assessment of the motives, benefits, costs, not to mention blatant declarations of Biden and State Department flunkies make it 99% clear who was responsible.
They were clearly not talking about physical attacks when they talked about that, but I guess Russian propaganda is going to hook onto whatever it can.
> Whether the British pulled the trigger or some other errand boy is of little consequence.
But it could easy be the Russians who pulled the trigger, they easily had the most to gain and the easiest way to pull it off too. Russia gains a lot by destroying the pipelines.
- they threaten a number of NATO countries energy infrastructure indirectly
- they attempt to force Germany into certifying the new pipeline which would be a big win for Russia
- they get out of any contractual clauses they had about non supply of gas.
LOL, now that you bring up these absurd arguments (again), I remember you.
"they attempt to force Germany into certifying the new pipeline which would be a big win for Russia"
So Russia blew up its own pipelines to force Germany into certifying those pipelines?
"they get out of any contractual clauses they had about non supply of gas"
No one at the Kremlin cares about contracts that are easily invalidated by acts of war and illegal sanctions.
"they threaten a number of NATO countries energy infrastructure indirectly"
-So Russia blew up its own energy infrastructure delivery to Europe (that it spent 10 billion to build and would have earned lots from) to threaten energy infrastructure indirectly?
There we go-- when presented with the illogical nature of your statements and inconvenient facts that are readily available with a Google search, you resort to the "Russian propaganda" trope. Even The Washington Post (PR firm for the US security state) is literally saying Russia didn't do it. Eventually, the "paper of record" will reveal which Western power did the deed in an "exclusive," when it's no longer relevant to decision-making, as they always do.
> There we go-- when presented with the illogical nature of your statements and inconvenient facts that are readily available with a Google search, you resort to the "Russian propaganda" trope. Even The Washington Post (PR firm for the US security state) is literally saying Russia didn't do it. Eventually, the "paper of record" will reveal which Western power did the deed in an "exclusive," when it's no longer relevant to decision-making, as they always do.
It's Russian propaganda that America did it, something you are very insistent on with literally zero evidence.
It’s impossible that it was the US that blew Nordstream, because it would have made the European allies very upset, and there is NO WAY the US wanted to make them upset.
Probably, and the EU was talking a big game about that a few years ago. But between Nordstream 2 and the Ukraine war the EU seems to have shown how willing it actually is to decouple...
Exactly. Even when the harm to Europe is as blatant as the examples you cited, the cowardly leadership does nothing. This lack of representation for citizens' interests will lead to a lot of resentment and perhaps even extremism, as it has in the past.
Again this is 5% _of deaths_ not 5% of the population. So it's roughly in line with the number of people who die from random accidents in a given year.
i dont think people revolt because they feel bad when they compare themselves to the 1%. People revolt because they have nothing to lose. Their material conditions are the most important thing in this equation. I'm sure that a populace can tolerate inequality to a point (look at the inequality in the US and Europe, for example) but once a large enough slice of the population has nothing to lose then it's choppy boy time.
is this a serious comment? Rupert murdoch is a global media baron, he literally owns news outlets that encourage people to vote in one way or another. Do you think those news outlets are free of his ideology? do you think the washington post is free of Bezos' ideology?
Even billionaires and millionaires who dont own media companies have outsized influence. They can fund politicians they prefer to an extent that a rival might not be able to match. They can pay for lobbyists. There are a myriad of ways that dollars turn into votes without a mustachioed man walking around with a bag of money being involved. Mass movements aside the working class isnt out there propping up politicians.
You haven't presented any evidence. So I'm not sure how this is "pursuing people with relentless requests for evidence, often tangential or previously addressed".
Do you think it uncivil to ask people to justify their claims with evidence?
If the pipeline was shut off it could presumably be turned back on. If the pipeline was blown up that changes things. At a time when much of the world is looking toward China and Russia instead of the US, Europe has been forced to be more dependent on the US.
1) The PR disaster that would ensue if the US were caught doing this
2) The fact that the US does this sort of thing with submarines, not ships.
Whereas: we have Vladmir Putin who is looking at would be assassins who have a nice, ready-made source of cash if they take him out simply by turning the pipeline back on. And Putin will suffer neither PR nor diplomatic repercussions for blowing up the pipeline.
>The PR disaster that would ensue if the US were caught doing this
Ha-ha, let's take a look how much of "PR disaster" was direct spying on European "allied" leaders. Europe simply swallowed it without much trouble. With NS/NS2 we have a much better field for deniability. Simply say that any evidence is a Russian conspiracy or false flag.
> The PR disaster that would ensue if the US were caught doing this
Why would the US care about a PR disaster? It's not like Europe has any choice in the matter at this point.
> Whereas: we have Vladmir Putin who is looking at would be assassins who have a nice, ready-made source of cash if they take him out simply by turning the pipeline back on. And Putin will suffer neither PR nor diplomatic repercussions for blowing up the pipeline.
> Why would the US care about a PR disaster? It's not like Europe has any choice in the matter at this point.
Because the will of the allied sanction group is strongly dependent upon PR? The EU nations are a fractious group on the best of days. One of the reasons why the support for Ukraine and sanctions for Russia were so swift was the fact that Biden played the PR and intelligence game perfectly.
> What?
What part of my statement is not clear? Putin is worried about assassins. Taking out Putin and taking over Russia can be converted to cash very quickly by turning the pipeline back on even before sanctions get lifted. Blowing up the pipeline prevents any would be assassins from making use of it later. Putin will suffer neither PR backlash (he controls the Russian media) nor diplomatic backlash (he has already been isolated) for blowing up the pipeline.
I'm not going to keep going back and forth with you but since you insist on me addressing the subs thing it's worth pointing out that the ships mentioned in the article were just present in the days ahead of the leaks and there is no concrete evidence they were the attackers.
I'm just a two-bit software engineer and not a lawyer but I'll go against the general flow of the rest of the posts here and say "this is interesting." Whether or not it will work is another question, but it seems like they are trying to establish some precedent that companies need to consider the downstream impacts of the things they do.
I see posters here brushing off talk about mental health and political impacts from decisions corporate directors make. Well if there is a measurable harm that can be traced back to a given company why shouldn't they be sued?
It's a meme, but we live in a society. Companies don't exist in isolation, neither do profits.
But the lawsuit isn't arguing that "companies need to consider the downstream impacts of the things they do." That's an argument to be made to governments that grant corporate charters (though, I'd note that some governments have recently gone in the opposite direction, e.g. prohibiting pension fund managers from considering anything besides financial returns in their decisions).
Instead, the lawsuit is trying to expand the concept of "fiduciary duty" to other aspects of shareholders lives. That is the part that a lot of us think is insane.
> But the lawsuit isn't arguing that "companies need to consider the downstream impacts of the things they do."
It seems like it is though? From the text of the article:
> These activities pose risks to political stability, public health, and rule of law, threatening the intrinsic value of the global economy and thus the value of diversified portfolios.
The argument they seem to be going after is that we live in a highly connected society and powerful companies with outsized influence can disrupt the global economy which therefore hurts their investments. Whether or not Meta has _actually_ done that is another question, but I think that this line of thinking is interesting.
> Well if there is a measurable harm that can be traced back to a given company why shouldn't they be sued?
Say I overhear my neighbors talking with each other. Despite my not knowing them, if based on listening to their conversation I decid to go kill some people at my place of employment - that is on me. My neighbors do not bear any responsibility. At some point there is the concept of personal responsibility. Honestly, this should be obvious.
The problem is that this creates an open ended obligation of companies to whatever common shareholders want in their dreams about Society, and are responsible for doing so.
Nothing, it's a hostage situation.