The attacks on Nord Stream and the elephant in the room

The attacks on Nord Stream and the elephant in the room
by: Jens Berger
[This article posted on 9/27/2022 is translated from the German on the Internet, NachDenkSeiten – Die kritische Website - NachDenkSeiten – Die kritische Website - http://www.NachDenkSeiten.de.]

According to a report in the Tagesspiegel, massive pressure drops occurred in the Nord Stream 1 and 2 natural gas pipelines on Monday night and yesterday evening, and the German government assumes that there were targeted attacks. Reports from the operators suggest that at least one section of Nord Stream 2 has been completely destroyed. Who could be the perpetrators? Absurdly, the media are already speculating that Russia could be behind the attacks. Yet it is obvious who could have the greatest interest in the final demise of the two Baltic Sea pipelines. In February, U.S. President Biden already openly announced that the U.S. would find a way to "put an end" to Nord Stream even against Germany's interests. That has now apparently happened, and Germany remains silent. By Jens Berger.

On Monday night, a huge leak occurred in the Nord Stream 2 pipeline southeast of Bornholm. According to the operator, the pressure dropped from 105 to just seven bars in a short time. Seven bars corresponds to the normal water pressure at a depth of 70 meters, which should roughly correspond to the sea depth at the position that was confirmed and widely cordoned off by the Danish authorities yesterday afternoon. From this it can be concluded that the pipeline is completely destroyed at this point. Already at this point, it was assumed that this was a deliberate act of "sabotage". According to the still sparse information, however, only one of the two Nord Stream 2 pipeline strings was apparently affected at this point.

Yesterday evening, the same scenario occurred with the parallel Nord Stream 1 pipeline. Here, too, there was a "sharp drop in pressure" observed on both pipeline strings. The leak is apparently also southeast off Bornholm. Here, too, authorities assume a "targeted attack." "Everything would point against a coincidence". Such an attack, according to a "person briefed by the federal government and federal authorities" quoted by the Tagesspiegel, would be "anything but trivial," since it would have to be "carried out with special forces, for example naval divers or a submarine." This narrows the circle of perpetrators to state actors.

The WELT and the Tagesspiegel, both reporting on the attacks, are also already speculating blithely about potential perpetrators. While the Tagesspiegel at least plays around with the idea that "Ukrainian forces or forces associated with Ukraine" could be responsible, both newspapers mention Russia as a possible suspect. So the Russians would have blown up their own pipelines in a "false flag operation" (quote: Tagesspiegel) in order to ... yes, why actually? And here at the latest the WELT and the Tagesspiegel prove to be real leading media for conspiracy theorists.

According to the Tagesspiegel, Russia's aim could be "to stir up uncertainty" and "possibly to drive up the price of gas again". Both assumptions lack any logic, since no gas is transported via the two pipelines and the "markets" did not expect this to change in the medium term. Accordingly, the gas price on the spot market today has not changed compared to yesterday, despite the attacks. A little more imaginative is the conspiracy theory of the WELT. The Springer journalists whisper that Russia wants to prevent Germany from tapping the technical gas that is in the pipelines "in an emergency situation in winter" by blowing up the pipelines and that Russia wants to prevent exactly this. This scary story, by the way, is based on a wild theory that Sigmar Gabriel sprinkled on ZDF a few weeks ago. But this story is pretty much nonsense. For one thing, there is comparatively little technical gas in the pipelines, and for another, it is more than questionable, both technically and legally, whether it is even possible to extract this technical gas. The fact that Russia is blowing up its own pipelines to prevent Germany from stealing a "paltry" 177 million cubic meters - the transport volume of both pipelines is 110 billion cubic meters - of technical gas is so absurd that the Springer publishing house should be presented with the Golden Aluhut.

What is most astonishing is that no one is addressing the elephant in the room. It's not as if there is no suspect. The U.S. has a motive and the technical means to have committed these acts, and it has also already stated in advance that if in doubt, it will "put an end to Nord Stream 2." At a joint press conference with Chancellor Scholz, US President Biden announced this. When asked how exactly he intended to implement this, since the project is within Germany's decision-making power, he replied coolly: "I promise you that we are in a position to do so. He has now possibly proved that.

There is no question that the U.S. has a vested interest in preventing Russian supplies of raw materials to Germany, even in the long term. The U.S. is on the verge of becoming Europe's largest LNG supplier. The billions of euros that went to Russia for energy supplies until last year are now largely going to the USA. Since LNG is much more expensive than piped natural gas, this naturally has an impact on European energy prices. Europe is no longer competitive. Both gas and electricity are cheaper in the USA than in Germany by a factor of about ten, and the USA is already making massive use of these price advantages to persuade German companies to relocate their production capacities across the Atlantic. There is an economic war going on - not only between the West and Russia, but also between the U.S. and the EU; except that no one is addressing this in this country. Blowing up the Baltic Sea pipelines would be entirely in the spirit of this war.

However, the USA also has a geostrategic interest in driving a wedge between Germany and Russia. One kills two birds with one stone - the old enemy Russia and the old competitor Germany. Oskar Lafontaine had pointed out this strategy devised by US think tanks only a few days ago at the Pleisweiler Talk.

If one were now a criminal, the case would actually be obvious. One has a suspect who has the means and a motive and who has already announced the crime at least indirectly in the past. But of all people, this crime suspect plays no role, at least in public communication. Isn't that astonishing?
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Fact check of the "Faktenchecker": With which manipulative methods the ZDF protects the USA in the case of the Nord-Stream-Sabotage by: by Florian Warweg
[This article posted on 10/7/2022 is translated from the German on the Internet, https://www.nachdenkseiten.de/?p=88905.]

The USA has a motive (gas monopoly in Europe), had openly announced in advance to put an end to Nord Stream in case of doubt ("one way or another"), they have the technical means to implement this, and moreover already several times in recent history demonstrably destroyed pipelines for geopolitical reasons by means of acts of sabotage (Soviet Yamal pipeline and in Nicaragua). So there is definitely circumstantial evidence that does not exclude at least the USA from the circle of suspects per se. But this is exactly what ZDF is trying to do with a forced "fact check" entitled "Rumors of Nord Stream sabotage: experts: no evidence of U.S. involvement." The U.S. is absolved of any motive or responsibility in this ZDF report. The approach is so highly manipulative and at the same time so self-contradictory that it serves as a prime example of the absurdity of the current "fact-checking" culture. By Florian Warweg.

"Fueled by Russia, conspiracy buffs speculate about U.S. involvement in the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines. Experts believe this is unlikely and disinformation."

Even this introduction to the alleged fact check stands on its own in its defamatory and tendentious language. No one who intends to deliver an unbiased fact check resorts to such manipulative words.

The argumentative line is thus set from the start: Only "conspiracy buffs" speak of possible "U.S. involvement" - "experts" classify reference to U.S. as "disinformation."

And in this manipulative manner it continues:

"Almost all questions are unanswered. Nevertheless, experts make assessments based on available information as to which scenarios are more likely than others. The vast majority consider Russian involvement to be the most obvious option."

Let's keep in mind: virtually nothing is known about the person responsible, almost all questions surrounding the destruction of Nord Stream 2 are still completely open - but at the same time it is clear to ZDF that a "large majority" of experts consider Russia to be the culprit. Anyone who does not see it that way is spreading "disinformation." Of course, the ZDF article does not cite any evidence for this alleged "large majority". Even more telling, however, is the feat of admitting, on the one hand, that there is as yet no concrete information about the possible perpetrators, while, on the other hand, even the thesis that the U.S. could be involved is dismissed per se as "disinformation.

Consequently, the ZDF article then continues with an approach that Norbert Häring calls the "contact guilt method" in an article on the subject:

"Parts of the Internet and Russian propaganda, however, sketch out an alternative scenario: the U.S. could be behind it. And this theory is catching on. Conspiracy-ideological alternative media, Fox News journalist Tucker Carlson, individual politicians from the AfD and left, and ex-head of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution Hans-Georg Maaßen - they all more or less openly suggest involvement or complicity by the U.S. and NATO."

The message conveyed by ZDF is clear, but has so purely nothing to do with the actual claim of a "fact check" striving for objectivity: If you don't want to be considered a conspiracy ideologue, Trump supporter, AfD sympathizer or "Russian propagandist," then you'd better quickly distance yourself from the hypothesis that the U.S. could also have a motive regarding the sabotage of the Nord Stream 2 pipelines. It was and always will be the Russians. Period.

Only after the framework ("framing") has been extensively set, how the inclined ZDF reader should please classify the Nord Stream sabotage case, comes the part of the fact check that is most worthy of the name. The alleged deconstruction of the "chain of evidence" that the USA could have been involved in the destruction of the pipelines. But here, too, ZDF works less with facts than with omission, distortion and manipulative language.

Thus it says right at the beginning of this part: "The alleged chain of evidence is thin. Three points in particular are cited". This is followed by a list under the title "Alleged evidence of U.S. involvement."

The key terms "chain of evidence" and "evidence of U.S. involvement" introduced by ZDF are, apropos, not substantiated with sources and thus remain a pure assertion by ZDF. An Internet search also yields hardly any hits on this. Of the previously mentioned representatives of the thesis of a possible US involvement, no one has used the term "proof" or "evidence". There is talk of hints, motives and circumstantial evidence. Only the ZDF itself speaks of "chain of evidence" or "proof". What a fact check! One invents assertions oneself, in order to refute these then.

In addition to these argumentative "tricks", it is equally revealing what the ZDF "fact checkers" omit from this enumeration and "deconstruction" of information relevant to the reader.

In point 1, "In a now-deleted tweet, former Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski thanked the U.S. for destroying the pipelines," there is no mention of the fact that Sikorski was also Poland's defense minister and, more relevantly, is married to Anne Applebaum, who is considered extremely well-connected in political Washington. For example, she is not only a member of the influential think tank Council on Foreign Relations, but also sits on the board of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), the semi-governmental arm of U.S. foreign policy that openly propagates and finances regime change attempts worldwide.

On point 2, it is pretended that this kind of explicit threat has only come from Biden. That is demonstrably not the case. The current Secretary of State at the U.S. State Department, Victoria Nuland, who gained dubious fame by exclaiming "Fuck the EU," also declared this year that if Russia invaded Ukraine, it would be over with Nord Stream, "one way or another." Other senior U.S. officials expressed similar sentiments.

The ZDF report was published at 8:22 p.m. on October 1. By that time, the statement made by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on September 30, when he called the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines a "great opportunity" for the LNG industry in the United States, had also long been known:

On point 3, ZDF presents it as if the U.S. warships in question were simply "underway in the Baltic Sea" in general, and that this was not an unusual occurrence, after all. The fact that the US fleet was not underway somewhere in the Baltic Sea, but directly over the later sabotage area and with the transponder switched off, is not mentioned by ZDF with a single word. Likewise, ZDF completely omits the fact that this U.S. presence, in turn, significantly reduces the probability of an unnoticed act of sabotage by Russian forces.

Also completely omitted is the fact that, as Jeffrey Sachs, professor at Columbia University in New York and director of the Earth Institute there, among others, pointed out in a live interview with the international TV news channel Bloomberg, there are radar records proving that shortly before the act of sabotage "U.S. military helicopters normally stationed in Gdansk were circling over the area" (Die NachDenkSeiten reported).

In an exclusive interview with Berliner Zeitung, the U.S. star economist also said that destroying Nord Stream would be contrary to Russia's interests; the country would lose "income, financial assets and bargaining power." The U.S., on the other hand, would "benefit strategically and financially from the operation." Sachs concluded by emphasizing:

"So by far the most likely culprit behind the operation is the United States."

(Incidentally, to this day not a single line can be found on the statements of the renowned US professor by the colleagues from ZDF).

After this listing and, at best, superficial "deconstruction" of the indications that speak for US involvement, ZDF lets the cat out of the bag and presents its two "experts" who are supposed to be representative of the claimed "majority of experts". And this selection of experts made by ZDF actually speaks for itself.

The first "expert" is not mentioned by name, but is supposed to be an employee of the Department for Maritime Strategy and Security at the Institute for Security Policy at the University of Kiel. As ZDF itself writes, the "Kiel experts" are currently being asked throughout Germany for their assessment of the Nord Stream 2 explosion. Almost everywhere they are also mentioned by name, but just to ZDF they want to remain anonymous? This then reads like this:

"The Kremlin's disinformation war has had noticeable consequences for the researchers: "In the last few days, we've received a lot of unwelcome fan mail," one employee tells ZDF. That's why he doesn't want to be quoted by name with assessments of Nord Stream at the moment."

The institute's website lists Johannes Peters, head of the Maritime Strategy and Security Department, and a single permanent research assistant, Dr. Sebastian Bruns, focusing on "Transatlantic Relations & U.S. Foreign and Security Policy." In addition, one research assistant and two "non-resident fellows" are mentioned, one from Australia with focus in "Indo-Pacific Security Issues", another from Austria and also with focus in "Transatlantic Relations", among others.

It is striking that the entire staff of this department has an explicitly transatlantic orientation. The only permanent staff member besides the head was, among other things, "military and defense policy officer at the U.S. House of Representatives" and "McCain Fulbright Distinguished Visiting Professor" at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis. Of all people, people with such a CV are then presumably asked by ZDF as experts whether the USA would also have a motive to commit an act of sabotage on Nord Stream 2.

This anonymous "expert" is then quoted by ZDF with the statement:

"Methodologically clean, one largely invalidates speculation about U.S. involvement by examining whether the U.S. had the means, the opportunity and motives," the researcher said. All three would have to be present - "If one factor is zero, the result is also zero."

Building on this statement, the latter then states as a conclusion, without further justifying it:

"It is difficult to construct motives of the U.S. president or other actors without Tom Clancy fictions. The speculations are not plausible."

Finally, the unnamed scholar advances the counterargument that in democratic states, such sophisticated actions would result in memos; these could potentially become public. If one follows the logic of this argument, then, after all, "democratic states" would never be allowed to perpetrate "sophisticated" acts of sabotage. A claim that has already been refuted dozens of times, as evidenced by proven and large-scale U.S. acts of sabotage in Cuba, Nicaragua, Vietnam, and the Soviet Union alone (e.g., explosion of the Yamal pipeline in 1982).

While the unknown expert from Kiel serves ZDF to explain why the USA had no motive for the sabotage of Nord Stream, the second expert is supposed to explain why everything speaks for Russian perpetration. This expert is presented as "Russia expert and former CDU employee Nico Lange". At least this time even a name is mentioned. However, one wonders what prompted ZDF to call Nico Lange a "Russia expert". Lange was considered the "closest associate" of former CDU chairwoman and defense minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer (AKK), as well as deputy federal executive director of the CDU. Previously, he headed the foreign office of the CDU-affiliated Konrad Adenauer Foundation (KAS) in Washington and Kiev. One searches in vain for publications explicitly on Russia; even on the list of publications linked on his own website, only publications from April 2022 on the Ukraine war are listed; before that, there are contributions on the USA and right-wing populism, but absolutely nothing on Russia. This inevitably leads to the question on which factual basis the ZDF fact checkers sell Nico Lange to the reader as a "Russia expert".

This alleged "Russia expert" is then asked what Russia's motive would be to blow up its own pipeline. His daring thesis is summarized by ZDF thus:

"The more European gas storage facilities filled up for the winter, the less Moscow's leverage to turn the gas tap on and off worked. Sabotaging a largely worthless pipeline could now be an attempt for Russia to sow mistrust among allies and in European societies."

That's it. Both argumentatively and with the ZDF fact check itself. The entire ZDF report ends not with a critical classification of the expert testimony or any other form of conclusion, but with a quote from AKK's intimate Lange:

"Putin knows the German debates very well and uses prejudices purposefully. Putin relies on anti-Americanism, well-known myths and conspiracy theories - that is where he starts with his disinformation. Russia relies both on paid and controlled spreading of disinformation among us and on 'useful idiots' who spread Russian disinformation on their own."

That really leaves one speechless. In its fact check, ZDF first grandiloquently claims that "the vast majority" of experts consider Russian involvement in the sabotage of the gas pipelines "the most obvious option" and that speculations about U.S. involvement are "unlikely and disinformation." At the end of the "fact check," however, it turns out that the "large majority" of experts claimed by ZDF is based exclusively on extremely vague and superficial assessments by an unnamed "expert" from Kiel (with a presumably very pro-U.S. bias) and a "Russia expert" who is in fact a former CDU and KAS functionary - without a single listed publication on Russia and who had never appeared as a Russia expert even before February 24, 2022. This form of "fact-checking" journalism is probably still very charitably described as "unserious."
More on the topic:

U.S. Secretary of State blinks at Nord Stream 2 destruction: 'This presents a tremendous strategic opportunity for years to come'

Fact checker's fact check: For Correctiv, fact-based reporting on Ukraine is "adoption of Russian narratives and disinformation"
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Ukraine War, Propaganda and the Geopolitical Descent of the West
Some theses from a value-critical perspective

by Andreas Urban
[This article posted on 9/30/2022 is translated from the German on the Internet, https://www.streifzuege.org/2022/ukraine-krieg-propaganda-und-der-geopolitische-abstieg-des-westens/.]

All wars have a prehistory, and there are always both occasions and causes for them. However, all reconstructible causes and historical preconditions that lead to war can never be a justification for war. There can never be a justification for war. This also and especially applies to Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine, which has shaken the world since the end of February 2022 and may have surprised even experts and informed observers of world events to some extent, despite the known history and recent escalations in the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

As a disclaimer, it is important to state such self-evident facts in advance of this thesis paper, especially since since the beginning of the war in Ukraine we have experienced remarkable parallels to the social debates during the Corona crisis, which largely determined the discourse in the last two years: With the help of an enormous propaganda apparatus, a public "consensus" is being produced that does not tolerate any contradiction or even differentiation. If in the "war against the virus" a "community of solidarity" was already created and conjured up, which reacted with fierce rankling to all those who dared to ask stupid questions (about lockdowns, masking obligations, vaccinations, etc.), now likewise an army of "solidarians" stands side by side with the Ukrainian government and in unity against the Russian aggressor. It almost seems as if the "people's body" rediscovered during the pandemic was only waiting to finally be allowed to prove itself in a "real" war. Anyone who does not agree with the bellicism that is spreading everywhere today (but especially in Germany) is almost denounced as an "enemy of the state. And anyone who asks questions, for example, about the role of the West in the escalation of the conflict, is defamed without further ado as a "Putin supporter"[1].

The mechanisms are thus very similar to those during the Corona crisis, when critics, as soon as they critically questioned the government line and the media "consensus", also very quickly found themselves in the garbage can of "Corona deniers" and "conspiracy theorists", if not "Nazis" and "anti-Semites". Corresponding defamations - usually not even supported by any meaningful arguments - could be experienced even within the left and even within value-critical circles.
critical circles.[2]

War propaganda has been the same since at least 1914, and its typical form and content make the media and political debates so easily identifiable for what they are - propaganda: war becomes a confrontation between good and evil. The enemy side is fundamentally mean, inhumane and bellicose, while one's own side is humane and peace-loving; the enemy is cruel, commits war crimes or uses weapons of mass destruction, while one's own side kills civilians - if at all - only by accident. And, of course, one's own side fights for higher values such as freedom, democracy and human rights; the enemy, on the other hand, is autocratic, bears equally inhuman and subhuman traits, is a dictator and despot, if not a new Hitler altogether."[3]

Of course, as in any war, the propaganda comes from both sides, but it also (and not least) comes from the West. This is what makes it so difficult to get useful information, because neither one side nor the other can be trusted. There should be at least enough consensus in a socio-critical context that one cannot easily take sides and should keep a sufficiently critical distance from media coverage and government statements, both from the Russian and the Ukrainian or Western side. Whoever wanted to do so could see in the Western war coverage - in which, by the way, journalists, as already at Corona, apparently check nothing, but really nothing at all for plausibility, let alone correctness - already in the first weeks of the war things that can be called simply hair-raising. Perhaps the most absurd display of pathetic journalism in some Western media was an excerpt from a Star Wars movie in an alleged report from the Ukrainian theater of war. In contrast, an impressive example of shameless disinformation was a Ukrainian report of the Russian attack on Mariupol. The footage was actually from a Ukrainian(!) attack on Donetsk a few days earlier, in which 21 civilians were killed by a cluster bomb (an act of war, by the way, that was not reported anywhere in the West - just as one learns nothing else about the situation in the areas in the Donbass that have been under Ukrainian fire for years). In view of such journalistic blunders and blatant disinformation and propaganda, it is difficult to avoid the impression that one is witnessing textbook projections in the face of the accusations of Russian disinformation and fake news that are repeatedly - certainly often not unjustly - raised by the Western side.[4] The West, however, is not aware of this.

In contrast to what the Western "consensus" decrees as the only adequate positioning in the Ukraine war, it must be insisted from a historically informed, socio-critical perspective that the current war, as well as the entire Russia-Ukraine conflict - which in the meantime also has a somewhat longer history and did not suddenly escalate from one day to the next - cannot be understood without (also) taking into account the role of the West in general and NATO in particular. This includes not least NATO's eastward expansion, which has been going on for more than 20 years. It is highly problematic to dismiss this as clumsy or even "conspiracy-theoretical" anti-Americanism, as is sometimes even the case in some value-critical debates - although there are, of course, such truncated, anti-Americanist manifestations, which are also to be criticized accordingly. But if it were per se inadmissible for value critics to address and criticize the role and the "machinations" of the West and especially of the USA, then such important books as Roberts Kurz' "World Order War"[5] would probably never have been written. Thus, a similar dynamic seems to be at work here and a similar arbitrary curtailment of critical thinking seems to be taking place as with Corona: When it comes to the evil virus or the evil Russian, the West or Western governments are apparently to be excluded from criticism. Here, one cannot help but notice that currently, especially in countries like Germany, a historically deeply ingrown hatred of the Russians is being actualized again, which may explain some of the course and quality of the discussion in this country (Germany has some things that it cannot or will not forgive the Russians for, especially in 1941).

The open racism, which is suddenly celebrating a happy reign again[6] by ascribing all kinds of negative characteristics to "the Russian" and waging downright smear campaigns against everything "Russian" (to the point that cultural institutions are removing music and theater plays by Russian composers and authors from their programs[7]), is, incidentally, not only raging against Russia, but not least also against the objects of Western "solidarity" themselves. What seems to be so particularly repugnant to the Western and here especially to the European citizen about the current war is obviously that this time it does not hit - as e.g. at that time in Afghanistan and Iraq or until today in Syria or Yemen - civilizationally "backward" countries, but a country oriented to "Western values" and "democracy" (almost) in the heart of Europe. [8] And while in the other wars primarily people of Muslim origin were affected and - if they were not killed[9] - set out in large numbers to flee to the West, today it is blond and blue-eyed women and children who need to be rescued and, compared to people from Afghan, Iraqi or Syrian war and collapse zones, are welcomed with almost open arms.[10] In other words: Ukraine is already counted as part of the West, and this time it is practically ourselves who are affected and no longer "the others".

All this, as I said, does not mean that criticism of the actions of the Russian government and its army is absolutely necessary. But it is just as difficult to see why the West should be exempt from criticism and why a critical perspective on the current war should be as one-sided as the barely tolerable media coverage and propaganda on practically all Western channels.

Final Crisis and Geopolitical Descent of the West

From a critical perspective, the war in Ukraine must be placed in the context of the final crisis and viewed in this light.[11] An essential aspect in this context, which e.g. Gerd Bedszent has at least roughly unfolded in his text on the Ukrainian war[12] are the processes of crisis and disintegration in the capitalist periphery and semi-periphery, which manifest themselves in Russia and Ukraine in particular in that notorious oligarchy which emerged from the disintegration of the Soviet Union and its subsequent neoliberal exploitation in the 1990s. [13] In Ukraine in particular, it is not least its status as a "failed state"[14] that is now likely to be definitively sealed by the war (this will also depend on how long the war is drawn out and how much of Ukraine is then left, e.g. in terms of infrastructure).[15]

But even here, from the point of view of the final crisis, a critical analysis probably cannot do without considering the West. It is difficult to avoid the impression that we are currently witnessing a rapidly accelerating geopolitical and economic decline of the West and especially of the USA. The USA in particular is now on its last legs at various levels - if only in terms of the degree of deindustrialization that has now been achieved and the accompanying pauperization of the population.[16] Even the military superiority from which the status of the USA as the "world police" was derived in recent decades no longer seems to be sustainable even as an imago.[17] And one of the most dangerous things about the current situation seems to be that the West does not want to admit this and now apparently believes its own propaganda. Otherwise, for example, the downright euphoric (and in many respects also hypocritical[18]) sanctions mania in this country can hardly be explained. In economic terms, this will hurt the U.S. economy less than the European economy in particular - for example, if an oil and gas embargo is actually imposed on Russia.

On this point, there may be some reservations about Anselm Jappe's idea of using the exit from Russian oil and gas as an opportunity to get out of ecologically devastating fossil capitalism in the first place, which is certainly worth discussing.[19] It is much more likely that the exit from Russian oil and gas will be compensated by US fracking oil and gas, which is even more harmful ecologically. And what cannot be compensated (if only because the U.S. supply is limited and very costly) will then be borne primarily by those who are already struggling to make ends meet - through energy shortages and/or skyrocketing electricity, gas and gasoline prices, mass unemployment as a result of the economic "collateral damage" of the sanctions policy, etc. In addition, the inevitably further forced phase-out of energy production by means of oil and gas as a result of the sanctions leads us to expect a renaissance of nuclear energy - this would then be the peak of insanity. In this context, a worldwide erosion of environmental legislation is also likely (Antarctica as a source of raw materials and landfill, etc.). Whether the Russia-Ukraine war is a good opportunity to initiate a practical exit from the current energy economy via sanctions against Russia seems questionable, as long as the capitalist mode of production is not shaken at the same time. At the very least, this project would have to be linked to a boycott of the U.S. fracking industry and nuclear energy, if only from an ecological point of view.

Also the constantly further fueled Western escalation policy can probably only be explained by the (after two years of Corona policy sufficiently known[20]) loss of reality and the galloping irrationality not only in the Western population, but also and especially among the Western functional elites.[21] There nobody seems to seriously understand anymore (or to want to understand) what a further escalation, e.g. an intervention of NATO, would mean - namely the third world war.

Geopolitically, the Russian war of aggression is probably to be interpreted as a signal of Russia's final turning away from the West and focusing on "Eurasian" relations, especially with China and India. There seems to be a lot going on here at the moment with regard to the establishment of a Eurasian economic area. This, too, is in fact part of the geopolitical and economic crisis of the West, which is consistently suppressed in this country. One example is the apparently very advanced efforts of China and Co. to withdraw from the world currency dollar ("de-dollarization"). Recently, even Saudi Arabia announced that it would no longer settle part of its oil deliveries to China in dollars, but in yuan.[22] It seems that intensive work is already being done on an alternative payment system analogous to the Western SWIFT system. If these efforts are successful, Russia's extensive exclusion from SWIFT as part of the Western sanctions should not only harm Russia much less than is hoped in the West (which would once again be proof of the loss of reality in this country), but should also prompt Russia to further push its cooperation with China - again primarily to the detriment of the West and not least of Europe.

In connection with the "de-dollarization" it should also be remembered that many of the "world order wars" waged by the West in recent decades served not least (also) to support the dollar as the world's reserve currency.[23] Even then, the hegemon USA, which now apparently only exists as such in its own perception, was hardly able to guarantee this economically, but only thanks to its military superiority. The fact that even states that are enemies to the death, such as India and Pakistan or Iran and Israel, are now virtually united in refusing to agree to the Western sanctions policy against Russia also illustrates the dwindling significance of the USA as a geopolitical power.

Implications for Crisis Theory?

Whether and what will result from these geopolitical shifts and what implications this will have, especially for crisis theory, remains to be seen. Perhaps we will experience (not for the first time, by the way) that the further course of the final crisis still has some surprises in store that we would not have expected. A (at least temporary) geopolitical shift of power to the Eurasian region would be possible (provided that the current escalation policy does not lead to a nuclear war in the foreseeable future).

A relevant factor for further developments in the coming months and years that deserves value-critical attention would be the fact that the West, especially the U.S., has vigorously promoted its own deindustrialization in recent decades by shifting production capacities abroad, especially to China. Robert Kurz has described these processes, especially in "World Capital," and theorized them as both a symptom and a major driving force of the final crisis.[24] However, this crisis process does not take the same form everywhere in the world and does not affect all countries equally or is pronounced differently in each case. Russia, for example, even if it really were the "gas station disguised as a state" that U.S. politicians like to conjure up, can essentially supply itself (at present), unlike the U.S. and especially Europe. The same applies to China: Unlike Russia, for example, the East Asian economic power is itself dependent on large energy imports. In the West, however, virtually nothing works without Chinese products and components. If China decided to stop supplying the West with Chinese goods, not only would the Western consumer's shopping cart be pretty much empty, but Western industries would also be largely paralyzed. In other words, on a material level, especially in terms of the production aggregate and the availability of raw materials, countries like Russia and China are in some respects much better off today than the U.S. or Europe. In some areas, the West now does not even have the necessary know-how to produce certain things and technologies itself in such a way that they would, first, work, and, second, be competitive on the world market.[25]

The fact that both China and Russia seem to be better equipped to deal with the impending crisis has, of course, historical reasons. Russia narrowly avoided state collapse after the market-radical excesses of the Yeltsin era; the current repressive Putin regime is ultimately the product of violent system stabilization.

And China, the economic colossus, began comparatively late to shake off the statist structures of its build-up phase and is currently even tending to expand them again. In the summer of 2021, for example, it was reported in the media that China had taken the country's tech companies by the scruff of the neck and sharply tightened their control. This was mainly about Big Data and data security issues. It seems that the CCP does not want to hand over the data on its huge population and, above all, does not want to hand over its Chinese capitalism to the Internet and tech oligarchs (here, the USA probably serves as a warning example again). In general, the CCP is trying to regain control of the market anarchy that it has unleashed itself in recent years, and is (allegedly) installing party cells in all larger private companies.[26] The CCP is also attempting to force the market anarchy back into its hands.

Of course, such forcibly enforced recourse to repressive early and enforcement phases of capitalism can only temporarily slow down the crisis of commodity production and abstract labor, but by no means stop it. Nevertheless, against this background it seems anything but certain - which has been more or less explicitly assumed within the critique of value - that the final crisis of capital will gradually eat its way from the periphery to the Western centers until (metaphorically speaking) the last island of prosperity sinks in the tide of devaluation. It seems at least possible that in the further course of the crisis those states will have advantages which still have the production capacities, the raw materials and the corresponding skills to be able to sufficiently produce "material wealth" themselves. And today, the USA and Europe are certainly no longer among them. At least for a limited time, states such as China could switch to the "modernization dictatorship" mode and, in addition, would probably have massive advantages in the not improbable case of (conventional) war.

Especially with a view to the further development of crisis theory, value (spin-off) criticism will have to keep the necessary openness to constantly check the theory against the empirical crisis reality and to modify it if necessary. And this crisis reality - among other things, as the current Ukraine war shows - is today increasingly characterized by far-reaching geopolitical shifts and, in particular, an accelerating, including intellectual and military, decline of the West.

Endnotes

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These Russians cut off two fingers of their own...
... and now can't shake hands with anyone.

by Wolf Wetzel
(first published in Overton magazine 4. 10. 2022)
[This article posted on 10/4/2022 is translated from the German on the Internet, https://www.streifzuege.org/2022/diese-russen-schneiden-sich-selbst-zwei-finger-ab/.]

First they occupy the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant in Ukraine. Then they shelled themselves. Then it became more and more dramatic. In the 9/9/2022 Tagesschau we were kept in suspense: "Continuous shelling, no more external power supply, hardly enough personnel - at the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant the danger of a nuclear catastrophe has once again increased significantly, according to the IAEA."

Who could be causing this shelling? The "Russians" or the "Ukrainians"? That nobody says: I did it! is obvious. What could be the motives of the possible perpetrators? What circumstantial evidence can be presented and put together? Is it logical, obvious and almost self-explanatory that the "Russians" fired at themselves? What would the Ukrainian government have to gain from this? What did the satellite surveillance reveal, which surely has this area in particular in its sights? The nuclear power plant is not running away and it is not hiding? Why don't we know anything about it?

In case of a bombardment, "pieces of evidence" are left behind, i.e. ammunition, missile debris. The IAEA inspectors were at the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant and could move around freely. Why is there silence about what could be seized there. Why is there no "crime scene analysis"?

Instead, a strange explanation: "We are playing with fire and something very, very catastrophic could happen," the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) told the United Nations (UN) Security Council in New York after his visit to Ukraine's Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant on September 6, 2022. Since then, the threat of nuclear catastrophe has been out of mind and out of the news.

Now "the Russians" are blowing up their own pipeline (Nordstream I and II) as well. What else? First they paid for the pipeline the most, that is billions of euros, then they find everything quite stupid and blow it up. In the "free West", the search for the cause is also getting freer and freer - away from any logic. One knows nothing at all and knows the culprit: The "Russians" want to escalate further by cutting off two fingers themselves. Yes, this hurts, but it is so perfidious that no one thinks it possible that this is exactly what the Russians are doing. Sure, that is obvious to everyone.

And also this logical thought is obviously completely offline: If the Russians want to blow up their own pipeline, they do it precisely where they have the least control over the action: in Swedish or Danish waters. It is simply much more exciting. Besides, the Russians can be trusted not to have known that they could do the whole thing at home.

And why don't the playpen media ask themselves why Russia doesn't destroy one of the pipelines that run through Ukraine and then blame this attack on the Ukrainian military? It would be a piece of cake! The southern Druzhba pipeline runs through Ukraine to Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia. But why is Russia not doing just that? Moreover, the Brotherhood and Soyuz pipelines also run through Ukrainian territory.

One thing is certain: this is state terrorism.

After all, the "free" West agrees on one thing: such an act of sabotage can only be carried out by state actors. To make sure that the idea is not pursued in all directions, the tables are quickly turned: The NATO Council declared that "all currently available information" indicated that the leaks were the result of "deliberate, reckless and irresponsible acts of sabotage".

The implication is that only Russia can be considered responsible for irresponsible acts of sabotage. After all, in this suggestion there is also a small hint to terrorism, which is of course cultivated, used and covered in the NATO circle. Such acts of sabotage then simply have to be ... responsibly carried out and graded. That the Ukrainian government might have something to do with it can be ruled out per se, since it is the government that benefits most from it. Logical, isn't it?

And you can't blame the Ukrainian government for that, all in all: It is sacrificing soldiers, land and lives in order to fight a war in which they provide only the human material and territory. In the end, even in case of victory, Ukraine is the house-high loser: they will be kippers of a mountain of debts. Up there, the sovereignty that Ukraine is supposedly fighting for is the size of a flea.

Since the first lead is not pursued, who could be interested in such an act of sabotage, the following question is superfluous: does Ukraine have the technical know-how for an attack at a depth of 80 meters on Danish/Swedish territory? And indeed, direct involvement is very unlikely. One has to search a bit to find one who can answer the question quickly and reliably: Former Polish Foreign Minister and current MEP Radek Sikorski commented on Twitter on a photo of the attack site in the Baltic Sea first with the words "A small thing, but such great joy" and then with "Thank you, USA."

This reactionary man has not only ideological reasons for this shout of joy. He also knows about the economic gain of this news: Nordstream I and II have deprived the Polish government of the transit fees that would be incurred in the event of a landfall. He had to delete his Twitter cheer a little later. He was probably told that this was no small matter at all ...

And what about the main sponsor of the war in Ukraine? What about the government, which long before the war in Ukraine from 2022, had started an economic war, with the undisguised aim of preventing the Nordstream II pipeline, by any means, with the verve of a godfather who stakes out his territory and tolerates only business partners who "hook up" for him?

"We will - I promise you - we will be able to do it."

Then one would look for motives and for circumstantial evidence that could point to perpetration. Take, for example, U.S. President Biden's announcement in early 2022, "If Russia invades ... there will be no more Nord Stream II. We will put an end to that." Reporter: "But how exactly are you going to do that, given that ... the project is under German control?" Biden: "I promise you that we will be able to do that."

And then we add another important element to the perpetrator search: Who benefits most from such an action? The answer is more than impressive: "Germany has now lost both Nord Streams. And the chance to buy Russian gas for 220 to 250 euros for a thousand cubic meters, it now has to import American liquefied gas for 1600 dollars." (Ivan Rodionov, an economist at the Moscow Higher School of Economics told FR Sept. 30, 2022)

Those who do not trust "Ivan" may also draw from this source. It is not called Ivan, but Antony J. Blinken and is currently US Secretary of State. On September 30, 2022, he told journalists quite freely and proudly, when asked about the impact of destroying one of Europe's key energy grids: "We are now the leading supplier of liquefied natural gas to Europe ... This is very significant and presents a tremendous strategic opportunity for years to come."

Jo Biden's announcement, then, was more than a self-disclosure. And it wasn't just blathering, hot air. On the contrary, state terrorist actions are part of the military arsenal of all U.S. governments and have a name. In military circles, they are called counterinsurgency actions. What is meant by counterinsurgency is explained to us quite openly and downright multilaterally by Jochen Hippler in an article for the Federal Agency for Civic Education in 2006:

"In the U.S. military (especially in the U.S. Army and Marine Corps), questions of military operations below the threshold of war have been conceptualized for decades, even if the terminology kept changing. If in the past one spoke of 'small wars,' in the 1960s mainly of counterinsurgency, and under President Ronald Reagan of 'low-intensity conflict' (LIC; also: 'low-intensity warfare'), today one speaks of 'military operations other than war' (MOOTW) and 'stability and support operations.'"

A few paragraphs earlier, the author states that this type of state terrorism has long since been adopted by NATO and its members: "Euphemistically, it can be formulated that this conception of security policy is highly flexible, does not commit itself to anything substantial, and at the same time leaves open all possibilities of military and security policy out-of-area. However, it could also be stated that such programming remains vague and unclear to the highest degree, as it is teeming with subjunctives ("possible developments could arise," etc.). (...) To put it bluntly: NATO commits itself to nothing here, but authorizes itself to everything - depending on the current assessment of the situation. Even 'organized crime' the 'interruption of the supply of vital resources' or 'the uncontrolled movement of large numbers of people' are placed under the Alliance's jurisdiction."

None of this coincides with international law. And of all things, the U.S. and NATO together want to protect the very thing they have been undermining or overriding for decades? To make a long story short: If Russia were a NATO member, this "special military operation" would meet all NATO standards and doctrines.

Out-of-area - down by law

So there is no need to reveal any secrets or to indulge in wild insinuations. In the USA, high military officers and politicians brag about it - when they have overthrown a government, liquidated an undesirable person or want to ruin an unwilling country economically. This is also called a low intensity war in the U.S. - a war below an official declaration of war.

In the 1980s, for example, the mining of Nicaraguan ports was ordered and carried out. One of the aims was to strangle the economy in Nicaragua after Somoza's dictatorship was overthrown in 1979 and the frente sandinista had made an even bigger enemy: The U.S. government, which considered Nicaragua its "backyard," responded with sabotage, but the financing and equipping of "contras" was also part of this subversion program. As in the case of Cuba, they built a mercenary army to wage war against the elected government in Nicaragua below a declaration of war, and of course denied involvement in this intended regime change.

In fact, one could witness the massive effects of this economic and shadow war in Nicaragua. Almost 50 percent of the national budget had to be put into the defense of the Sandinista revolution. This is deadly for a country that is one of the poorest on this continent. This covert war not only killed many people, it also destroyed - year after year - the hope for a better life. Because when the defense of a revolution brings more suffering and misery than life under Somoza's dictatorship, no political ideals will help. That was precisely the goal of this war, in which no U.S. soldier was sent to the battlefield.

Some will rightly say that this is possible, but that it must first be proven. After all, there would be too many accusations of this kind. In fact, a very rare guilty verdict occurred in 1986, as far as international jurisprudence is concerned. The Sandinista government went to the International Court of Justice in The Hague (ICJ) in 1984, accusing the United States of state terrorism and claiming direct and indirect war damages of $17 billion. Two years later, the ICJ found that the U.S. had broken international law and bilateral agreements by mining ports in Nicaragua in 1984 and by supporting anti-Sandinista "Contra" mercenaries. The International Court of Justice in The Hague ordered the U.S. government to compensate Nicaragua for the losses incurred. And how did the spearhead of the "rules-based" world order react? They ignored the verdict. The U.S. government under Ronald Reagan had already announced this at the beginning of the proceedings: they would not recognize the jurisdiction of the ICJ for the next two years.

Sources and references:

We are working on the (nuclear) catastrophe: https://overton-magazin.de/kolumnen/kohlhaas-unchained/wir-arbeiten-an-der-nuklearen-katastrophe/

Remarks by President Biden and Chancellor Scholz of the Federal Republic of Germany at Press Conference: whitehouse.gov 07.02.2022 and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMmY1pdvTOA

"Goodbye, Nord Stream": https://www.german-foreign-policy.com/news/detail/9037

Pipeline leaks: Russia suspects the U.S., FR 9/30/2022: https://www.fr.de/politik/pipeline-lecks-russland-verdaechtigt-die-usa-91820727.html

"Counterinsurgency" - New Forms of Deployment for NATO? , Jochen Hippler, 2006: https://www.bpb.de/shop/zeitschriften/apuz/29460/counterinsurgency-neue-einsatzformen-fuer-die-nato/

US Secretary of State blinks at destruction of Nord Stream 2: https://www.nachdenkseiten.de/?p=88813#more-88813

"We are capable of doing this," Arno Luik, Overton, Oct. 4, 2022: https://overton-magazin.de/hintergrund/politik/wir-sind-dazu-in-der-lage/

Who sawed my pipe? - Küppersbusch TV: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8dyGfmEnfnU

Written by: Wetzel, Wolf

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