In the last few hours, various news has emerged on what could have caused the large gas leaks that had occurred at the end of September from the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines, built to bring Russian gas to Europe and which pass through the Baltic Sea to get to Germany: for months it was assumed that the losses were caused by sabotage carried out by Russia (there was no evidence anyway), but the latest revelations seem to suggest otherwise. It was immediately assumed that the losses had been caused by two large submarine explosions: at the time of the explosions the two pipelines were both closed due to Western sanctions against Russia (Nord Stream 2 had not even been inaugurated), and the damage caused by the sabotage had rendered them unusable.
According to an article published Tuesday by the New York Times, based on statements by some anonymous US intelligence sources, the sabotage of the pipelines would have been a pro-Ukraine group composed of Ukrainian and possibly Russian citizens, who would have placed offices explosives on gas pipelines. At the moment, US intelligence excludes that the Ukrainian government or army commands had a role in the sabotage or had knowledge of it.
According to what intelligence sources told the New York Times, a group of expert divers would have placed the positions on 26 September, but they would not be affiliated with any army or government agency, even if it cannot be excluded that they had passed military training.
This information is the result of a preliminary investigation and therefore should be taken with some caution, but again on Tuesday an article was published in the German newspaper Zeit, in collaboration with the public television stations ARD and SWR, which would seem to corroborate this thesis. The article cites some evidence collected by investigators in Germany who are investigating the matter, according to which the sabotage was carried out by a team of six people (five men and a woman, whose nationality is unknown) who arrived near the gas pipelines on the night of September 26-27 on board a yacht chartered by a company based in Poland, owned by two Ukrainian citizens.
On board the yacht there would have been a captain, two divers, two assistants and a doctor. According to German investigators, the yacht would have set sail on 6 September from Rostock, a German port on the Baltic Sea, and the explosive material would have been delivered in the previous days by truck. Investigators say they identified the yacht in the following days first in Wieck auf dem Darß, a German port city about 50 kilometers from Rostock, and then on the Danish island of Christiansø. After September 26, the yacht would have been returned to the charterer, and according to what was written in the article, the investigators would have found traces of explosives on board.
However, the article underlines another thing: although the investigators suspect a Ukrainian involvement in the sabotage, it cannot be excluded that it was a false flag operation, i.e. an operation organized by Russians “under a false flag” to bring blame it on Ukraine. Meanwhile, the Ukrainian government has denied any involvement through Mykhailo Podolyak, adviser to President Volodymyr Zelensky, who said on Tuesday evening that he had no information on the matter.
There are currently three ongoing investigations into the matter, led by Germany, Denmark and Sweden. In recent months, various theories had been circulating about the cause of the losses, and in addition to Russia, the Ukrainian, American and British governments had also been accused of the sabotage, without proof. In the last month a theory supported by the well-known US investigative journalist Seymour Hersh, Pulitzer Prize in 1970 but in recent years much criticized for having often exposed conspiracy theories, contradictory and based on insufficiently solid information, which he had supported in his newsletter that the sabotage would have been organized in collaboration by the United States and Norway: his thesis has been widely criticized and judged by many to be unfounded, also because it is based on a single anonymous source.
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