Russian sources indicated that the damage would further delay the delivery of natural gas from Russia to Germany, meaning as winter approaches that another source of energy for Europe will be unavailable.
Blasts were heard at the Nord Stream 1 pipeline last week, and damage to the pipeline itself was detected underwater shortly thereafter. Russian sources indicated that the damage would further delay the delivery of natural gas from Russia to Germany, meaning as winter approaches that another source of energy for Europe will be unavailable.
Western sources accused Russia of sabotaging its own pipeline, thus giving Putin a convenient excuse to cut off Europe from Russian gas supplies as cold weather approaches. There is substantial controversy about who is behind this sabotage, but many believe it may have been Putin himself who ordered this done. If this is in fact what happened, it suggests two obvious things:
First, Vladimir Putin is so determined to use the energy weapon against Europe in an attempt to break its solidarity with Ukraine that he will even destroy his own infrastructure.
Second, Putin remains confident enough in his other markets for gas and oil – namely China and India – that he will engage in such extreme tactics, despite both the long-term loss of credibility from Westerners who rely on Russian gas and the significant physical damage to its own pipeline network.
This truly is a remarkable moment. If Putin did this, then he appears convinced that the West’s greatest vulnerability is its inability to wean itself from reliance on his energy. If past is prologue, he may even be right about that assessment. In any case, Putin will obviously do everything he can to press that advantage to the fullest.
Perhaps not surprisingly, but highly illogically, cities in the Northeast part of the United States, like Boston and New York, seeing this extreme gambit by Putin, have reacted by doubling down to increase their own vulnerability to him. Instead of finally adopting the most obvious and rational approach of acting to swiftly complete the existing pipeline system to move gas from the Marcellus Shale region of Northeastern Pennsylvania to the Eastern seaboard of the United States, which would ensure that Northeast cities and states will have ready supply and will have successfully insulated themselves from any more of Putin’s shenanigans in the future, the Northeastern United States has astonishingly done the exact opposite.
