“[Jens Steltonberg] was a hardliner on all things Putin and Russia who had cooperated with the American intelligence community since the Vietnam War. He has been trusted completely since.”
when he was actually born in 1959 is not a small thing. It’s simply making things up.
I would call it completely unrealistic (asuming we have entered John le Carre territory); Stoltenberg is of a political family in Norway; and I am sure it he was politically active from an early age. While Saigon fell in 1975, the various Vietnam movements countinue as organisations providing support for and cultural exchange with the newly unified (and heavily sanctioned) Vietnam.
It's almost definitely an error, but I don't think it significantly reduces the chances that Hersh's source is telling the truth. This feels like a detail that Hersh (incorrectly) added to the story, rather than something the source claimed. The charitable interpretation is that the aging Hersh confused Stoltenberg with his father, a Norwegian politician who was indeed involved with Vietnam. It's not a good look if Hersh is conflating different people from different generations, but it doesn't really reflect on the accuracy of his source one way or the other.
So what else in his age makes it not a small thing? That he cooperated with the American intelligence community back then? If he was some random teenager I guess it would be no random thing. However, his father was defense minister of this NATO country. Him spying on the student peace movement and relating details to his father and whoever his father had dealings with is the accusation. He certainly did a complete about face on the US military - or did he? Maybe this was his inclination from the beginning.
Incidentally NATO had a massive intelligence operation against the Norwegian student anti-NATO movement which was in the papers a few years ago.
I'm sure you had no clue the papers talked about his importance as a supposed anti-Vietnam activist years ago. I'm sure you had no idea his father was defense Minister of a NATO country. You're attempting to "discredit" the article by seeing a date, knowing none of these details, and deciding it discredits the article.
“[Jens Steltonberg] was a hardliner on all things Putin and Russia who had cooperated with the American intelligence community since the Vietnam War. He has been trusted completely since.”
when he was actually born in 1959 is not a small thing. It’s simply making things up.