These people are on record for threatening the pipeline. They had the motive and the means. So why should we disbelieve their threats? Sy Hersh is the most trusted living investigative reporter today. I'll take his word over some OSINTbro shill any day of the week. And to claim that Russians destroyed their own pipeline is ludicrous. Once they start cutting our undersea cables and destroying our pipelines, I guess they'll claim we're doing it to ourselves. Same "logic".
You're entire system of reasoning comes down to choosing what to believe based on how much you like the person saying it. And when you don't like the person saying it you can't even say their name without inserting a stupid insult like "criminal cabal" and "OSINTbro shill". You systematically sidestep all questions on matters of fact in favor of naked tribal social reasoning. Even in this discourse you opted to reason about the motivation semantics of the GP, speculating outloud that they are "invested" in defending a certain position, rather than directly addressing the arguments they made for that position. Your follow up comment is based 100% in elaborating on which sources you think are more reputable and 0% in analysis of what these sources are actually claiming.
Did you just get here from Twitter?
I don't care if its Hersh or otherwise, if someone says 1+1=3 then what they are saying doesn't add up. Debunking the Hersh story isn't a claim about Russia doing it to themselves, nor even a rejection of the hypothesis that the US did it. It merely refutes the Hersh story as evidence one way or the other.
It doesn't do that at all if it's false in all its particulars. You need to separate the idea that the US is behind this sabotage from the idea that Hersh is a kook. Both things can be true at the same time!
What are the chances that Hersh made up the whole thing? What are the chances that his source is just completely faking him out and he doesn’t know better?
If Putin had threatened to “end” some US internet cable to Norway, would anyone be doubting the nature of that threat if the cable suddenly blew up?
Even after I point out your "reasoning" system and its flaws, you come right out the gate with "CIA approved sources". Are you even capable of anything other than bashing the source?
