Back in September after the Nord Stream 1 pipeline was blown up, we published this post: Own up, who did this? 28.9.22. Even back then, we and many others had a shrewd idea it wasn’t the Russians blowing up their own infrastructure, suspecting it was highly likely that the United States had a hand in it. What struck us at the time was the cursory interest the mainstream media showed in this act of physical and economic sabotage before swiftly moving the agenda onwards.

Fortunately, there are still a few journalists with the guts and moral integrity to do the necessary digging to find out the truth of the matter. This is what Seymour Hersh, a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist did and we link to his findings in the first reading listed below. Despite the thoroughly researched presentation of the facts made by Hersh, the mainstream media have remained ominously silent about the whole affair. This is discussed by Alan Macleod in the second reading listed below. When you consider that the sabotage of Nord Stream is effectively an act of war by a leading NATO country against Russia, the silence from the media about this is pretty bloody worrying.

Truth is always the first casualty of war. Judging by the propagandistic tone of the mainstream media coverage, the truth already seems to have taken a pretty bad hit. When what to all intents and purposes is an act of war carried out by a NATO country gets dismissed and brushed under the carpet, you can be forgiven for thinking that the media is already in war mode. So the question has to be asked – are we in the early stages of WW3? This is what the third reading listed below from Nevermore Media attempts to address.

How America Took Out The Nord Stream Pipeline – Seymour Hersh | Substack | 8.2.23

From its earliest days, Nord Stream 1 was seen by Washington and its anti-Russian NATO partners as a threat to western dominance. The holding company behind it, Nord Stream AG, was incorporated in Switzerland in 2005 in partnership with Gazprom, a publicly traded Russian company producing enormous profits for shareholders which is dominated by oligarchs known to be in the thrall of Putin. Gazprom controlled 51 percent of the company, with four European energy firms—one in France, one in the Netherlands and two in Germany—sharing the remaining 49 percent of stock, and having the right to control downstream sales of the inexpensive natural gas to local distributors in Germany and Western Europe.

Media Ignore Seymour Hersh Bombshell Report of US Destroying Nord Stream II – Alan Macleod | Mint Press | 15.2.23

It has now been one week since Seymour Hersh published an in-depth report claiming that the Biden administration deliberately blew up the Nord Stream II gas pipeline without Germany’s consent or even knowledge – an operation which began planning long before the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Based on interviews with national security insiders, Hersh – the journalist who broke the stories of the My Lai Massacre, the CIA spying program and the Abu Ghraib torture scandal – claims that in June, U.S. Navy divers traveled to the Baltic Sea and attached C4 explosive charges to the pipeline. By September, President Biden himself ordered its destruction. According to Hersh, all understood the stakes and the gravity of what they were doing, acknowledging that, if caught, it would be seen as a flagrant “act of war” against their allies.

If the U.S. really did blow up Nord Stream, does that mean it`s officially WWIII? – Nevermore Media | Substack | 15.2.23

But make no mistake – WWIII will not be a fake war orchestrated by hidden puppet-masters. It will be real, because it must be real in order for it to serve its purpose. There will be winners and losers. There is a real power struggle, and some factions will come out on top. Others will see their power reduced, and some may be destroyed altogether. But one cannot look at WWIII as simply a fight between NATO and BRICS. Things are much more complicated than that. There aren`t three players in this game. There are countless.

WW3 is a big deal. A confrontation between NATO and Russia is bad enough. On top of this, there’s an increasing amount of sabre rattling aimed at China: Murdoch Propaganda Pushes Australia To Double Its Military Budget For War With China – Caitlin Johnstone | 16.2.23. We’ve been politically active since the late 1970s and what we’re seeing now is more worrying than what was going on in the 1980s. The big difference is that back in the 1980s, there was a sizeable anti-war movement. Now, while there are still a few sound anti-imperialist elements around, opposition to the impending war is much more diffuse and fragmented.

What’s interesting is that some of the opposition to what feels like an impending global conflict is coming from what some would regard as the political Right as well as what remains of the traditional anti-imperialists. Having seen opposition to the Covid restrictions and lockdowns coming from across and beyond the political spectrum, we’re not surprised that what opposition there is to the war also defies the traditional and increasingly redundant Left vs Right divide. Interesting though this is, the worrying fact that anti-war feeling is nowhere near as prevalent as it was in the 1980s remains.

Which makes the attitude of a significant section of what passes for an anarchist movement here in the UK absolutely baffling. When sound geo-political analysis of how the conflict between NATO and Ukraine on the one hand and Russia on the other is dismissed as ‘Westplaining’ by some elements associated with Freedom and the Anarchist Federation, we’re in a pretty bad place. Fortunately, there are some anarchists who can see through the crap and grasp the gravity of the situation: British Anarchism Succumbs to War Fever – Alex Alder | libcom.org | 2.2.23.

We make no apology for keeping on putting up these posts trying to alert people to the dangers we face. We make no apology for putting up stickers featuring the graphic at the top of this post when we’re out and about in Bristol. Last but by no means least, we have no time for those former comrades who dismiss our fears about WW3 as mere ‘Westplaining’.