US knew of detailed Ukrainian plan to attack Nord Stream: WaPo
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A report by the Washington Post details how the CIA heard via a European espionage agency that a six-person squad of Ukrainian special operations forces intended on destroying the pipeline.
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US President Joe Biden’s meeting last week with German Chancellor Angela Merkel on July 21 (AP)
According to a report by The Washington Post, the CIA knew through a European spy agency that members of a Ukrainian special operations team intended on blowing up the NordStream pipeline.
Three months before the explosion, the US administration knew from an ally of the attack whereby a small team of divers, who reported directly to Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky, were employed.
Details concerning the plot, previously unknown, were gathered by a European intelligence agency and provided to the CIA in June 2022. They present some of the most detailed evidence to date tying the Ukrainian government to the eventual attack in the Baltic Sea, which has been described as brazen and dangerous by the US and Western authorities.
The European intelligence reporting was shared on the chat platform Discord, allegedly by Air National Guard member Jack Teixeira.
In March, The Wall Street Journal reported that the CIA warned the German Federal Intelligence Service, BND, about a potential attack that could hit the Nord Stream pipelines months ahead of the attack taking place in September 2022.
The reporting was shared on the Discord platform by Jack Teixeira, the 21-year-old accused of being responsible for one of the most serious security breaches in the United States in years. The WaPo was able to obtain a copy of the reporting.
The details include the number of forces, and the method of the attack shows that the West had very good reason to suspect Ukraine for more than a year, a conclusion only strengthened by German law enforcement officers unearthing information concerning the explosion that bore a remarkable resemblance to what the European Union alleged Ukraine was plotting.
Ukrainian officials, who earlier denied any involvement in the Nord Stream attack, did not reply to calls for comment from the Post.
Even the White House and CIA declined to comment.
In late May, German news outlet Der Spiegel reported that indications of Ukraine's involvement in the sabotage operation on the Nord Stream gas pipelines are increasing. As per the report, the evidence pointing to such a connection was identified via metadata from emails used to rent a sailboat suspected to have been used to carry out the operation.
A report published by The Washington Post on April 4 revealed that the yacht, which was used in the operation, the "Andromeda" sailboat, wasn't the only vessel involved in the bombing of the Nord Stream pipelines.
The paper alleges that Andromeda was only a decoy that effectively acted as a diversion for the perpetrator.
The United States and Europe remain adamant about being unaware of the real perpetrators of the Nord Stream sabotage.
In March, investigative journalist Seymour Hersh claimed that President Joe Biden was responsible for ordering the Nord Stream pipeline explosion in September last year by using C-4 charges planted by US Navy divers.
He revealed that it was Norway that pointed out to the US the location of where the underwater pipeline was closest to the surface to facilitate the US operation.
