Posted on 02/20/2023 4:57:50 PM PST by SeekAndFind
The White House's John Kirby — who seems to work as a pinch hitter on tough briefing days for Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre as much as he does his day job as the National Security Council's Coordinator for Strategic Communications — hit the airwaves on Sunday and renewed strong denials of any U.S. involvement in the sabotage of Russia's Nord Stream pipeline.
Appearing on Fox News Sunday, Kirby was asked by host Shannon Bream about a report by award-winning journalist Seymour Hersch that Townhall covered in early February. As Leah reported when the story first ran:
A bombshell report by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Seymour Hersch alleges specialized U.S. Navy diving teams were responsible for blowing up the underwater Nord Stream pipelines that supplied Russian gas to Western Europe...While the Biden administration initially blamed Russia for sabotaging their own pipeline, suspicions were raised about possible U.S. involvement after the president himself vowed that "we will bring an end" to the Nord Stream 2 if Russia invades Ukraine. Asked by a reporter how that would be possible, pointing out that it was in Germany's control, the commander in chief replied, "I promise you we will be able to do it."
So, the threats were there, the claims of ability were there, but the Biden administration said the United States didn't blow the pipelines. Usually, that would be a "nuff said" situation and the White House would be able to move on. But Bream raised the story again, plus its sources that include someone with "direct knowledge of the process," and Biden's previous statements about being "able to" bring an end to Nord Stream if the U.S. wanted to cut off Russia's stream of oil to other countries.
But Kirby wasn't having any of it. "It's a completely false story," Kirby said before reiterating the same thing several times. "There is no truth to it, Shannon — not a shred of it — it is not true. The United States, and no proxies of the United States, had anything to do with that," he continued. "Nothing."
Bream then asked Kirby whether President Biden would be obligated to notify Congress before taking such an action, but Kirby again hit the denials without, curiously, actually answering the question.
"We did not take any such operation, Shannon, and obviously we keep Congress informed appropriately of things — both classified and unclassified — but I can tell you now, regardless of the notification process, there was no U.S. involvement in this," Kirby emphasized. "None. Zero. It's completely false," he said again of Hersch's story.
But would Biden need to let Congress know before he took action to sabotage another country's infrastructure? Kirby, for whatever reason, declined to answer.
Watch:
NSC spokesperson John Kirby claims the Seymour Hersh story alleging the US blew up the Nord Stream pipeline is not true.
"It's a completely false story. There is no truth to it, Shannon. Not a shred of it. It is not true." pic.twitter.com/KqwUNPyMLc— Wendell Husebø (@WendellHusebo) February 19, 2023
What a choice.
A bombshell report by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist
Weren't the Russiagate Hoax reporters given this same reward?
Thank you. I’m sick to death of hearing “Pulitzer prize” this and “respected” journalist that. “He’s a tool of the government and industry too…”. Frank Zappa
Why the gratuitous canard?
Until you read and disprove Hersh's air-tight narrative-- with its absolutely interlocking detail to prove his case, you have absolutely no standing to slop your "America-haters" smear into the Free Republic website.
Outsourcing
No doubt Hersh will get the Pierre Salanger treatment.
I miss Frank.
Cui Bono? Who else but the US benefits?
Nailed it.
It’s obvious the smear deflects attention away from Biden, Obama, Clinton, etc, but mostly Biden.
Canuck “Conservative” - to say that out of nowhere - must hate that attention placed on them as there were better ways for him to make his point than for him to stoop to being a liar.
That the US did it but Hersch knows nothing and is totally fabricating his account.
wrong, it’s not up to anyone to disprove Hersh’s wild speculations
you got it backwards - it’s up to you America-haters to prove that the US did it ... and so far, you’ve proven bupkis
US officials and elected politicians have directly verbalized intent to take action against the pipeline. See video clip:
What do you have? Trusting what all these creeps tell us? Sorry, they don’t deserve our trust anymore.
Truthfully, I was a dumbass dropout wannabe back when I first heard Zappa’s musical work. Then I was in high school and saw him and William F. Buckley, Jr on Crossfire or whatever was the political show de jour was, I was amazed, it changed my life for the better. I too miss him.
“... a ship Hersch has participating in this dastardly deed was decommissioned long ago...”
It’s not unbelievable that the ship could have been taken off the books and put into some sort of “special operations”.
Someone forgot to tell Hersh to put the bong down.
The story conveniently aligns with Russian propaganda to stir up more anti-American sentiment in Germany and have NATO allies pointing fingers at one another.
The explosives were laid when the pipelines were built: they were always a political project not an economic one as Russia could keep delivering gas more cheaply through Ukraine and Poland. It was designed to shaft both countries and make the Germans directly dependent on Russia. The pipelines were blown the week after Germany started proceedings to seize Gazprom's assets in Germany.
As I recall, on Crossfire, the “liberal” was Thomas Braden, and the “conservative” was Robert Novak, and Braden was the one who attacked Zappa, while Novak agreed with a lot of Zappa’s points.
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