Renowned Journalist Seymour Hersh Says US-Planted Explosives Destroyed Nord Stream

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) – Investigative journalist Seymour Hersh confirmed to Sputnik that he authored an investigative report saying that US Navy divers planted explosives to destroy the Nord Stream pipelines last year.

"Of course," Hersh told Sputnik, when asked whether he authored the article, which was published on a Substack account created shortly before its publication.

The article states that the United States decided to sabotage the pipelines following more than nine months of highly secret debate inside the US national security community.

"Last June, the Navy divers, operating under the cover of a widely publicized mid-summer NATO exercise known as BALTOPS 22, planted the remotely triggered explosives that, three months later, destroyed three of the four Nord Stream pipelines, according to a source with direct knowledge of the operational planning," Hersh wrote in his Substack newsletter.

The article also says that the alleged decision to sabotage the pipelines followed more than nine months of highly secret debate inside US national security community.

The White House dismissed the claims as "false and complete fiction.”

Commenting on the situation, a US Defense Department spokesperson told Sputnik on Wednesday that the United States was not involved in the blowing up of the Nord Stream pipelines on September 26, 2022.

"The United States was not involved in the Nord Stream explosion," the spokesperson said.

The blasts occurred on September 26 at three of the four strings of Nord Stream 1 and 2 underwater pipelines built to carry a combined 110 billion cubic meters of Russian gas to Europe annually.

Germany, Denmark, and Sweden launched separate investigations into the suspected sabotage, with German media reporting trust issues among the three EU nations. The Russian chief prosecutor's office said it had opened an inquiry into possible international terrorism.