Attempt to Pin Nord Stream Bombing on Ukraine Shows Biden Ready to Drop Kiev - Experts

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) - The US campaign to frame Ukraine as the culprit behind the Nord Stream attack may indicate the Biden administration is now ready to abandon Kiev or press it into settlement talks with Russia, analysts told Sputnik.

American media earlier reported that a "pro-Ukrainian group" was behind the Nord Stream bombing. Meanwhile, German outlets reported that the group used a boat rented from a Poland-based firm, apparently owned by two Ukrainians.

Both stories emanated in the wake of a bombshell report by legendary investigative reporter Seymour Hersh that identified the US government as being behind the bombing. The Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist said US navy divers during NATO drills in the summer of 2022 planted explosives on the pipelines that were activated three months later.

On Wednesday, it was reported by US media that the CIA, months before the incident, allegedly warned European counterparts that a group was planning the Nord Stream attack, senior Biden advisers suspected Ukraine involvement, and the White House was concerned about it rattling Kiev's ties with Germany and other NATO allies.

Political commentator Alex Krainer, founder of Krainer Analytics, thinks the attempt to blame the bombing on Ukrainians indicated that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his regime in Kiev were now dispensable as far as the Biden administration was concerned.

"Importantly, this also indicates that they are ready to wash their hands of the Ukraine regime, probably call for a negotiated settlement to the war and regroup," Krainer told Sputnik.

Krainer assessed the story now being circulated about how the Ukrainians allegedly carried off the undersea bombing as lacking any credibility.

"They [the Biden administration] are hoping that we are all dumb and they are counting on their EU/ NATO/German public leaders to embrace it and amplify it as the most credible explanation for what happened," he said. "How many buy it today is secondary, this will be the designated 'truth' for posterity and will be forced into history books."

When the victors write history, he added, they will airbrush Hersh's revelations as a fringe extremist theory.

Historian and foreign policy analyst Jeremy Kuzmarov said Hersh's work applied intense pressure on the Biden administration to find an alternative narrative and referred to the latest story as an "intriguing thesis."

"Perhaps there is an attempt to scapegoat Ukraine now that the cat is out of the bag and heat is being placed on the Biden administration because of Hersh's expose," he said.

Hersh's report was a devastating revelation about the nature of policymaking in the Biden administration, Kuzmarov commented.

"The Hersh report shows the United States to be an aggressive power carrying out a brazen act of international terrorism that is tantamount to an act of war against Russia," he added.