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Finnish President Says Undersea Gas and Telecom Cables Damaged By 'External Acti...

 11 months ago
source link: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/23/10/10/1831237/finnish-president-says-undersea-gas-and-telecom-cables-damaged-by-external-activity
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Finnish President Says Undersea Gas and Telecom Cables Damaged By 'External Activity'

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Damage to an undersea gas pipeline and telecommunications cable connecting Finland and Estonia appears to have been caused by "external activity," Finnish officials said Tuesday, adding that authorities were investigating. From a report: Finnish and Estonian gas system operators on Sunday said they noted an unusual drop in pressure in the Balticconnector pipeline after which they shut down the gas flow. The Finnish government on Tuesday said there was damage both to the gas pipeline and to a telecommunications cable between the two NATO countries. Speaking at a news conference Tuesday, Prime Minister Petteri Orpo stopped short of calling the pipeline leak sabotage, but said it could not have been caused by regular operations. "According to a preliminary assessment, the observed damage could not have occurred as a result of normal use of the pipe or pressure fluctuations. It is likely that the damage is the result of external activity," Orpo said. Finland's National Bureau of Investigation was leading an investigation into the leak, Orpo said, adding that the leak occurred in Finland's economic zone.

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It it time for WWIII. Here we gooooooooooo

Currently, we don't know for sure, because investigation hasn't really started yet. It will take a few days to get relevant resources to suspected site where it's damaged. Telecommunications is fine, because those get damaged all the time and will probably be fixed pretty quickly.

Natgas one is the actual problem of the two. With it out, and with Russian connection stopped since Ukraine war start, the only remaining source of gas is floating LNG terminal which sits at the same place as where this cable used to terminate. Security has probably been increased significantly around it. Problem is that pipe is one of those natgas pipes that are heavily armored and covered with rock and it's a pretty new one, so accidental damage is extremely unlikely. This is why some are already stating that it's all but certain to be an outside actor who did it.

Just in time for winter usage spike too, so Russia is someone with a motive and capability, and this is the first winter in Finland as a member of NATO. So it was expected that Russia would begin to test new security arrangements to see where new limits are. Considering the precedent with someone blowing up Nord Stream severing Russian options to try to blackmail Germany into abandoning pro-Ukrainian alliance last year, it makes logical sense that Russia would see it as acceptable to do same thing by damaging pipelines within the alliance.

  • Re:

    Thank you for Russia's position
  • Nice try Russia, we know you did it
  • Re:

    Know who else has motive? Exxon, BP, Conoco, Shell, and Chevron, the five largest LNG exporters in the world. People mistakenly think that only governments are capable of sabotage, but that's not true at all.

    • Re:

      LNG market is bought out right now, to the point where if you have spares, Pakistan will take it immediately.

      There's really no shortage of demand. It's the supply side that is constrained right now.

      • Re:

        Shortages raise prices, dire shortages raise prices dramatically, in case you haven't noticed. LNG is already expensive, it can go to stupidly expensive and the vendors won't mind a bit. The sunk cost that their customers and the end users have in equipment means that they're going to have to pay it, they're a captive audience. That pipeline terminated at the LNG terminal, where both feed into the distribution network. If Russia/Iran/Al Qaeda/China/boogieman-of-the-day wanted to damage Finland they woul

    • Re:

      Oh come on, Russia did this last year with Nordstream 2. There are pictures of a Russian ship lowering a minisub directly in that area 4 days before the pipe sabotage, it's pretty obvious in that case who did it. Nordstream 2 was sabotaged right before winter also, just like this one. Why assume it isn't Russia today, given that they're just as beligerant as always and their leader shows no sign of regaining mental stability. Putin is still shitting bricks because Finland joined NATO, he's not just goin

      • Re:

        Seriously? You actually think that Russia would damage its own infrastructure (well, 50% its own) and throw away 500+ million cubic meters of unsold natural gas worth billions because, well, why? They couldn't figure out how to turn off the tap? Russians are naturally evil? Russians are too stupid to comprehend the consequences? I have yet to hear a rational explanation of why it would have been in their interest, nothing beyond basic racism and, "That's what the State Department says." (As if the Sta

        • Re:

          Invading Ukraine drove Finland and Sweden into NATO, which was very definitely not in their interest, and was a very foreseeable outcome. You're assuming Putin behaves rationally when all evidence suggests otherwise.

        • Re:

          Russia damaged it's own Nordstream 2 pipeline already, there's pretty strong evidence pointing that directlly, far stronger evidence that that the west sabotaged it as a false flag. Putin gets more from causing Finns to shiver in the winter than he'll get from the money. Putin wants Europeans to shiver, he wants them to know that he should be the one dictating policies and what they stand to lose. It's not necessarily logical, but Putin seems to be acting on emotion instead of logic. Putin doesn't behave

        • Russia views geopolitics as a zero-sum game. It doesn't matter if they lose some as long as others lose even more. The pipeline had never been opened, was not going to be anywhere in the near future, if even ever (Europe doesn't want to depend on russia for the foreseeable future), and russia already was limiting gas flow on other pipelines and electricity sales as well.

          So what harm did russia do with the sabotage, and what did it lose? Like I pointed out, in the foreseeable future, it did not lose any mone

          • Re:

            Like I pointed out, in the foreseeable future, it did not lose any money.

            They have lost a shitload of money - about half of Gazprom revenues. So much, in fact, that Russia had to demand a "voluntary" one time payment from their largest companies. Putin did not expect to lose this game of chicken with the EU, but here we are. Unfortunately for us the only way he is able to react to losses is escalation of commitment.

    • Re:

      Unlikely, as contracts for LNG have been signed for a while now. Far too late to get new ones, and Finland isn't really big enough nor consume enough gas for that level of effort.

    • Re:

      Why would the US sabotage the energy infrastructure of its closest and most important allies? You do know that increased LNG exports have harmed the American domestic energy market, right? My retail cost for natural gas, which I use to heat my home, went up nearly 40%. Happy to pay that price if it means my friends in the EU don't freeze through winter but it's pretty laughable to think there was any financial or political motive for the US to do this.

      You might also consider that the Baltic Sea is essen

      • Re:

        And why on Earth do you think that the natural gas companies are disappointed by that? Why do you think that destroying the single most valuable thing keeping western Europe tied to Russia was not in NATO's interest?

        There was an entire NATO fleet in the Baltic just days before the explosions, including ships and staff which would have been competent to set the charges, for an annual exercise called BALTOPS. The 2023 exercise just ended Sept. 24.

        • Russia was already restricting gas flow, this was a convenient way to shift some of the blame. The gas companies knew that the inflow was already going to stop due to sanctions so it would have been a very risky move for them. And for any other party in Europe either. Russia didn't really have anything to lose. But the fact that we on the West are still making arguments against each others is exactly what russia wants.

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