When public events of great consequence — such as the Nord Stream Pipeline bombing — are met with silence from both government and media, the silence itself becomes more terrifying than any atomic bomb.
It is interesting how people remember things differently - I really do not think that there was silence from the public or government in regards of the Nord Stream bombings. Yes, there weren’t any demonstrations or riots on the street, but silence?
Well, silence is not the correct word, I agree. But the reaction was kind of mild, when you think about that it was a terrorist attack on seemingly very important infrastructure and thus on Germany’s sovereignity. And that holds especially true after it became clear that it wasn’t the Russians but someone who wanted to influence Germany’s stance on Russia’s invasion. Nobody cared.
I mean, Germany is obviously not in the position, but the US basically devastates whole regions for less. Thus it can be argued, that the reaction was comparably “silent”.
How should Germany have reacted? As I see it there were two possible culprits: Russia or Ukraine. If we make a big deal out of it we have to act.
Say it turns out to be Russia, then we have a direct attack on the infrastructure of a NATO member. If we don’t react to that it sends a desastrous message. If we do we and the rest of NATO have to react with force, something everyone has tried to avoid at all cost so far.
If links to Ukraine turn out to be true (which seems more likely atm) this will give a massive boost to anti Ukrainian sentiment, with a good chance of complete collapse of public support for Ukraine. So what are we supposed to do then? Considering how Germany got bashed by everyone already for seemingly not doing enough (unfairly imo).
Now even getting into a position like that is the result of long-term strategic failure. But in my limited view keeping this topic comparatively small is a favor to everyone involved. Because in the end world goes on without the pipeline as well.
What you describe is exactly the point Ai WeiWei is trying to make in that paragraph: you let something as severe as an blatant attack just slide, because it does not fit in your strategic planning.
And that is the hypocrisy he is calling out: the reaction would have been different if it was an enemy state like Russia or Iran but “silent” when it was Ukraine or Israel for example. Take that “it is not okay to spy on friends” bullshit as another example. Like spying for Russia or China is uncovered and the perpetrators prosecuted (which is obviously a good thing), but nobody ever did something about the large scale spying by our allies.
There is obviously nothing new about it, except that in our age those hypocrisies are more easily uncovered. And that leads to frustration, when it becomes clear, that it is never about the act itself but about who is the actor. That holds true on geopolitical issues like that, but also, as pointed out, for
When Israel genocides it is okay (and Germany even supplies weapons), when China does it it’s not
When the US attacks or threatens another country it is okay (and Germany even might help), when Russia does it it’s not
When rich people commit crimes it’s okay, when poor people do it it’s not
and many more
And the cherry on top is, that nobody openly tells the truth as “yeah, obviously all of that is different for our allies than for our enemies, because it is in our strategic interest”, but always hides behind some “values”, like “it’s about international law or human rights”. No, if it were, we had to do something about that stuff equally.
It still is quite strange for him to focus on Nord Stream. Yeah, it was important infrastructure. But it was switched off for quite a while due to sanctions against russia before the attack. So not great, but there was no immediate impact for people.
I could understand if he was focussing on silence in regard of the Ukraine war or even Gaza, but Nord Stream is strange
I think he took it as an example, because it was basically an direct attack on Germany. So the example is crass, as in “if it doesn’t fit into the mainstream story, we even ‘ignore’ direct attacks”.
While the silence on the Gaza genocide holds just as true, it is not a direct attack and thus not such a strong example for the point.
NS2 should not have existed in the first place. Don’t you feel shame for building huge pipeline around whole Eastern Europe just so your trade wouldn’t be interrupted as russia invades everything? Because you should feel the shame. It have been built when russia already invaded Ukraine.
And yes, it wasn’t yet used, but almost finished state of it gave russia more courage to launch full scale invasion.
The shame already begins in still burning gas in the 21st century, no matter where it comes from and how it gets to Germany (or other countries for that matter) ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I mean, when Nordstream was conceived, everybody and their mother loved it: in the public opinion of the late 00s Ukraine was basically the devil and state enemy, stealing “our gas which we paid for”. Dumb take even then, but instead of just saying “ok, let’s start an effort to not use gas anymore” somebody came up with Nordstream. Turns out infrastructure projects take longer than huge shifts in the geopolitical landscape.
You do understand that late 00s is when pro-Ukrainian president in Ukraine have been elected, and russia was using economic pressure as an instrument to make him unpopular and, as a result, installed pro-russian puppet Yanukovich?
And instantly all the gas issues vanished, 30% discount was given, in exchange for permission to extend Russia’s lease of a major naval base in the Ukrainian Black Sea port of Sevastopol for an additional 25 years - the soldiers from this base occupied Crimea in 2014.
It is interesting how people remember things differently - I really do not think that there was silence from the public or government in regards of the Nord Stream bombings. Yes, there weren’t any demonstrations or riots on the street, but silence?
Well, silence is not the correct word, I agree. But the reaction was kind of mild, when you think about that it was a terrorist attack on seemingly very important infrastructure and thus on Germany’s sovereignity. And that holds especially true after it became clear that it wasn’t the Russians but someone who wanted to influence Germany’s stance on Russia’s invasion. Nobody cared.
I mean, Germany is obviously not in the position, but the US basically devastates whole regions for less. Thus it can be argued, that the reaction was comparably “silent”.
How should Germany have reacted? As I see it there were two possible culprits: Russia or Ukraine. If we make a big deal out of it we have to act.
Say it turns out to be Russia, then we have a direct attack on the infrastructure of a NATO member. If we don’t react to that it sends a desastrous message. If we do we and the rest of NATO have to react with force, something everyone has tried to avoid at all cost so far.
If links to Ukraine turn out to be true (which seems more likely atm) this will give a massive boost to anti Ukrainian sentiment, with a good chance of complete collapse of public support for Ukraine. So what are we supposed to do then? Considering how Germany got bashed by everyone already for seemingly not doing enough (unfairly imo).
Now even getting into a position like that is the result of long-term strategic failure. But in my limited view keeping this topic comparatively small is a favor to everyone involved. Because in the end world goes on without the pipeline as well.
What you describe is exactly the point Ai WeiWei is trying to make in that paragraph: you let something as severe as an blatant attack just slide, because it does not fit in your strategic planning.
And that is the hypocrisy he is calling out: the reaction would have been different if it was an enemy state like Russia or Iran but “silent” when it was Ukraine or Israel for example. Take that “it is not okay to spy on friends” bullshit as another example. Like spying for Russia or China is uncovered and the perpetrators prosecuted (which is obviously a good thing), but nobody ever did something about the large scale spying by our allies.
There is obviously nothing new about it, except that in our age those hypocrisies are more easily uncovered. And that leads to frustration, when it becomes clear, that it is never about the act itself but about who is the actor. That holds true on geopolitical issues like that, but also, as pointed out, for
And the cherry on top is, that nobody openly tells the truth as “yeah, obviously all of that is different for our allies than for our enemies, because it is in our strategic interest”, but always hides behind some “values”, like “it’s about international law or human rights”. No, if it were, we had to do something about that stuff equally.
It still is quite strange for him to focus on Nord Stream. Yeah, it was important infrastructure. But it was switched off for quite a while due to sanctions against russia before the attack. So not great, but there was no immediate impact for people.
I could understand if he was focussing on silence in regard of the Ukraine war or even Gaza, but Nord Stream is strange
I think he took it as an example, because it was basically an direct attack on Germany. So the example is crass, as in “if it doesn’t fit into the mainstream story, we even ‘ignore’ direct attacks”.
While the silence on the Gaza genocide holds just as true, it is not a direct attack and thus not such a strong example for the point.
NS2 should not have existed in the first place. Don’t you feel shame for building huge pipeline around whole Eastern Europe just so your trade wouldn’t be interrupted as russia invades everything? Because you should feel the shame. It have been built when russia already invaded Ukraine.
And yes, it wasn’t yet used, but almost finished state of it gave russia more courage to launch full scale invasion.
The shame already begins in still burning gas in the 21st century, no matter where it comes from and how it gets to Germany (or other countries for that matter) ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I mean, when Nordstream was conceived, everybody and their mother loved it: in the public opinion of the late 00s Ukraine was basically the devil and state enemy, stealing “our gas which we paid for”. Dumb take even then, but instead of just saying “ok, let’s start an effort to not use gas anymore” somebody came up with Nordstream. Turns out infrastructure projects take longer than huge shifts in the geopolitical landscape.
You do understand that late 00s is when pro-Ukrainian president in Ukraine have been elected, and russia was using economic pressure as an instrument to make him unpopular and, as a result, installed pro-russian puppet Yanukovich?
And instantly all the gas issues vanished, 30% discount was given, in exchange for permission to extend Russia’s lease of a major naval base in the Ukrainian Black Sea port of Sevastopol for an additional 25 years - the soldiers from this base occupied Crimea in 2014.