The United States was reportedly told by a European spy agency that the Ukrainian military planned to attack the Nord Stream gas pipelines covertly three months before they were bombed.
The intelligence would mean that, for nearly a year, the U.S. and other European allies had a basis to suspect Kyiv in the sabotage.
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The intelligence was first shared with the CIA in June 2022 by a European intelligence service with close ties to the U.S. The report was shared on the chat platform Discord allegedly by Air National Guard member Jack Teixeira, who is accused of leaking a tranche of top-secret government documents on the platform.
The report said the divers who had planned to carry out the attack were all members of Ukraine’s special military forces team and reported directly to the commander in chief of the Ukrainian armed services.
The report includes a number of highly specific details about the planned Nord Stream detonations, including the number of operatives and methods of attack, according to the Washington Post, which obtained a copy of the intelligence report from one of Teixeira’s online friends.
It said that all members of the group were to report directly to Gen. Valerii Zaluzhnyi, Ukraine’s highest-ranking military officer, who was tapped to head up the operation so as to give Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky plausible deniability in any attack.
According to the intelligence summary, the military divers had planned to attack the Nord Stream pipeline following a massive allied naval exercise known as BALTOPS, which took place from June 5-17.
It said the military operation was “put on hold” for unknown reasons. The intelligence report also did not mention Nord Stream 2, the second pipeline linking Russia to Germany, which was not yet operational at the time of the explosions.
Still, some key details of both reports line up.
German investigators have said they believe six people used fake passports to rent a yacht called the Andromeda to transport the explosives and plant them on the Baltic Sea floor at three separate locations along the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines.
Authorities also said previously that they believe those involved are skilled divers given that the explosives were planted at a depth of about 240 feet.
Earlier this year, German authorities also said they matched traces of the same explosive residue found on the exploded pipeline with residue found inside the cabin of the rented yacht.
The CIA shared the information with its counterparts in Germany and other European countries, according to the Washington Post.
The twin Nord Stream gas pipelines were hit by four undersea blasts in September. European officials said the explosions caused “extensive damage” to Nord Stream 1, the main gas artery linking Russia to the EU and supplying the bulk of the bloc’s supplies until Moscow began throttling its deliveries last summer.
To date, no Western leaders have assigned any blame in the attacks, though they have all described the blasts as an act of sabotage.
Where things stand
At a press briefing Tuesday, White House spokesman John Kirby said investigations into the Nord Stream explosions are ongoing.
“The last thing that we’re going to want to do from this podium is get ahead of those investigations,” Kirby told reporters when asked about the allegations.
In March, unnamed U.S. officials briefed on new intelligence said that pro-Ukrainian actors, likely Ukrainian or Russian nationals, were behind the explosions, the New York Times reported.
U.S. officials said at the time they did not have evidence that the group was tied to Zelensky or that the perpetrators were acting on the orders of any Ukrainian government officials.
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Ukraine also denied any involvement in the explosions at the time.
The CIA and other U.S. intelligence officials did not respond to the Washington Examiner’s request for comment.
