In today's #vatnik soup I'll introduce an American investigative journalist and political writer, Seymour "Sy" Hersh. His recent article suggested that the Nord Stream bombing is connected to the US, Sweden and Norway and that it was ordered by no other than Joe Biden.
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Let's begin with the obvious: Hersh is an accomplished journalist whose reporting is widely known around the world. His first big story was exposing the 1969 My Lai massacre and its cover-up during the Vietnam War.
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In the 70s, he covered the Watergate scandal and in 2004 he reported on the torture and abuse of prisoners taking place in Abu Ghraib, Iraq. He's won 5 George Polk awards, a Pulitzer price and two National Magazine Awards.
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But, then there's the other stuff. The kind of journalism that doesn't bear scrutiny.
In Sep, 2013, Hersh said in an interview that the death of Osama Bin Laden was "one big lie, not one word of it is true". In 2015 he published his own take on what happened in an ...
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... article called "The Killing of Osama bin Laden". He suggested that Pakistan had detained Bin Laden and both the Pakistani and the US governments knew about the attack beforehand. It was widely criticized by reporters, media commentators, academics and US official.
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In Dec, 2013,London Review of Books published Hersh's article "Whose Sarin?".The article was previously rejected by both New Yorker & Washington Post. In his story,Seymour claimed that the US had used "cherry picked intel" to justify military attacks on pro-al-Assad troops.
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Various chemical weapons experts were critical at the time, and latest OPCW report concluded that the "reasonable grounds" exist to believe that the Syrian Government was behind these attacks.
In 2017, Welt am Sonntag published Sy's article "Trump's Red Line"...
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..., which suggested that the US intel had not informed President Trump that "it had found no evidence that the Syrians had used a chemical weapon". Bellingcat called Hersh's reporting "sloppy" as he based the case on tiny number of anonymous sources.
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Regarding 9/11, Hersh has said in an interview that he doesn't "necessarily buy the story that Bin Laden was responsible for 9/11." Then he continued: "We really don't have an ending to the story. I’ve known people in the [intelligence] community. ...
9/20
... We don't know anything empirical about who did what."
Seymour's also been skeptical of the Skripal poisoning, saying that "the story of novichok poisoning has not held up very well. He [Skripal] was most likely talking to British intelligence services about Russian...
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... organised crime". He suggested that the poisoning was coming from organized crime rather than being state-sponsored.
Hersh is known for often using anonymous sources. He's also been criticized for this, and for example investigative journalist Edward Jay Epstein and...
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... activist Amir Taheri have said that he is "over-reliant" on them. Taheri said that "by my count Hersh has anonymous 'sources' inside 30 foreign governments and virtually every department of the U.S. government".
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In his story on Bin Laden, Hersh referred a 55 times to an "anonymous retired senior intelligence official". Vox's Max Fisher have stated that "Hersh has appeared increasingly to have gone off the rails. His stories, often alleging vast and shadowy conspiracies, ...
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... have made startling-& often internally inconsistent- accusations,based on little or no proof beyond a handful of anonymous 'officials'".Slate's James Kirchick stated that "Hersh's problem is that he evinces no skepticism whatsoever toward what his crank sources tell him"14/20
Hersh has defended his style of reporting, and has said that he may change details when he's giving speeches: "Sometimes I change events, dates, and places in a certain way to protect people. I can't fudge what I write. But I can certainly fudge what I say."
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Hersh "fudged" facts in his 2004 speech about the Abu Ghraib scandal, where he alleged that American troops had sodomized young boys and that the whole thing was recorded. In a later interview, he said that his statement "wasn't that inaccurate, but it was misstated".
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I have read Hersh's article on Nord Stream. It's a highly detailed blog post, describing the planning and the execution of the operation in detail.
Oliver Alexander (@OAlexanderDK) has researched Hersh's story on the Nord Stream bombing.
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Based on him and the OSINT evidence he's gathered, the story is full of holes and inaccuracies. One example:Hersh stated that a Norwegian Alta class mine hunter was used in the operation, but in reality the Alta hasn't been used since 2012 and was being scrapped at the time.18/20
The reasons why Hersh has resorted to sloppy journalism can only be guessed. Maybe he wants to stay relevant? Maybe it's the money?
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Either way, he should realize that his pieces riddled with dis- and misinformation are used as propaganda tools - On 15th of Feb, 2023, TASS reported that Russia requests UNSC meeting over the Nord Stream sabotage. Hersh has no plans to speak at the event if it occurs.
Addendum: Amir Taheri whom I referred in the report seems to be mixed in several controversial cases, too. The whole case seems to be a kind of "the pot calling the kettle black" scenario. I would disregard Taheri's comments on this matter.
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In today’s Vatnik Soup, I’ll introduce an American national security policy professional and the current under secretary of defense for policy, Elbridge Colby (@ElbridgeColby). He’s best-known for fighting with cartoon dogs online and for halting military aid to Ukraine.
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Elbridge "Cheese" Colby earned his bachelor’s degree from Yale and a Juris Doctor from Harvard Law School. Before entering government, he worked at top think tanks and in the intelligence community, focusing on nuclear policy and strategic planning.
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Cheese quickly became a key voice for a “China First” strategy, arguing the US must prioritize military buildup in Asia over commitments in Europe or the Middle East. He sees (or saw, rather) Taiwan as the core test of US credibility.
In today’s Vatnik Soup, I’m going to talk about… Vatnik Soup! As some of you know, we also have a website where you can find every soup ever published. The site also has other useful resources, making it the most comprehensive resource on Russian disinformation & vatniks.
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Unfortunately, Elon has flagged the website as malware, as he might not be very happy about the soups I wrote about him - so far, they have garnered over 60 million views on X/Twitter.
The “freedom of speech” spokesperson doesn’t seem too keen on free speech, after all.
2/15
The heart & soul of the website is of course the soups page. There you can find all 360+ soups, which can be sorted chronologically, by popularity, etc. You can also search for soups by title or even in the soup text:
In today’s Wumao Soup, I’ll introduce how and where the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) online propaganda and influence operations work. Due to China’s massive population and advances in AI, CCP-aligned online content has become increasingly visible.
1/20
Like Russia’s troll farms, China has its own troll army: the “50 Cent Party” or “Wumao” refers to state-linked online commentators who are reportedly paid ¥0.50 per post to steer discussions away from criticism and amplify CCP narratives on social media.
2/20
Back in 2017, a research paper estimated that the Wumao produced almost 500 million fabricated comments annually to distract readers and shift topics. In that sense, Wumao operates very similarly to the Russian “Firehose of Falsehood” model:
In today’s Vatnik Soup and the “Degenerate Russia” series, I’ll show you the brutal reality of Russian war crimes, in particular the horrific tortures and sexual abuses of children, women and men.
Buckle up, this one is not for the faint-hearted.
1/24
For over a decade now and as part of their “firehose of falsehood” propaganda strategy, Russia has been spreading false narratives targeted at right-wing/conservative audiences, portraying russia as a bastion of Christian, traditional,family values.
In the previous “degenerate Russia” series we discussed Russia’s insanely high divorce rates, rampant domestic violence, high murder rates, thriving neo-Nazi culture, corruption of the Orthodox Church, and their massive demographic problem:
In today’s Vatnik Soup, I’ll explore how Russia is working with Iran, and how the recent Israel–US strikes on Iran could affect the war in Ukraine. Iran has been one of Russia’s key allies in their genocidal war, but in reality the partnership is deeply one-sided.
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Historically, Russia/USSR has been involved in numerous wars in the Middle East, invading Afghanistan for nearly a decade and desperately trying to keep Syria’s authoritarian leader, al-Assad, in power before his eventual downfall.
2/21
While initially supportive of Israel, the Soviet Union quickly pivoted to backing its enemies, fueling antisemitism, terrorism, and chaos in an already tense region. At times, this meant near-open war, like when Soviet Air Force MiG-21s were shot down by Israel over Egypt.
In today’s Vatnik Soup REBREW, I’ll re-introduce a Latvian politician and former MEP, Tatjana Ždanoka. She’s best-known for her history in the Communist Party of Latvia, for her pro-Russian politics in the country, and her connections to Russian intelligence.
1/22
Based on Ždanoka’s speeches and social media posts, she has a deep hatred towards the people of Latvia. The reason for this can only be speculated, but part of it could be due to her paternal family being killed by the Latvian Auxiliary Police,…
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…a paramilitary force supported by the Nazis, during the early 1940s. Ždanoka became politically active in the late 80s. She was one of the leaders of Interfront, a political party that supported Latvia remaining part of the USSR.