The US has urged Ukraine to halt attacks on Russia’s energy infrastructure, warning that the drone strikes risk driving up global oil prices and provoking retaliation, according to three people familiar with the discussions. […]
One person said that the White House had grown increasingly frustrated by brazen Ukrainian drone attacks that have struck oil refineries, terminals, depots and storage facilities across western Russia, hurting its oil production capacity.
Russia remains one of the world’s most important energy exporters despite western sanctions on its oil and gas sector. Oil prices have risen about 15 per cent this year, to $85 a barrel, pushing up fuel costs just as US President Joe Biden begins his campaign for re-election.
Un-paywalled link: https://archive.ph/wv1Y3
I have yet to see an argument of how Ukraine has the capability to do it: The explosions are consistent with two depth charges being put squarely on top of the pipelines. Not just dropped, that would’ve been less accurate. Those things are huge and heavy you’d either need a team of divers and lots of time, or a submarine. The number of actors with capability to do it that way isn’t exactly large, and Ukraine isn’t really on it. Germany and Russia certainly is, US – I doubt it. They’re not good at all at sneaky submarines and nothing goes past the Danes or through the Kiel channel without being detected while a medium-sneaky Russian sub could’ve done it as it’s already in the Baltic Sea, anyway.
Yeah thats a good point. It was mostly the newspapers here in Sweden saying that Ukraine was the top suspect. I believe they thought the charges were set with divers, no Submarine involved, but maybe there’s been more analysis since then.