> Surely Russia has no interest in sabotaging the pipelines that give them leverage over Europe.
Apart from a false-flag operation by Putin to have a casus belli to start a war with NATO?
Normally, that would be suicide. But Putin has already proven that he, to put it diplomatically, does not see the world the way most sane people see it.
A couple of years of ukranians shelling the prorussian regions were a good enough reason.... considering that nato used the same one to bomb serbia in 1999.
2021 only had 18 civilian deaths in that region, of which 11 were caused by mines. 79% of casualties were in separatist areas and 21% in Ukrainian controlled territory. That is a good enough reason to kill thousands and thousand, make millions of Ukrainian children flee their homes? Level entire cities?
Apart from a false-flag operation by Putin to have a casus belli to start a war with NATO?
Normally, that would be suicide. But Putin has already proven that he, to put it diplomatically, does not see the world the way most sane people see it.