Can you point to the commenter here who does know what any nation's subs have been up to, and isn't pulling stuff out of their ass to satisfy their geopolitical soap opera fantasies? What's "absurd" is pretending that a nation state would either need or even want to use submarines for an operation like this; reports indicate that these pipelines are at a depth of 80m, which is well within the depths that professional deep-sea divers regularly access undersea pipelines.
In practice there's not a single state on Earth that benefits from the temporary disabling of this unused pipeline, but of all the states that have something to lose from being discovered as the perpetrator, the US is near the top of the list.
It has nothing to do with the depth. Surface ship diver tenders work great if you don't mind everybody seeing what you're doing. For something like this, it would be stupid.
> In practice there's not a single state on Earth that benefits from the temporary disabling of this unused pipeline,
Severing this tie between Germany and Russia benefits America. If you don't understand this then you haven't been paying attention. Furthermore, doing it in a way that takes the blame off the German government is beneficial to the German government. The German people will be uncomfortable in the short term, but in the long run severing this link between their country and Russia will be good in the long run for them and the rest of NATO.
> Furthermore, doing it in a way that takes the blame off the German government is beneficial to the German government.
No, the German government knows it needs to weather the winter, and have been relying (and continue to rely upon) Russian gas to fill their reserves. Their goal was to have their gas reserves filled to 95% capacity by November, and they appear to have been at around 75% before Russia started playing games with Nord Stream 1 last month. Of all the states most negatively impacted by this, Germany is probably #1 (yes, even more than Russia).
In practice there's not a single state on Earth that benefits from the temporary disabling of this unused pipeline, but of all the states that have something to lose from being discovered as the perpetrator, the US is near the top of the list.