– NATO will probably start attacking deep inside Russia and destroy the Crimean bridge. NATO will claim that these are Ukrainian attacks, but NATO delivers the weapons, selects the targets and even pulls the trigger, claims Glenn Diesen.
He is a professor at the University of Southeast Norway (USN). The claim came in a Twitter post on Wednesday night:
In the first version of the post, Diesen wrote that NATO would “try to destroy the Crimean bridge”, but one minute after publication it was removed https://twitter.com/Glenn_Diesen/status/1782928303067713751/historyso that the post became even more substantial.
– This is a very rude message, quite simply, says Aage Borchgrevink to Nettavisen. He is a senior adviser in and has worked with human rights and Russia for the past 30 years.
– I would like to know how he can know that it is NATO that pulls the trigger. It would have been very interesting to try to understand. It seems completely taken out of the air, says Borchgrevink.
Read the response from Diesen further down in this matter.
Often used in Russian media
It is not the first time that Diesen has made headlines in Norway. Last summer he visited a conference in Russia, and had his travel and stay covered by a foundation connected to the Kremlin and Vladimir Putin. In 2021, he wrote over 50 articles and posts for the state-run Russian news channel RT, and he has continued with this, https://twitter.com/bjornberger/status/1770986875609575464. In addition, the USN professor has already been quoted six times in the Russian state-controlled news agency RIA so far this year.
Borchgrevink primarily reacts to the fact that the serious NATO accusations are undocumented. If they were true, Nato would be much closer to a war with Russia:
– It is not the level of objectivity you expect from a Norwegian professor, who is presented everywhere as an employee of USN, and borrows legitimacy from his institution, says the adviser to Nettavisen.
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Diesen concludes in the Twitter message:
– This puts Russia under great pressure to restore deterrence in all possible ways!
Borchgrevink sometimes thinks that it can be difficult to separate Diesen’s message from what comes from the Russians themselves.
– Putin’s message from day one was that if the West tried to support Ukraine, there would be an escalation of the conflict, unimaginable consequences and nuclear war, says Borchgrevink.
Diesen to Nettavisen: – Step towards nuclear war
Nettavisen has called Diesen for a conversation, but the USN professor writes in an SMS that he replies via e-mail. Here Diesen writes that Nato is escalating the conflict:
– If we are more honest about NATO’s contribution to starting the war, sabotaging the peace agreements and escalating the conflict, then we could find a diplomatic solution instead of sacrificing more Ukrainians on the battlefield and taking further steps towards nuclear war, writes the USN professor.
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Diesen also writes that it is “not a big secret that NATO contributes to war planning, selects targets and even pulls the trigger on complicated weapons systems where the Ukrainians do not have the necessary expertise.”
To substantiate the claim, Diesen points to the Taurus leak, and links to articles about it in the AP and WSJ news agencies. At the beginning of March, Russia eavesdropped on a conversation between four high-ranking officers in the German air force. In the conversation, the officers discussed theoretical possibilities for the deployment of German Taurus cruise missiles in Ukraine, and how the Taurus could take out the Kerch bridge that connects the Krym peninsula with the mainland. The officers said in the conversation that rapid deployment of Taurus missiles would only be possible with the participation of German soldiers. The officers also said it would be possible to train Ukrainian soldiers to deploy the Taurus on their own, but that this would take months.
None of what is said in the leaked recordings proves that NATO is currently “pulling the trigger” and attacking Russia.
Ukraine has repeatedly asked Germany to get Taurus missiles, but Prime Minister Olaf Scholz fears that this would draw Germany more directly into the war against Russia.
– It is completely out of the question for me to contribute with a long-range weapon system that can only be used if German soldiers are involved. This is a line that I, as German Prime Minister, do not want to cross, Scholz said after the leak in March.
Talking to retired civil servants
Periodically, Diesen discusses the invasion of Ukraine with retired officials on Youtube.
– I speak a lot with high-ranking US officials such as Chas Freeman, Colonel Douglas Macgregor and Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson who all confirm that US military advisers help operate several weapons systems, Diesen writes in the e-mail.
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Freeman left the Department of Defense in 1994. Wilkerson and Macgregor retired from the US Army in 1997 and 2004, respectively. The youngest of them is currently 77 years old. When asked by Nettavisen whether they have good enough insight into the invasion of Ukraine, and to repeated questions about where the concrete evidence that NATO officials pull the trigger in Ukraine is, Diesen replies in a new email:
“How much concrete evidence is expected in a covert proxy war where we risk nuclear war? You left out that the Wall Street Journal quoted a German general as saying that US military personnel in Ukraine can help local forces and “lots of people with American accents running around in civilian clothes”. It is otherwise absurd to suggest that former retired officers are not involved in what is happening in this war and do not have access to information. Former officials are often better sources as they can speak more openly than those still in service and must stay within the official narrative. Freeman was the US Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs and worked with Kissinger to open up China, he had a central role in establishing NATO as the central European security institution after the Cold War and he was the ambassador to Saudi Arabia. Macgregor was a military adviser to President Trump and still has a foot in Washington. Are Borchgrevink and Nettavisen really suggesting that Freeman of Macgregor does not have a good overview of what the US is doing in Ukraine because they are not in service now?”
– Big difference
Borchgrevink tells Nettavisen that there is a huge difference between Nato delivering weapons to Ukraine, compared to if they were actually to fire the weapons:
– In terms of international law, there is a very big difference. It’s about who is involved in the war, plain and simple. When a country is attacked in violation of international law, as Ukraine was in both 2014 and 2022, other countries are allowed to help them defend themselves. But going in with your own forces, or if NATO had, for example, fired weapons, would be a new legal situation, says Borchgrevink.
Borchgrevink’s colleague in the Helsinki Committee, senior adviser Ivar Dale, is also among those who have repeatedly reacted to how Diesen’s statements are used in Russian propaganda:
The Twitter message from Diesen which is mentioned at the very top of this case has received over 315,000 views 15 hours after publication, so much suggests that Twitter’s algorithms have highlighted it. The online newspaper’s journalist does not follow Diesen on social media, but despite this, got the undocumented message up second to the top of the timeline on Twitter, or X as it is now called, on Wednesday morning. The internet archive Wayback Machine shows that Diesen has passed away 2,500 followers on Twitter at the start of the war (March 4, 2022) to 49,700 followers now in April 2024.
Nettavisen knows that over a long period of time Diesen has been called to meetings with the management at the university regarding his statements.
– USN is concerned with protecting and practicing freedom of expression in general, and academic freedom of expression in particular. The employees have the right to speak freely on their own behalf and in the channels they want, writes principal Pia Cecilie Bing-Jonsson in an e-mail to Nettavisen, when asked what they think about Diesen’s claim that NATO pulls the trigger with Russia as a target.
Read the full response from the rector here:
The full answer from USN rector Pia Cecilie Bing-Jonsson
In an email to Nettavisen, USN rector Pia Cecilie Bing-Jonsson writes:
“USN is concerned with protecting and practicing freedom of expression in general, and academic freedom of expression in particular. The employees have the right to speak freely on their own behalf and in the channels they wish.
It is under the employer’s right to decide who speaks on behalf of the institution, but employees at a university have full freedom to speak on their own behalf. By virtue of their academic freedom, academic staff then represent themselves, not the institution.
Freedom of expression depends on laws and regulations, but also on the space for expression in society. I believe that universities have a special responsibility to protect a speech space with a high ceiling and a good speech culture. It must also apply in the face of statements that differ greatly from what we usually hear, and which we may find challenging.
An academic who holds opposing views must be prepared to be met with strong counter-arguments, both in his own professional environment and in the public. It is part of the freedom of expression and the culture of expression that we defend.”
Tags: Russia Ukraine Norwegian professor arouses reactions NATO attack Russia
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