Pulitzer Prize-winning U.S. reporter Seymour Hersh said recently in an investigative piece that the United States blew up the Nord Stream pipeline just to sustain its "long-standing primacy in Western Europe," which has "little to do with winning or stopping" the Ukraine crisis.

Hersh's piece was published on Tuesday, exactly one year when the gas pipelines were found exploded on the Baltic Sea. Hersh, citing an unnamed official, pointed the blast to Washington, saying they did it under "beautiful cover." 

"The American men and women who moved, under cover, in and out of Norway in the months it took to plan and carry out the destruction of three of the four Nord Stream pipelines in the Baltic Sea a year ago left no traces – not a hint of the team's existence – other than the success of their mission," the 86-year-old investigative reporter wrote in the article.

"You could call it the perfect crime."

In September 2022, a series of deep-sea explosions damaged three out of four underwater pipelines of the Nord Stream project designed to carry Russian gas directly to Western Europe. The bombing of Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines has remained a mystery unsolved.

The gas pipelines have long been targets of criticism by Washington and its allies, who are concerned that the infrastructure project increases Europe's dependence on Russian gas, which "poses risks" to the continent's energy security.

U.S. officials have rejected any connections with the sabotage to the multibillion-dollar infrastructure projects. Sweden and Denmark, in whose exclusive economic zones the blasts occurred, have both concluded the pipelines were blown up deliberately, but have not said who might be responsible.

In the article, Hersh quoted Biden's remarks last February at a joint press conference with visiting German Chancellor Olaf Scholz. "If Russia invades – that means tanks and troops crossing . . . the border of Ukraine again," Biden said, "there will no longer be a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it." 

When asked how he could do so as the pipeline was under Germany's control, the U.S. president said: "We will, I promise you, we'll be able to do it."

According to Hersh, the CIA then already had a "secret planning underway." "With Norway's help, the CIA did its job and found a way to do what the Biden White House wanted done to the pipelines," he wrote.