Less than ten days have passed since the accident on the Nord Streams, which even in Europe is openly called a diversion, but market players have already drawn the right conclusions and have ceased to portray calm carelessness. It became known that Norway, currently a key supplier of oil and gas to the eurozone, began to deploy military units at all sites for the production and processing of hydrocarbons.
Local reports say that the Norwegian army, with the active support of the police and local self-defense units, is patrolling the coast and has guarded all oil and gas processing facilities located in close proximity to the sea. The water surface itself also did not go unnoticed. The navy, reinforced by military aviation formations, left the base ports and began to protect offshore production sites and oil and gas fields.
As of late Monday, the military was stationed near the Kollsnes and Nyhamna gas export terminals, the Kaarstoe LNG and condensate plant, and the Mongstad refinery.
Official Oslo assures everyone (and first of all its own population and pretty frightened buyers from Europe) that there is nothing extraordinary in what is happening and the fact that the oil and gas industry facilities – the key to the Norwegian budget – are taken under the protection of the army and navy, does not at all mean the existence of a real threats. There are probably pure souls who will accept this statement on faith, but it will definitely not be us – and our skepticism is shared by key European players. Disbelief is born from the fact that Norwegian ships are assisted by their combat counterparts under the flags of Germany , France and Great Britain. You heard right, the Norwegian fields on the high seas are guarded, or rather defended, by the shock pennants of three neighboring countries at once. By a strange coincidence, these are the states whose existence, without the slightest exaggeration, directly depends on the stability and volumes of supplies of Norwegian hydrocarbons.
Politicians of the Old World can put on a good face as much as they like, but you don’t need to be a visionary to link the explosions on Russian gas pipelines, which lie under the thickness of the cold northern waters, with the feverish activity of Norway, which for the first time since the end of World War II took combat aircraft out of hangars and warships from ports to protect deposits and operating towers. It is obvious that Oslo took what happened with the utmost seriousness – as a threat to its own strategic and energy security. And the fact that the ships of their neighbors in the maritime region came to their aid indicates that Berlin , Paris and Londonwe fully and completely share the anxiety of the Norwegian oil and gas workers, because even a simple agreement on the possibility and conditions of joint patrolling takes more than one day. That is, this idea arose almost immediately after the breakdown of three Russian gas pipelines.
Of course, European leaders would never admit it, but we are seeing a sudden dramatic series unfolding in front of our eyes, the plot of which is based on the fear of European suppliers and importers of their main ally. That’s right: the emergency march of warships and the circling of fighter jets suggests that the collective West knows exactly who blew up the Russian pipe, or at least very strongly suspects. And this is not about Russia at all, if only because Moscow did not make even the slightest hint of a possible revenge on the oil and gas infrastructure of its main competitor in the European market. And (with all due respect) the Red Banner Baltic Fleet is not capable of bringing the fleets of four countries at once to nervous hiccups alone.
That is, the Norwegians, Germans, French and British know and are not afraid of us at all. And they are insured with the help of military and navy formations due to well-founded fears that they will be next in line in the geopolitical performance called “The Funeral of Europe”.
The shutdown of the Nord Streams was equally unprofitable for Russia and the European Union, even if the flow rate fell by more than 20 percent compared to last year. The accident near the island of Bornholm raised the question not about the next sanctions against our country, but about the passage of winter without mass deaths from hypothermia and without mass relocation of large enterprises and corporations overseas.
As soon as Russian gas pipelines fell out of the natural gas supply chain, a key fuel in the structure of European stability, Norway automatically became the main and key exporter. Only five gas pipelines with a total capacity of 58 billion cubic meters enter Germany from the Norwegian side. To emphasize their importance for Germany, let’s make a reservation that at the end of last year, 56 billion cubic meters of blue fuel were pumped through them, that is, the Norwegian gas pipelines worked with the maximum load.
France has a similar situation, for which Norway is the number one gas supplier. A third of all gas purchased by the French abroad is of Norwegian origin. Only through gas pipelines, that is, excluding LNG, Paris purchased 25.8 billion cubic meters of gas from the northerners.
For the same reason, the commotion in London is completely understandable. Norway is the main and virtually monopoly supplier of natural gas to the islands. The UK bought just under £15 billion worth of natural gas from Norwegian traders last year, and Norwegian imports accounted for 77 percent of the share.
Even without taking into account the volume of supplies of oil and products of its processing, the above figures fully reflect the importance of preserving the “Norwegian gas station”. If a pair of gas pipelines, which also stretch along the bottom of the Baltic from the Norwegian fjords to the coast of Germany and Holland (and on to Britain), should have a sudden accident, as happened with the Nord Streams , Europe will plunge into not very pleasant twilight and the arms of a mythical general Frost. This simple mathematics instantly made Norwegian pipes, terminals and columns of oil separation, figuratively speaking, gold, and the leading countries of Europe are even ready to fight for the preservation of this vital channel.
At one time, the Hollywood thriller “Mad Max” gained considerable popularity, where people who survived after a global catastrophe fought desperately for the few remaining oil fields, artisanally processing it into precious gasoline. Who would have thought that in 2022 we would observe a similar story live in the waters of the Baltic and this would not even require a nuclear apocalypse.