I know nothing of him, but given that there's an entire paragraph about Jens Stoltenberg where almost every sentence is just completely factually wrong in a way that could be verified to be wrong with a look at the first paragraph on his Wikipedia page, I'm not inclined to take what he says seriously.
I mean, par for the course for modern journalism, I suppose.
> "Today, the supreme commander of NATO is Jens Stoltenberg ... He was a hardliner on all things Putin and Russia who had cooperated with the American intelligence community since the Vietnam War."
During the Vietnam War (1955-1975) Stoltenberg (born 1959) was -4 to 16 years old..
Hersh possibly confused Jens with his father Thorvald Stoltenberg. Who travelled to North-Vietnam in 1970 to negotiate between them and USA, and who was commended for his negotiating skills by the am. intel community in a declassified rapport from 1980.
Links/sources follow:
«Thorvald Stoltenberg and Reiulf Steen visited Hanoi in 1970.»
https://vietnamkrigen-wordpress-com.translate.goog/2010/02/2...
«In a new biography of Thorvald Stoltenberg, it is described how Norway brokered peace between the parties in the Vietnam War at the end of the 1960s.»
https://www-vg-no.translate.goog/nyheter/innenriks/i/Pk947/n...
«Defense Minister Thorvald Stoltenberg was praised for his negotiating skills in a so far classified CIA report from 1980.«
https://www-nettavisen-no.translate.goog/nyheter/cia-vurdert...
WTF, he's born in 1959. That makes him 16 by the time the war ended? How can a professional journalist make a claim like that?
Hersh possibly confused Jens with his father Thorvald Stoltenberg. Who travelled to North-Vietnam in 1970 to negotiate between them and USA, and who was commended for his negotiating skills by the am. intel community in a declassified rapport from 1980.
See my other comment for quotes and sources.
Yeah, the idea that he was involved in the American war in Vietnam seems far-fetched. Perhaps this is a confusion with some other, older Stoltenberg?
Likely. Jens's father was Thorvald Stoltenberg, a powerful Labour politician working in foreign policy most of his life. He was allegedly trying to negotiate between the US and Vietnam.
Yes. Hersh possibly confused Jens with his father Thorvald Stoltenberg. Who travelled to North-Vietnam in 1970 to negotiate between them and USA, and who was commended for his negotiating skills by the am. intel community in a declassified rapport from 1980.
See my other comment for quotes and sources.
HN favorite Mark Ames has another theory about Stoltenberg fils that wouldn't contradict TFA: perhaps even his teenage war protest was of the "observe then snitch" variety?
https://twitter.com/MarkAmesExiled/status/162420098079862374...