Pelshval

Antropologiske betraktninger om pelshvaldrift

…qui tollis peccata mundi

13.06.2026 /

This string of words appears in my record collection, in compositions by:

J.S. Bach, Samuel Barber, Benjamin Britten, Luigi Cherubini, Gabriel Fauré, Vivaldi, Mozart, Palestrina, Arvo Pärt, Ariel Ramirez (in the vernacular), Rossini, Scarlatti, Verdi.

Most of the compositions bearing the name “Agnus Dei qui tollis peccata mundi” sound funereal. You will probably have heard the one in Mozart’s Requiem. It sends shivers down my spine.

Leaving aside the “Agnus Dei” bit (since in our day and age, the concept of a lamb does not resonate), I was fascinated by the hard consonants – the t-s, p-s and k-s – of the Latin words, long before I understood their meaning. Just uttering them – qui toll-is pec-ca-ta mun-di made me sense the weight of an overwhelming burden.

And so it is, the burden, that is, of evil: It is almost too hideous to contemplate. After I learnt the meaning of the words, which in my inexact translation read “you who pay the price for the sins of the world” – indeed, he was crucified – I addressed them, not to “God’s lamb”, but to the soldiers who died in ditches or in tanks in two world wars, to the peasants and unarmed people whose throats have been slit or who have been shot, starved, burnt to death or dismembered by mines, so that we in the political West can safely enjoy our three full meals a day and our daily hot showers.

“You who pay the price of our sins”, I mentally told them – our sins being mostly, I thought, cowardice. Because we didn’t speak up; we didn’t tell the bastards to STOP all the killing. I am moved by old videos of US kids who protested against the Vietnam war and were badly beaten. They DID speak up. Have I ever gone out and been beaten by the police? No, never. I was a coward. Or maybe I was a realist?

Because the US – totally disregarding the protests – continued its killing, not only of the Vietnamese. And in the end, we all got used to it, while the innocent continued paying the price. …qui tollis peccata mundi…

No, I was not a realist, for only recently did I understand that it makes no difference what we say or shout, or whom we vote for: If the 1 % want war, war it is.

As years passed, the shame of my cowardice was overshadowed by growing insight into financial greed. Because now, more and more people even in the political West are no longer able to afford three full meals a day and a daily hot shower.

Since USA was the “greatest” of the financial players, it was also the most active aggressor. Most of my compatriots, who adore US soft power, refused to see that and naively supported NATO, still do, for the most part.

The US and its European vassals, created and nurtured Israel. Israeli governments have been openly encouraging villainy against Palestinians ever since day one. But only on 7 October, when inmates of the world’s largest prison were miraculously able to escape and create havoc, only then, did even peaceful Israelis become sadists. After 7 October, many Israelis asked themselves why IDF seemed to be asleep on 7 October. I ask: were the Gazans deliberately allowed to escape so as to foment rage and eventually sadism among Israelis?

Sadism cannot entirely exterminate a people. There are now Palestinians all over the world. Like the Jews after WWII, the Palestinian diaspora will remember.

Moreover, encouraging sadism was a mistake on the part of the Israeli government. A stupid mistake. Because since 7 October 2023, the entire world has finally understood that Israel is a madhouse run by homicidal maniacs.

I had long known about and protested against Israeli violent theft of Palestinian homes in Jerusalem and the West Bank. But I never imagined I would see, anywhere, the extent of the Israeli depravity we have been witnessing these past three years.

Yet, nobody in the political West is lifting a finger to stop the carnage. NOBODY, except Palestine Action, and what a disproportionate price they are being made to pay!

What does that make us? As far as I can make out, we are the accomplices of homicidal maniacs, are we not?

Objection! Our governments do NOT represent us. They do NOT reflect our will. We were taught at school that they do, but all that is sham, make-belief. Though we are taken in by “panem et circenses”, bread and circus, mainly the latter, because most of us do not have much dough,, we are deeply disturbed by our governments’ failure to take decisive action against Israel.

What does that make Iran, that solitary country that has been vilified for 50 years? We have been told it is a backward terrorist state. The “backward” state is standing up for the underdog! It is standing up to the biggest bully of them all. Wow!

I suspect that many of my compatriots are pretty impressed with Iran, in spite of negative media coverage. I suspect that many people silently hope that Iran will prevail against Israel and against the US, regardless of the consequences for us.

Iran is a shining light. Maybe there is hope for humanity after all.

In that spirit, I recommend Ariel Ramirez’ adaptation of qui tollis peccata mundi in the composer’s vernacular. The prayer was to the point in USA’s long-suffering “backyard” when the wonderful Misa Criolla was composed (1964), and so it is today, there and in the rest of the world.


Cordero de Dios, que quitas el pecado del mundo;
ten compasión de nosotros.
Cordero de Dios, que quitas el pecado del mundo;
ten piedad de nosotros.
Cordero de Dios, que quitas el pecado del mundo;
danos la paz,
danos la paz.

Couples

06.06.2026 /

If a couple learns that one or the other is suffering from a terminal illness, something happens to the relationship between them. I am sure that must be so, although I have not studied the subject.

I happen to know a couple in that situation, and am fascinated by how they seem determined to concentrate on enjoying each other and enjoying life together more than they ever did before, more, even, than when they were courting. The sharpness of tone of voice outsiders often discerned in their discourse, is gone. There is a softness, an attentiveness between them that makes me wonder: Will not the grief and the loss seem all the greater in the end?

For some people, perhaps, the very announcement that death will come within – say, half a year – is received as a signed and stamped death certificate, as a fait accompli. Knowing that life as they know it will end, they turn from each other, turn off the light, as it were, in advance, waiting for sleep to turn off the pain.

And there must be a multitude of other reactions, more or less chaotic combinations of the two extremes described. There must be, after all, innumerable unresolved past issues – “you called me a stupid bitch!” – there may be former lovers; there may be “my children”, “your children”…

Moreover, living together is not only a matter of emotional attachment: There are also the house, the bills, the debts, the cost of treatment and, finally, the purely physical burden of having to care for one who is bedridden.

I have never lived with a person who was dying. But I can to some extent imagine how it must be, because I am living with a planet that is dying. To be more precise: It is being killed.

We are all effectively impotent in the face of this atrocity. We know who the killers are, or rather what they are, but we are as incapable of stopping them as Spartacus was of freeing the Roman slaves or as Palestine Action is of freeing the Palestinians. In the end, all who try, suffer the same fate as Spartacus and Palestine Action. They get quashed one way or another.

While injustice has always incited some – as Spartacus – to express their anger violently (which Palestine Action did not, by the way), others direct it at themselves, in the form of depression, which is, in essence, self-harm.

Most of us, however, just carry on the day to day business of staying alive and allowing business to proceed as usual.

You will put to me that there is a distinction between disease and “politics”. Indeed. But the two have a common denominator: They both kill and the net result for those who survive is LOSS.

The loss to most of us who live with this planet is unfathomable.

I grew up loving the swallows who returned to us every spring. No more. There are still swallows somewhere, I believe, but not where I live. I am surely not the only one who notices their absence.

I suspect that most of us are worried and (or) sad, some more, some less. Increasingly, though, people are getting angry.

There is so much to be angry about, where to start?

  • The 1% is running the show (the Mont Pelerin Society, the Bilderberg lot, the Davos and Trilateral Commission lot, the G7 …): Their field of expertise is exploitation at which they excel, using instruments, such as:
    • Our political class – basically all parties (new parties are soon bribed or otherwise discombobulated) – which are tasked with following agendas set for them.
    • State and corporate media whose task it should be to inform us, but which are instructed to withhold information and skew what little information they impart in order to keep us in the dark.

The problem about anger is that when you don’t know what is going on, you don’t know where to address it. When so much effort is being devoted to keeping us in the dark, we can do no more than knock our heads against walls. There is certainly no dearth of walls. Even in Gaza, they still have walls.

I have therefore decided to follow the example of the friends I described in my opening paragraph. At least for now. I have decided to love my dying partner, the planet, with all the tenderness I can muster.

Day by day, I love it more and more, knowing that it is just a matter of time before it or I must die. And this week I have been downright happy: Every day, there has been some rain. And every day, there has been some sunshine. The birds – those who are still around – have been singing, leaves are green, and there are even some insects around. I sit out in the evenings just listening, taking in the scents of life.

It is true, there were more birds last year. But those who still survive from year to year are infinitely dear to me.

Det gjelder å isolere fienden

25.05.2026 /

Antakelig har vi visst dette allerede i steinalderen. Det vi i mindre grad vet, er hvordan vi skal unngå å være offer for splitt-og-hersk-taktikker. I militærkampanjer og på fotballbaner er spillerne kjent med mottiltak. Men ellers i samfunnet hvor noen mål er ikke-spesifiserte, kanskje sågar kamuflerte, blir vi lett overrumplet. Tenk arbeidsplasser, for eksempel.

Alle er vi nok kjent med tilfeller av skitne triks, uggen stemning, intriger og lignende rettet mot en person eller en gruppe i vår nærhet. Kanskje har vi selv vært rammet. Kanskje har vi selv deltatt i en slik kampanje. Oftest blir sånt ikke en gang påtalt – man vil jo ikke lage bråk – så det kan fortsette i lang tid.

I samfunnet som helhet, ser vi systemisk bruk av splitt-og-hersk teknikker når målet er å motarbeide uønsket atferd. Ta for eksempel det nedsettende ordet “navere” som i prinsippet gjelder, ikke de som virkelig er funksjonshemmede, men de som later som om de er det, “unnasluntrere”, “parasitter”. Meningen er å skremme folk fra å legge seg på latsida. Det virker nok langt på vei, i hvert fall i forhold til voksne. Men enkelte ungdommer har så dårlig selvbilde at et negativt epitet fra eller til spiller liten rolle. The Lancet har nylig vakt stor oppsikt med en omfattende undersøkelse som påviser en dramatisk økning i psykiske lidelser globalt siden 1990, men særlig i vesten, særlig blant unge, og særlig siden Covid. Å isolere disse menneskene er åpenbart ikke særlig lurt.

Oftest vet vi ikke hvem angriperen er og hva som er målet for angrepet. Det gjelder ikke minst i politikken hvor det føres semantisk krigføring. Det er PR-bedrifter (omtalt i SSB som “næring” av typen “informasjon og kommunikasjon”) som hjelper politikerne til å frame hvordan de skal fremstille fienden i media. Det er 30.201 bedrifter i Norge som driver med “informasjon og kommunikasjon” ifølge SSB.

Vi har f.eks. alle merket at uttrykket “radikal” som på 80-tallet betød venstresinnet nå har en heller ullen betydning.

Derimot er det i dag bra å være “venstrevridd” og å “ligge på venstresida”. Men er det noen som vet hva det betyr? Det gjør i alle fall ikke jeg.

Derimot vet jeg veldig godt hva “ytre høyre” er: det er kort fortalt noe som er “fysj-a-meg”.

Når jeg nå vil forsvare litt av denne “fysj-a-meg-greia”, insisterer jeg på at jeg ikke – gjentar – IKKE tilhører den. Men jeg liker dårlig skitne triks, og merkelapp-krig er en skitten krig.

I prinsippet skal uttrykket “ytre høyre” bety en som er mot muslimske og mørkhudede innvandrere, gjerne også mot jøder. Uttrykket brukes ofte som en kode for “neo-nazisme”, “fascisme” – da vi nå endelig har forstått at det ikke er god tone å misbruke merkelapper som ender på a/z/sc/isme. Når vi hører “ytre høyre” forstår vi altså …, ja, du forstår, ikke sant?

Dette er viktig. Veldig viktig. Fordi media forteller oss bestyrtet om en voldsom fremvekst av ytre-høyre-partier i hele Europa. Det er selvfølgelig skremmende om det nærmer seg en tsunami av det unevnelige. Men jeg er ikke overbevist om at det er det unevnelige som nærmer seg. Jeg tror det som nærmer seg er misnøye med EUs “demokratiske underskudd”, og, ja, immigrasjon.

Jo, AfD er konservativ i verdispørsmål. AfD er dessuten skeptisk til både EU og NATO og stiller seg tvilende til å forsyne Ukraina med våpen. Det finnes absolutt rasister i partiet, antakelig flere i AfD enn i CDU eller Arbeiderpartiet. Men en av partiets to ledere, Alice Weidel, er samboer og har to barn med en kvinne fra Sri Lanka. Hun behersker mandarin og tok doktorgrad i Kina i 2011 om det landets pensjonssystem. Så det er åpenbart høyere under taket i AfD enn våre media er villige til å formidle.

Det bør også nevnes at AfD og Sara Wagenknechts parti (BSW) har drøftet samarbeid. BSW er som kjent et “venstre-ekstremistisk” parti som også vil begrense immigrasjon.

Og hva ligger så i uttrykket “venstre-ekstremistisk”? Jo, det er også noe “vi” ikke liker selv om det ikke er helt “fysj-a-meg”. “Vi” ligger et eller annet sted på midten, forstås, gjerne en ørliten tanke til venstre for midten – helt uavhengig av hvilken akse det dreier seg om. “Vi” er det etablerte. Det bestående.
Makten rår.

“Nasjonal samling” i Frankrike har mye til felles med AfD:

Partiet ønsker å bevare Frankrike i tråd med franske skikker og regler, og har et nasjonalt-konservativt kultur- og verdisyn. De er motstandere av innvandring, særlig fra muslimske land. De forfekter «nasjonal suverenitet» (alle lover for et land skal vedtas av landets egne lovgivende forsamling, ikke av internasjonale organer) og er derfor også motstandere av fransk medlemskap i EU.
[Wikipedia pr. 25/5-26]

Og hva er så galt med å ville bevare egne skikker og regler? Så vidt jeg vet, vil også de fleste nordmenn det. Unge mennesker har til alle tider villet utfordre det gamle, finne på noe nytt – ære være dem for det. Men de har ikke alltid rett. For tiden utfordrer de ikke våre 479 norske milliardærers evne til å bli enda rikere. Næringslivet (dermed også politikken og media) allierer seg derfor med dem. Det er jo de som har, eller som snart kommer til å ha, penger, tror de da. De eldre steiler, som de alltid har gjort: “det finnes to kjønn, basta!”

Og hva er så galt med å være motstander av EU-medlemskap, om jeg må be? Og av NATO?

Til slutt et lite blikk på MAGA. Ja, det er virkelig rare greier, mye hummer og kanari. Trump selv er jo temmelig uspiselig. Men det mange av velgerne hans (inkludert såkalte “libertarians”) i sin tid håpet, var at han ville få slutt på de evinnelige krigene som USA har ført siden tidenes morgen, at han ville stanse den voldsomme innvandringen, at folk da ville få jobbene tilbake og at de nedlagte fabrikkene ville opp og stå igjen. Som vi vet er ingen av disse løftene blitt innfridd.

Blant dem som støttet Trump var Tulsi Gabbard (en modig motstander av ulovlige kriger, som derfor forlot det Demokratiske partiet og som nå har forlatt også Trump) og Tucker Carlson.

Sistnevnte er en slags “Libertarian”. Det er ikke så mange av dem i USA, men de gjør seg gjeldende som motstandere av mye av det vi ikke liker ved det landet. Ellers er de opptatt av personlig frihet (inkludert skattefrihet) og selvbestemmelse (inkludert retten til å forsvare seg med våpen).

..frihetsbegrepet er i samsvar med ikke-aggresjonsprinsippet, som innebærer at hvert enkelt individ har rett til å leve slik det selv ønsker, så lenge det ikke krenker andres rettigheter ved å bruke vold eller svindel mot dem.

… og [de] legger vekt på prinsippene om likhet for loven og beskyttelse av borgerrettigheter, inkludert retten til foreningsfrihet, ytringsfrihet, tankefrihet og valgfrihet. De støtter generelt individuell frihet og motsetter seg autoritet, statsmakt, krigføring, militarisme og nasjonalisme…
[Wikipedia pr 25/5_26]

De av oss som på noe tidspunkt har stått på stand for en sak eller et parti, vet at kommer man først skikkelig i tale med folk kan en enes om de mest forbløffende detaljer. F.eks.:

  • Jo, opprustningsspiraler er ikke bra.
  • Jo, vi ser at krigen i Ukraina ikke gagner Ukraina.
  • Jo, vi vet at ledelsen i Ukraina er korrupt og vi antar at mye av pengene vi sender, lander i deres egne lommer.
  • Jo, utvidelsen av NATO mellom 1990 og 2009 må ha vært svært provoserende for Russland.
  • Vi er sågar enige om at ved å sende våpen til Ukraina bidrar vi til å forlenge og forverre det ukrainske folkets lidelse.

Men vi er ikke enige om min påstand at Ukraina er et beinhardt diktatur med klare neo-nazistiske (ja, faktisk!) trekk. Grunnen til uenigheten er at motparten leser aviser. Og det står ingenting i avisene som underbygger påstanden min. Det står heller ingenting om at styrtingen av Yanukovitch i 2014 var et USA-orkestrert kupp. (Det er mye som ikke står i avisene, gitt.)

Vi vil ikke spille med ytre-høyre eller med venstre-ekstremister. Vi vil ikke en gang spille mot dem. Vi later som om de ikke eksisterer. EU eksisterer. Vi vil spille med EU. Vi skylder våre 479 milliardærer å leke med EU, NATO og sågar Trump.

Se på listen igjen, forresten: 479 milliardærer:

  • Finans 111 (flytter på penger, det man før kalte spekulasjon)
  • Eiendom: 88 (driver lønnsom åger, fordi alle mennesker trenger et sted å bo)
  • Industri: 48 (Kun? Var det ikke for å fremme industri at vi skulle senke formueskatt?)
  • Sjømat 48 (Er ikke det også industri, forresten? Var det de som ikke ville betale grunnrente for fjordene de forringer?)
  • Shipping 48 (48 er et yndigt tall)
  • Olje & energi 4 (Kun?)

Nåja. Jeg pretenderer ikke å være økonom.

Veterans

19.05.2026 /

On 8 May, former UNSCOM weapons inspector Scott Ritter wrote: “America did not become a nation of racketeers under Trump. It always was one!”

But there was a time when a man’s word meant something.
When a handshake was as good as a signature on a piece of paper.
When a reputation mattered.
Those days, unfortunately, are long gone.
Arrogance and insolence have long been traits attributable to the United States of America and the American people.

But these normally repulsive character flaws were always wrapped in the cloak of well-meaning innocence, to be forgiven because those possessed of such traits carried themselves with a smile on their face and the perceived intent of wanting to do the right thing.

Just so, except that I suspect the “American people” have no influence over US policy, domestic or foreign.

Ritter is one of the founding members of VIPS, Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity. I find him somewhat alarming: He seems dauntingly intense and angry,but I’m sure he has reason to be! One possible reason being something another founding VIPS member, Larry Johnson, wrote about just yesterday on Sonar21:

Since 2001, the United States has lost more than 140,000 veterans to suicide — more than the total American combat deaths in every war since Vietnam combined. Between 6,000 and 6,700 veterans have died by suicide every single year since the War on Terror began, and the VA’s most recent annual report documents an average of 17.6 veteran deaths by suicide every day. [VA is the Department of Veteran Affairs.]

Some researchers believe even that devastating figure is understated: America’s Warrior Partnership estimates the true number may be closer to 24 veterans per day when accounting for underreporting, with an additional 20 dying daily from “self-injury mortality” such as overdoses — a combined total roughly 2.4 times higher than the VA’s official count.

Why am I going on about Scott Ritter? Because I am deeply grateful to him for directing me to a remarkable 12-page booklet you can actually download: War is a Racket, authored by Major General Smedley D. Butler. There is also a public domain audiobook.

In 1935, this extraordinary retired major general smelled a new global war on its way. He did not like it one bit.

On a tour of the country, in the midst of which I am at the time of this writing, I have visited eighteen government hospitals for veterans. In them are a total of about 50,000 destroyed men — men who were the pick of the nation eighteen years ago.

The very able chief surgeon at the government hospital at Milwaukee, where there are 3,800 of the living dead, told me that mortality among veterans is three times as great as among those who stayed at home.

I chose this quote to highlight why Scott Ritter may be angry, and why Larry Johnson is grieving over his friend, a veteran who killed himself last week. But it is far from the most striking part of the little tract.

The entire piece is quite simply brilliant and would have deserved not only a Nobel peace prize, if said prize had not been so demeaned as to represent an insult to whoever receives it, but also a Nobel prize in literature. No wonder the American public was reluctant to join WWII.

Now, I am of the opinion that German Nazism in WWII represented such a hideous threat that it had to be stopped, at all cost. But Smedley D. Butler could not have foreseen that in 1935. And that was not the case, I believe, in 1914 when WWI started. For years, certain forces in several countries had been hankering to cut each other’s throats. (Cf. Carroll Quigley, Tragedy and Hope, ch. 11: The growth of international tensions 1871-1914)

The factors currently leading us into a new global war resemble those leading up to WWI. Certain forces in certain countries, notably the US and in Europe are positively itching for an excuse to create bedlam and see some action. For instance, even at the best of times, there are, in Washington, in both parties, those who manipulate the incumbent president into starting a war. Reading War is a Racket you will be in no doubt as to why that is.

With such a tool as Trump in their hands, they may even decide to go all out in support of Israeli Übermensch calls to exterminate enemy civilisations and promote acquisition of “lebensraum“. After all, by piggy-backing the Israelis, they hope to help themselves to new chunks of Asia and thus to weaken China.

At any rate, the difference between the global war we are sleepwalking into and the previous one is that this time, we, in the political West are not the good guys.

As for Europe, EU leaders are patently acting, not for the good of their countries, but on behalf of what we recently have learnt to recognise as the Epstein Class.

Finally a quote to remind us that some things never change. The prescient major general wrote in 1935:

Then, incidentally, they announce maneuvers in the Pacific. For defense. Uh, huh.

The Pacific is a great big ocean. We have a tremendous coastline on the Pacific. Will the maneuvers be off the coast, two or three hundred miles? Oh, no. The maneuvers will be two thousand, yes, perhaps even thirty-five hundred miles, off the coast. The Japanese, a proud people, of course will be pleased beyond expression to see the united States fleet so close to Nippon’s shores. Even as pleased as would be the residents of California were they to dimly discern through the morning mist, the Japanese fleet playing at war games off Los Angeles.

Julia

16.05.2026 /

Her i Norge får vi høre fint lite som kan gi oss en mer nyansert forståelse av krigen i Ukraina. De av oss som prøver å forklare at det som skjedde der i 2014, var et USA-ledet kupp, at Zelenski senere ble valgt (med over 70 % oppslutning) fordi han talte for fred med Russland og nettopp ikke NATO-medlemskap, blir møtt med det hånlige budskapet at vi farer med “Putins talepunkter”.

Når Putin gang på gang har prøvd å forklare hva som var Russlands mål, ble han ikke hørt, fordi det han sier jo er “propaganda”, til forskjell fra det våre vestlige ledere sier, som jo er “informasjon”.

At EU-landene nettopp har bevilget et lån på 90 milliarder Euro til Ukraina, et lån som skattebetalerne vil måtte betale, det snakkes det mindre om. At levestandarden raser nedover i EU-land og at velgere derfor vender ryggen til de tradisjonelle partiene, snakkes det heller ikke mye om.

Og hvorfor raser levestandarden nedover i EU? Bl.a. fordi våpenimport til Europeiske NATO-land økte, i perioden 2021 til 2025 med 143 %. Europeiske land står nå for 33 % av verdens våpenkjøp.

Amerikanske kampfly og langtrekkende luftvernsystemer dominerte innkjøpslistene. F-35 er symbolet på denne utviklingen. Ved utgangen av 2025 hadde tolv europeiske land bestilt 466 av Lockheed Martins femtegenerasjons jagerfly. … Flyet er enestående – og det er også et knutepunkt i et målrettings- og etterretningsnettverk som styres av USA. Å fly F-35 er å operere innenfor en arkitektur som Washington kontrollerer: nemlig programvareoppdateringene, oppdragsdatafilene og integrasjonen i den bredere, USA-ledede kommandostrukturen. De europeiske statene som anskaffer det, kjøper ikke bare et fly. De velger en grad av operativ avhengighet som begrenser deres handlingsfrihet i ethvert scenario der europeiske og amerikanske interesser divergerer. [Kilde], [AI-oversatt]

Europa ruster altså voldsomt opp (Tyskland er dessuten blitt verdens fjerde største våpeneksportør) angivelig fordi Russland fører en “uprovosert fullskalakrig” mot Ukraina. Men var krigen virkelig uprovosert? Og var det en fullskalakrig? I februar – mars 2022 var det bare 150-180 tusen russiske tropper som gikk inn i Ukraina. Selv et lite land kan ikke erobres av 150-180 tusen mann. Først i september samme år økte antallet til 250-300 tusen pga av “delmobilisering”, igjen langt fra det som skal til for å okkupere et land.

Vi fikk aldri høre hva Russlands mål var, blant annet fordi Tucker Carlsons lange intervju av Putin ble latterliggjort i vår presse og raskt føyset til side. Det er ikke meningen at vi skal forstå hvorfor Russland mente de måtte gripe inn i Donbas. Det er heller ikke meningen at vi skal vite at Putin og Zelenski faktisk sluttet fred i Istanbul i 2022.

Og her kommer Tucker Carlson igjen inn i bildet. Han har nemlig nå intervjuet Iuliia Mendel, som var Zelensky’s pressetalskvinne fra 2019 til 2021. Før den tid hadde hun vært en meget kjent journalist. Hun skrev også for flere kjente aviser i vesten, som NY Times (bl.a. en artikkel i 2019 om hvordan Joe Biden hadde fått fjernet den ukrainske riksadvokaten som etterforsket Burisma).

Hun skriver for tiden en bok basert på et stort antall samtaler hun har hatt med ikke-navngitte personer i Zelenslys innerste krets og andre. Hun har nok forberedt seg til samtalen med Tucker Carlson, fordi hun har et budskap både til oss – folk i NATO-land – og til russerne: Budskapet er: Denne krigen er i ferd med å tilintetgjøre Ukraina.

NATO var overhode ikke på dagsorden, hverken for Ukrainerne eller for Zelensky da hun jobbet for ham. Sier Iuliia Mendel. På det tidspunktet var Zelensky enda opptatt av fred med de russisktalende opprørerne i Donbas og med Russland. Men han ble truet på livet, rett og slett, av ytterliggående nasjonalister. Selv NY Times kom med en forsiktig innrømmelse om dette den 10. februar 2022.

Kanskje det viktigste av det Iuliia Mendel sier, er at under forhandlingene som startet allerede i februar 2022, ble partene, altså Putin og Zelensky, egentlig helt enige. Avtalen var så godt som i boks. Det dreier seg om det man gjerne omtaler som Istanbul-avtalen. Dette er en brikke som systematisk utelates fra det vestlige narrativet. “Men så var det denne Johnson…,” sukker hun. Boris Johnson, altså.

Zelensky har siden snudd kappen etter vinden gang på gang på gang, sier Iuliia Mendel. Han er som Ibsens løk, bare skall på skall – en skuespiller av rang – lettere hysterisk, uten empati, og uten reell forståelse av virkeligheten. Han omgir seg med folk som jatter med ham og Yermak. De to klekker ut egne intriger på bakrommet – hun vil ikke gå i detaljer om intrigene, men man aner at det dreier seg om penger. Spurt om Yermak, gyser hun. Han er en “ondartet, paranoid psykopat”, sier hun. Det er de begge, legger hun til.

Ikke rart at Zelensky er paranoid. Han har kanskje ikke alltid vært det, men det Iuliia Mendel ikke nevner, er at han holdes i ørene av farlige etno-ekstremister som Andriy Biletsky,

who in 2010 reportedly called for Ukraine to “lead the white races of the world in a final crusade” against what he described as “Semite-led Untermenschen” – or subhumans. [Kilde: France 24]

Og Biletsky er langt fra alene. Zelensky er dessuten hatet av mange, ikke minst av sine fengslede politiske motstandere, av folk han undertrykker – i praksis mesteparten av det som er igjen av befolkningen. De var en gang 40-42 millioner, men nå er de kanskje 25 millioner hvorav 11 millioner er pensjonister som får 75-200 $ i måneden. Og Ukraina er langt fra noe lavkostland. Det har vært en hard vinter. Folk fryser og sulter i hjel. Sier Iuliia Mendel.

Spurt om hvor mange som er drept i krigshandlinger, uttrykker hun mistillit til offisielle tall på begge sider, men – sier hun – bare i Mariupol er det rundt 20 tusen ukrainske graver.

Vestens Zelensky-myte skjuler hans tilsynelatende sug etter stadig mer makt. Vestens ledere vet om, men overser, korrupsjonen fordi man ikke vil svekke hans stilling. Å støtte opp under ham anses som ensbetydende med å støtte opp om Ukraina. Men, sier Iuliia Mendel, hverken Zelensky eller de som sender ham penger og våpen støtter opp om Ukraina. Tvert imot.

Hun var selv til stede på et møte i Paris mellom, ja, nettopp Zelensky og Putin i 2019. Zelensky lovet Putin at Ukraina aldri ville bli NATO-medlem. Men så forandret han helt plutselig retning. Midt i et intervju på TV, var det som om han fikk en ide. Og etter det har NATO-medlemskap vært et av hans betingelser for fred.

Hun gir flere eksempler på hvordan han stadig endrer betingelsene for fred, slik at det blir umulig å oppfylle dem. Poenget hennes er at Zelensky ikke under noen omstendigheter vil at krigen skal slutte. Slik hun ser det, er krigen blitt et modus vivendi for ham. I den anledning tegner hun et nokså gjenkjennelig portrett av en diktator som har låst seg inn i et kognitivt bur.

Og det er ikke tvil om at han er en klassisk diktator. Hun forteller om løgnpropaganda, om manglende selvbeherskelse og raserianfall, avstraffelser og bestikkelser. Folk som kritiserer ham blir sendt til fronten. Der sultefores folk og fryser av seg fingre og tær fordi de ikke er skikkelig utstyrt. Selv folk fra sikkerhetstjenesten er blitt sendt “som straff” til fronten.

Alle er redde. Zelensky kjenner ingen grenser. Det er problemet. Jeg sitter her i dag fordi jeg vet han står litt ustøtt nå. Jeg vet at det er mange rundt ham som vil ha fred nå. Jeg hadde ikke lyst til å kaste dritt på ham, men jeg sitter her fordi også jeg vil ha fred. Og denne fyren vil finne på hva som helst …for å forlenge krigen og få mer penger. Han vil ikke begå politisk selvmord. Å avslutte krigen er politisk selvmord.

Intervjuet er langt. Blant annet fordi hun ikke kort kan vise til tall og utilgjengelig statistikk. Hun må tegne et bilde gjennom eksempler. Dessuten må hun være svært forsiktig for at ikke det hun forteller kan spores tilbake til hennes kilder.

Den russiske pressetalskvinnen Maria Zaxharova morer seg over Iuliia Mendels beretning om Zelenskys mange 15-minutter-lange dobesøk med påfølgende personlighetsendring. Den beretningen har også vestlig presse festet seg ved. Men Zaxharova la til at det også er mye annet snadder i intervjuet. Og det er det virkelig!

Intervjuet er altså her.

Budskapet til russerne fremfører Iuliia Mendel til slutt direkte til kamera, på russisk. Det er rettet til Putin. Hun appellerer til det han selv har opplevd og trygler – for å si det slik – trygler ham om hjelp til å avslutte krigen. Vestlige og ukrainske media er i harnisk over at hun har “humanized Putin” – altså at hun snakker til ham som til et menneske.

***

Jeg finner oppslag om dette intervjuet i kun 2 norske aviser, Aftenposten og Dagbladet. Jeg abonnerer ikke på noen av dem og kan derfor bare gjengi overskrifter.

Aftenposten:

Iuliia Mendel, tidligere presserådgiver for Zelenskyj, kritiserer nå Ukrainas president og hevder han er en diktator og hinder for fred. Under et intervju med Tucker Carlson fremmet hun korrupsjons- og rusanklager mot Zelenskyj, mens forsker Oleksandra Deineko mener dette er strategisk desinformasjon.

Dabladet:

Pepres av eks-sekretær: – Han er ond
Tidligere pressesekretær langer ut i intervju med kontroversiell podkastvert.
«Fullt av løgner», skriver ukrainsk avis.

***

Jeg vil nevne noe jeg fant påfallende ved intervjuet: Ikke på noe tidspunkt nevnte Iuliia Mendel eller, for den del, Tucker Carlson, gruppene som i vestlig presse vekslende omtales som “høyreekstremister, “ultranasjonalister”, “neo-nazister” eller “fascister”. Jeg kaller dem for etno-ekstremister. Tausheten om noen mektige menn og de væpnede gjengene de leder må ha vært avtalt. Jeg kan bare spekulere om årsaken.

Det jeg imidlertid vet er at Iuliia Mendel etter intervjuet ble ført opp på den ukrainske hitlisten Mirotvorets, hvor også den sveitsiske forfatteren Jacques Baud står oppført. Årsakene til at hun føres opp fremgår av det som må være en ukrainsk avis. For å balansere tilføyer jeg link til (russiske) Pravdas beskrivelse av Mirotvorets.

Fresh perspectives

13.05.2026 /

There is this Chinese whizz-kid, Jiang Xueqin. Actually, he is neither a kid nor Chinese. According to the linked Wikipedia article, he is about 50, and probably Canadian. But he certainly is more than usually brainy.

Glenn Diesen has interviewed him on a couple of occasions and I note that what he says differs in almost every way from what just about everybody else says, both in form, style and content.

For one thing, he is anything but diffident. He seems almost insolently confident about his predictions. Yes, he is in the business of making geopolitical predictions. And he does so – to be sure – on the basis knowledge and, allegedly, game theory. (To my knowledge, game theory has absolutely nothing to do with gaming.)

Online with Glenn Diesen, he is unsmiling and very concentrated. He serves his apocalyptic predictions with chilling cool, although he concedes from time to time that they sound terribly cynical, inferring that the cynicism is not his, but that of the people who run the world.

They, the people who run the world, pretend they are not Netanyahus, but that is exactly what they are. (Take for instance Keir Starmer, a so-called “Labour” PM, who has turned the UK into a Zionist police state).

I shook my head, as he told Glenn Diesen how the US will bamboozle even the Chinese, and will crack the Iranians if not in the strait of Hormuz, at least in the strait of Malacca. It is true that Trump gleefully bragged, just the other day, that “we’re like pirates”. So, yes, the US can and will do exactly what they want to do with any ship, anywhere.

I also shook my head when he explained that this war, these wars, I should say, is not about China but between the US and Russia. Then I remembered that until Trump claimed he wanted the Ukraine war to end, we always maintained that the Ukraine war was a proxy war, that Ukraine was a US proxy. (And just today I read that Tulsi Gabbard has confirmed the existence of more than 40 gain-of-function bio-labs in Ukraine paid for by US tax payers.) The US has now merely outsourced its Ukraine war to its European vassals. Indeed, Jiang Xueqin’s explanation of how and why the US outsources its wars is exhilarating.

I decided to take a look at his website, and having done so I urge you to do likewise.

This picture from Iran on his site is not one I have seen before:

He writes:

Trump ordered the destruction of Iran’s largest bridge. This is considered a war crime because you’re not supposed to target civilian infrastructure. Now, you can make the argument that this is dual-use, meaning that the military uses it as well, but everything is dual-use. The military also uses water, they also use electricity, and their kids also go to university. So, there’s a great fear now that we are already at the point of no return.”

Makes sense.

But I am writing all this only to tell you that this insolently self-confident thinker has produced a treasure trove of a web-site, full of information and mind-boggling theories.

I know for a fact that I do not agree with him about Dante’s Divina Comedia, for example, and a number of other issues. But disagreeing with intelligently developed points of view is stimulating. In a piece about economic bubbles (“The Great Reset”), he writes “How do economies rise and fall? I’m not an expert or a professor. I engage in speculation for fun and entertainment. See this as an exploration of some topics that have no scholarly basis.”

Take a look at his long essay (for lack of a better word) “The Hollywood-Pentagon Complex”, or his impressive Glossary, or his “Mid-Term Examination” starting with the sentence “Today is our midterm examination—a chance for you to question and examine me”. Again, he is in the business of making geopolitical predictions based on a combination of facts, reasoning and adventurism. Game theory is not about gaming, but his predictions are, in a sense, a game.

My approach to analyses of current events is to seek, not confirmation, but understanding. I admittedly want to see an end to US hegemony and I tend to be happy reading promises of the imminent demise of USD reserve currency status. This whizz kid and his Predictive History site is not promising anything of the sort. Yet, he is well worth my time and I therefore suggest he might be worth yours as well. After all, do we not need to understand why rogue states such as the US and Israel are still calling the shots and why US piracy is being tolerated?

Joyless

06.05.2026 /

Many years after the end of the Pinochet dictatorship, a popular Chilean journalist who had been tortured in Villa Grimaldi, was asked what effect it had had on her. She pondered her answer, which was odd because she was usually very much on the ball, and finally replied: “Perdí la felicidad.” Literally: I lost my happiness.

Another one of Pinochet’s innumerable victims told me that her reply made a tremendous impression on him. When she said what she said, he realised: That was exactly what had happened to him!

I did not understand, then, what on earth he was going on about. I mean: Is anybody more than momentarily “happy”?

But the other day, reading about the five Palestine Action defendants who dismissed their lawyers in order to address the jury personally, I finally understood. They had committed vandalism (red paint, broken windows, etc.) against an Israeli arms factory and are facing gargantuan penalties as “terrorists”. The defendants’ lawyers had been given a gag order. The defendants themselves, however, could not be prevented from giving the jury a piece of their mind. I read a short piece that quoted some of their statements, including the following:

Ms —- recalled how she went on local marches and national demonstrations while her “mental health plummeted watching what was happening and feeling helpless to stop it.”

An email to her local MP came back with an “automated response,” she said.

Ms —-, who worked at a nursery, spoke about “the conflict of going to work — teaching young children — and going home to watch videos of children losing everything”.

She felt “sick going to bed feeling helpless witnessing massacres” and felt “compelled to act in defence of those children.”

Now this was something that I could understand and relate to!

People are not all born “happy”. Among “healthy” children of parents who can afford to care for them, some are no doubt happier than others. There are sure to be many factors that determine why people are different in that respect. Whatever those factors are, I for my part have been a joyful sort of person.

Life in Europe tends to take the following course: School, secondary school, infatuations, professional training, finding a partner, buying a home, making children, etc. There are dramas, large and small all along the route, from periods of stressful unemployment and inability to pay bills, to loss of loved ones, serious accidents or illness. We find comfort in our church, mosque or synagogue and the equivalent holy texts, if we are believers.

Personally, I have taken greater comfort from the UN Charter and the Declaration of Human Rights, which I thought were more substantial than millennia-old texts. They contain the rules that the entire global community agreed to try to follow and to consider “Law” – International Law.

I fear those who put their trust in the holy texts are better off than me now.

Remember the Canadian Prime Minister’s astounding speech at Davos? Mark Carney spoke about the end of what he called a “pleasant fiction” in a world where, routinely, “the strong can do what they can, and the weak must suffer what they must.”

We knew the story of the international rules-based order was partially false that the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient, that trade rules were enforced asymmetrically. And we knew that international law applied with varying rigour depending on the identity of the accused or the victim.

The PM admitted that

The system’s power comes not from its truth, but from everyone’s willingness to perform as if it were true.

No, I am not digressing. The post-WWII global order was predicated NOT on “Pax Americana”, (which was not peace in any way, shape or form – on the contrary) but on the understanding that cultures, religions and political systems differ, and that when interests clash, disputes must be resolved through the United Nations.

Or so we thought. Now we see that it was all a charade. The US no longer even pretends to respect the UN. It flouts, and has flouted from day one, every rule in the book of international law.

***

In my country, children were taught that evil would be punished. As an adult, I learn, and re-learn every single day: evil is rewarded.

That the world is governed by such awful principles as those now openly and unabashedly espoused not only by the USA (including its Congress!), but also by its European vassals, is sickening. Yes, watching feel-good films can distract us for a few moments, but more and more people suffer from a general sense of disgust.

Like the former victims of Pinochet – I have lost the capacity to be joyful. I have not been tortured, it is true. I have not even been incarcerated and killed without a trial like hundreds of thousands of Palestinians and Lebanese. I have not lost my wife or husband or sons or daughters to killers simply because they are not “Jews”. I have not been imprisoned or lost my job, scholarship or residence permit for attending demonstrations.

What has happened to me is merely that I have lost faith in mankind. It is true that not all people are nearly as evil as Netanyahu, Ursula von der Leyen, Lindsey Graham, Nancy Pelosi or Javier Milei. In fact, very few are. But people like them are the people who run the world.

After WWII, Norwegians asked themselves: Had we been German, would we have been proud to kill Slavs and Jews? The thought was horrifying. After all, in terms of ethnicity, Norwegians and Germans are very close.

Since then, we have learnt that the genetic difference between what used to be called “races” of homo sapiens is hardly worth mentioning. Some, it is true, tolerate salt, milk and other substances better than others.

That means, I am very much afraid, that we all could become just as homicidal as Israelis and Nazis.

I used to hope that the UN and the shared principles enshrined in its Charter and Human Rights Declaration would protect our moral condition. But alas, the one country that has done most to undermine the two is the USA, staunchly backed by Santa Ursula’s army of European warmongers.

The human species is in the process of self-extermination. Should we even bother to grieve its demise?

Borettslag – for folk eller for finans?

05.05.2026 /

Kantarellen terrasse var et riktig pent borettslag i vakre omgivelser på Mortensrudhøyden med utsikt over fjorden og med ettermiddagssol på de aller fleste balkongene. Byggingen av de 267 individuelle andelene fordelt på 47 dus-gule mursteinsbygninger med dekormønstre (av mørke murstein) og blå detaljer ble avsluttet i 1990. Noen av andelene er i rekkehus, de andre er i terrasseblokker på 3 eller 4 etasjer. Borettslaget forvaltes av USBL.

Det har vært to kostbare “prosjekter” i borettslaget siden 2010.


  1. Innglassering av balkonger måtte gjentas, da den forrige innglasseringen to år tidligere var slett utført. Firmaet som hadde stått for den første innglasseringen gikk konkurs. Borettslaget tapte den påfølgende rettssaken.
  2. Skifte av tak mm: Det var klart nødvendig, og det utførte arbeidet er det visstnok ikke noe å si på.

Alt dette medførte en kraftig økning av fellesgjelda, og dermed også av husleie for hver av beboerne – aka “andelshaverne”.

Nå har man startet et nytt og mye større prosjekt. Det er grunn til å stille spørsmålstegn ved omfanget og behovet for det.

Denne gangen heter det intet mindre enn ombygging. Med rette: Mursteinsveggene skal vekk. Ja. De rives – murstein for murstein. Alle de 47 bygningene skal avkles deres vakre murstein, til en prosjektert pris av 200 millioner! I stedet skal de nakne boenhetene dekkes av “plater” i moteriktige farger. Dessuten bytter man ut alle vinduene og ytterdører – i de fleste leilighetene er vinduer og ytterdører visstnok i utmerket stand.

Det er sant at de vakre gule mursteinene ser ut til å angripes over tid av fukt + frost. Men finnes det ikke midler som kan beskytte dem? Er dette et eksempel på at man ønsker å få en ny “look”?

Borettslaget har tatt ut et lån på 200 millioner kroner – tohundre millioner – norske kroner som skal nedbetales i løpet av 35 år med en foreløpig rente på 4,85 %. For de som har nedbetalt andel av tidligere fellesgjeld vil dette medføre en fordobling av “leien”.

Var denne “ombyggingen” virkelig nødvendig?

Hvor mange av beboerne i de 267 boenhetene vil nå falle under fattigdomsgrensen?

Hvordan er det egentlig med boligbyggelag? Skal de tjene byggherrer, banker og konsulentselskaper eller skal de gi folk med middels og lavere inntekt mulighet til å bo?

Har Norge med sitt høye fokus på stil og stand mistet av syne 60-tallets mål om at her skal det være økonomisk trygghet for alle?

Danger

26.04.2026 /

There are those who argue that Donald Trump is suffering from frontotemporal dementia (FTD). His innumerable conflicting declarations and outbursts certainly seem unhinged and his foreign policy – if he has a foreign policy – is psychedelic. I put to you that if he now has FTD, he can’t help it. However, he should be removed from power, together with his mad hatter Hegseth.

But his is not the only administration that appears to be on some dangerous drug-related trip. Keir Starmer refuses to step down, although he has – as The Guardian all too kindly puts it – “morphed from asset to liability” for his party. Not that he ever was anything but a pitiful US puppet. Remember his treatment of Julian Assange? And the very idea of accusing Jeremy Corbyn of anti-Semitism! He has turned his entire country into an unstaffed hospital ward where all too many patients are sleeping on the ground. He is, however, an asset for Israel, just like Trump. As Tariq Cyril Amar writes: The Starmer Regime is turning Britain into a genocide-complicit police-state.

Like Starmer, EU leaders, already deeply unpopular, are digging themselves deeper and deeper into a pit. Finland even “plans to lift decades-old ban on hosting nuclear weapon“. Good luck with that. Do you really believe that NATO membership for Finland will help defend Finland? Finland was a safe country before it joined NATO. Now, however… And of course Russia is alarmed. No wonder.

And they all – the EU brass – seem determined to cling to power. Here is a question to which we learnt the answer when still in primary school: If you are a famously unpopular king/president/PM: how do you divert your subjects’ attention from yourself to some lofty cause? Answer: You wage war.

Mind you, it is imperative that you first convince your subjects that

  • the war in question is one of self-defence (“He started it!” )
  • that you are defending a good cause (women’s rights, democracy, etc.) and
  • that the leader of that country is the devil incarnate.

Now to the extent we admit that men or women can actually be “devils incarnate”, they will indeed be heads of states or of corporations that design gadgets that spy on people to kill. (Read Tariq Cyril Amar’s furious rant against AI to kill and take a guided tour with Max Blumenthal through a Palantir-sponsored war tech summit ). Only in such positions can they truly exercise unlimited power and cause unlimited harm, i.e. kill and/or maim an unlimited number of people.

I do not postulate that Santa Ursula, Mertz, Macron, or Kaja Kallas are quite that evil. Not even Starmer. They are merely morally inferior. Their self-harming bellicose attitude to Russia is not depraved. At least I don’t believe so. But it is truly very strange.

In view of all the unjust and ghastly wars the USA has engaged in over the decades, in view of the torture and killings of millions of Latin Americans, in view of US/UK/EU complicity in Israel’s genocide of Palestinians and war crimes in Lebanon, the Soviet Union and Russia seem like a Sunday school.

I have been sceptical, I admit, to scholars such as Jeffrey Sachs who see Russophobia as a root cause of US/EU antagonism towards Russia. I realise now I may have been wrong, because European warmongering quite simply seems irrational, almost as irrational as Trump’s war on Iran.

I could understand that many leaders in the West might be unable to forgive the Communism of the Soviet Union. But there are scholars, such as Richard Sakwa (The Lost Peace – How the West Failed to Prevent a Second Cold War, Yale University Press, 2023) who maintain that Russophobia goes back to 1054 AD (yes, a religious power struggle), and that it has been kept alive and burning every since.

But of course not only due to religion. In 1966, in his classic Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in Our Time, Caroll Quigley warned of a powerful transnational group of elites, primarily British and American, who controlled

  • major financial institutions that influenced economic policy
  • prominent media outlets shaping public opinion,
  • elite educational institutions, training future leaders, and
  • government agencies, implementing policies.

Whatever their motives, they have been locked in deadly competition with other players for access to resources, etc. By its mere existence, Russia, with its vast land mass and enormous resources, has been an irritant to competing powers for centuries.

To this day, in effect, Quigley’s “transnational group of elites” is stronger than ever. We have the annual off-the-record Bilderberg forum, the World Economic Forum (Davos), the G7, the Mont Pelerin Society and the Atlas Network (the goal of which was and is to promote and defend at all costs Neoliberalism). These are all clubs for the super-rich and/or influential, and they are all designed to help the 1 % to manipulate government. And they have effectively managed to neuter the UN.

Back in 1966, the UK and the USA were helping each other to help themselves to the world’s resources, while the Soviet Union was offering free university education to Africans wanting to liberate their countries from colonialism and neo-colonialism. The Soviet Union has many sins to atone for, no doubt about that, but their foreign policy was comparatively benign.

***

I have been told that President Kennedy wanted to change course with regard to the Soviet Union. For the record, here is his famous university Commencement Address of June 1963, just months before he was killed. More and more historians are suggesting that the assassination was an inside job. The policy changes he had just initiated, which would have cancelled the Cold War, were reversed.

Quoting from a book I urgently recommend that you read (see below), I am fast forwarding to the second Cold War:

In 2001, George W. Bush decided to unilaterally withdraw from the ABM Treaty, so that he could deploy anti-ballistic missiles (ABM) in Eastern Europe.
…
In 2007, the Americans are in full negotiation with the Czechs and the Poles to deploy these missiles, officially to protect themselves from the Iranian threat.
….
In fact, the United States has gradually withdrawn from all Cold War arms control agreements: the ABM Treaty (2002), the Open Skies Treaty (2018) and the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty ( INF) (2019).
…
In 2019, Donald Trump justified his withdrawal from the INF Treaty with a so-called violation by the Russian side. As noted by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the Americans have never provided proof of these violations.
…
they were looking to get out of the deal so they could install their AEGIS missile systems in Poland and Romania, officially intended to intercept Iranian ballistic missiles
…
these systems use Mk41 launchers, which can launch either anti-ballistic missiles (defensive) or nuclear missiles (offensive). The Radzikowo site (Poland) is 800 km from the Russian border and 1,300 km from Moscow. [Highlights are Pelshval’s]

What “Iranian threat”, pray tell?

Yes, the reason I am quoting just these paragraphs is that I wish to point out that Iran is not a new issue, not a Trump invention. The Lines were written before Iran was unwillingly hauled onto centre stage. Iran has become, for several countries in Asia, a conduit for trade over land, bypassing US control of the Pacific. Trump is not alone in resenting this by-passing of US maritime control.

I urge you to read the entire book from which these quotes have been taken:

Operation Z, 2022, by Jacques Baud.

It is a particularly well sourced book about the background of the Ukraine war. Its author; Jacques Baud has been “sanctioned” without due process (without a trial). His bank accounts and his sources of income are blocked by EU, and he is not allowed to leave Belgium. Such treatment of people who write literature that is politically disagreeable to the powers-that-be, is eerily reminiscent of a 1966 film, based on a novel by Ray Bradbury. You can see the film on a Russian channel: Farenheit 451

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