A short while ago I was 'force-fed' a video-clip on YT which was real footage from Thailand, offered by an expat living in the country who urged visitors not to be stupid. The video was showing a couple of athletic 'Caucasian' men who were denied entry into a bar, for whatever reason. They responded…
Blog posts : "In English"
There is no cure for stupidity
If you make mistakes, you are not a stupid person. We all make mistakes, all the time. But you are stupid if you make the same mistake over and over, expecting different results, as Einstein said. Within this concept, a mistake is a choice which brings harm to others, as well as to your own objectiv…
Amateur-hour in Istanbul?
After an interruption of three years, the Russians and the Ukrainians meet again in Istanbul, in the same building and the same room where they produced the 'Istanbul Accord' back in 2022, which was subsequently shredded by Zelensky. Through the 'leaks' which allowed the NYT to reveal large parts of…
Boy-scouts to the rescue
What on earth were these European leaders and Zelensky 'thinking'? You must have seen the results of the photo-shoots. Five extremely happy, broadly smiling European leaders, hugging, holding hands, patting the others, and themselves, on the back, as they met in Kiev for 'talks'. To say they were in…
Talk is cheap
On May 8th King Charles addressed the British people celebrating the defeat of Nazi-Germany and the 'Axis'-Powers. He quoted the British war-time leader Sir Winston Churchill, who once said that it is better to 'Jaw-jaw than to War-war'. What was it the King wanted to communicate? Fascinating questi…
Victory Day Parade cease fire
Tomorrow the Russians are celebrating Victory over Nazi-Germany, Eighty years ago. Both Ukraine and the EU did what they could to make it absolutely clear that they saw no reason whatsoever to celebrate. The EU threatened heads of state, inside the bloc, as well as leaders of prospective members. An…
Lacklustre and faltering? Really?
Multiple commentators supporting NATO's 'proxy'-war in Ukraine published optimistic predictions after the Trump administration signed the long awaited 'Minerals Deal'. One professional, prominent Dutch 'Think-Tanker' stated that the progress of the Russians in Ukraine is 'lacklustre', and the Russia…
Haters will be haters
Russia is interested in a peace-deal, but not a cease fire, because Ukraine and Europe will only use it to rearm and retrain. Ukraine is interested in a cease fire, to arm and retrain with the help of Europe, and give it another go, but not in a peace deal. Both countries do not trust the US, which …
Tensions rising
Tensions are rising everywhere as the 'Collective West' is losing its grip on reality. Mind you, up till now the 'Collective West' was under the impression that it was the dominant force on earth, and the only tensions worth paying attention to were those within the 'Collective West' itself, as it s…
In a parallel universe
The Warparty is taking the gloves off. And so is Trump. During his first term he relied on the Republicans to back him up, but that never happened. Now he is relying on a few handpicked people from both sides of the political spectrum to back him up as he shakes the tree for the rotten fruit to fall…
Is the US going to walk away?
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte raced across the Atlantic to salvage the war with Russia on Ukrainian soil. He shook hands with a line-up of Pentagon officials, and spoke briefly with Trump. No cozy press-briefing side by side afterwards, just Rutte claiming that NATO was united in its assessment …
Ukraine rejects Trump's Peace Deal?
The latest news regarding the Trump Peace Plan, is that Zelensky rejected it out of hand. The British newspaper ‘Independent’ published the story, which claimed that today the Americans, Rubio and Witkoff, were to present the plan to the representatives of the ‘Coalition of the Willing’, the U…
What about Trump's upcoming Peace Deal?
The biggest risk when analyzing a war, is hyper-focus. Not seeing the entire picture. Especially when you focus on the wrong things, which have no bearing on the outcome. A war ends through negotiations, or when one of the warring parties is defeated, or exhausted. Exhaustion refers to material exha…
A debate between two supporters of Ukraine
As I was sanding and painting a sideboard, I listened to a video produced by Willy OAM, a pro-Ukrainian realist analyst, debating Drew Pavlou, a ‘hard core’ activist pushing the ‘case’ for Ukraine. The reason for this debate was an on-line confrontation between the two which became somewhat ‘…
Let's be brutally honest
To analyse a situation as the war in Ukraine requires knowledge nobody I know has. Even if someone has impeccable sources from one side of the fence, that almost guarantees that he has none from the other side, even if he is interested. I do my best to check out what all those sources are saying. Fi…
Does decaptitation of a country or group serve any purpose?
As I mentioned yesterday, the strike in Sumy was targeted at a military brigade which got together in that Ukrainian town to celebrate, and be honored. A yet unknown number of soldiers died, together with over thirty civilians. Ukraine and their Western propagandists initially denied that the missil…
A position of strength
Until very recently Ukraine, supported by NATO, which included the US under Biden, told everybody who cared to ask why they wouldn’t talk to the Russians about a cease fire, that a cease fire would only benefit Russia. It would provide Russia with breathing space needed to rearm and regroup. Therefo…
Maybe, maybe not
Two different ‘envoys’ from the US speaking different languages when it comes to what the US has to offer Ukraine. Steve Witkoff is essentially saying that Ukraine is out of options, and their only realistic choice is to settle with the Russians, basically on their terms, before things get even wo…
Patterns in the mist of time
Order is not a natural state of affairs. We humans create order out of chaos, because we can’t handle an environment with nothing but variables and uncertainty. Yet too much order and no individual choices, or not enough freedom, rubs us the wrong way too. Trump clearly is an ‘Agent of Chaos’ in…