The Global Balance of Power Just Shifted

Europeans, all your lives are forever changed. Palestinians, beware.

I was at work yesterday when this happened.

Zelensky rejected a ceasefire in the stupidest way possible; I’ll tell you how in a second. Trump followed up a few hours later by demanding a ceasefire now.

Donald Trump sees himself as a deal-making Tony Soprano from The Sopranos, or some real-life wheeler-dealer mafia boss who gets things done.

What Zelensky did was the equivalent of a hired gang leader who had botched a job, after being paid in advance, going into the house of the Godfather of the Gambiones or Corleones, not even bothering to dress respectfully, and declaring that he was in fact the one in charge of the whole family business.

There are some who feel sorry for the comedian turned comprador, who was only acting out the same schtick he’s been playing in every Western capital to thunderous applause for three years, but I am not one of them. I’m that rare creature—an American with a long memory—and Zelensky is just another name in a long chain of imperial puppets who wore out their usefulness.

Diem, Thieu, Lon Nol, Noriega, Somoza, Hussein…what is one more to me? More importantly, what is one more to Trump and Vance? Apparently, not so much.

The wailing and gnashing of teeth from all of the other European compradors, from Starmer to Macron to Ursula von der Lyin’, sounds positively desperate because it is. After all, if the US Empire pulls the plug on Ukraine, how long will it be before it withdraws its military, and all the grift and support networks that go with it, from the rest of Europe?

Just how much money sucked from American taxpayers goes to fund things like, oh, the European Union bureaucracy? I don’t know, but USAID(ie State Dept.) cuts are already shutting down imperial propaganda “independent media” outlets all over eastern Europe, and no doubt making their absence felt in the west as well.

IOW, how much does the current European leadership, and the EU in general, depend on American grift largesse? I don’t know, but they do, and they’re freaking out, so there’s definitely some there there.

The US Empire has started its withdrawal from Europe, which means that the reality all those European leaders grew up in has changed forever. The same goes for every single British and EU citizen.

All that grift flowing from Washington in the name of NATO and fear of the Russian Bear, swirling around every European capital, condensing in and precipitating from European banks and governments, is in danger of being cut off at the source. In fact, it almost certainly will be cut; the only question is one of timing.

The good news is that the peoples of Europe will have a chance to shape a new and better destiny for themselves without worrying about getting permission from the Empire; the bad news is that their current leaders, with a couple of exceptions in places like Hungary and Serbia, are so mired in the old reality that they have no idea how to adapt to the emerging new one.

This means we are going to see some new faces in European capitals soon. The only question is how they will get there, which depends entirely on how gracefully the old ones choose to depart. But depart they will. Interesting times have definitely arrived in Europe.

They may have also arrived for every single Arab nation, and perhaps for Iran as well. I know from long experience that Israel always does its worst when the attention of the rest of the world is focused elsewhere. The winding down of the Ukraine War, and perhaps the established European order, will provide just the kind of cover and distraction the genocidal maniacs of Tel Aviv love.

The Israelis will likely accelerate their new naqba in the West Bank and resume the slaughter in Gaza while the Western media focuses on What Trump Will Do Next.

The governments of Arab nations such as Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia will be forced to decide just how far they can let Israel go without doing something about it before their own people decide they have to go for not doing enough. Yes, take a long hard look and think deeply, MBS.

The Iranian government faces a similar dilemma, but fortunately for them they can have nuclear weapons in about six weeks if they really want them. Trump says they won’t be allowed to get one, but former presidents said the same thing about North Korea, and now they’ve had the things for years.

The Russians and Chinese had to school Kim Pudgy Leader on The Rule of the nuclear club—now that you have the Damned Things you can never, ever use them first, just like the rest of us except for the Americans because they already did but even they know they can’t do it again, and if you do, you will be erased—but Kim’s still there, isn’t he? Unlike Qaddafi in Libya, who played nice. It’s not much of a stretch to say the Persians are bound to have figured that out by now.

Iran is likely to become the second Muslim country, after Pakistan, with which Israel simply cannot afford to fuck, and they’re likely to do it very soon. I would if I were them.

The US is moving away from the Atlantic Alliance and towards a new détente with Russia and China, with all of the diminishing of the old imperial order that necessarily entails. The upside is that the risk of global thermonuclear war just dropped by at least 80% in one day.

The weeks ahead will very probably see an end to the Zelensky regime, if not that of Zelensky himself, an end to the Ukraine War, an escalation of the Israeli genocide, and increasingly maddened squeals of panic from war pigs from Ottawa to Bucharest.

The 250th year since the Shot Heard Round the World will be at least as loud, and perhaps even more confusing to various political establishments.

Thank you for reading, good day or night, and good luck.

If you appreciate my scribbling, please share this post and consider making a one-time donation by buying me a beer or becoming a paid subscriber to help me keep scribbling.