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Debt Rattle April 17 2026

Apr 172026
 
 April 17, 2026  Posted by at 9:09 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , ,  38 Responses »


Gustave Caillebotte Rue Mont-Cenis, Montmartre 1880


• The CIA Tried to Remove a Sitting President (CTH)
• DNI Tulsi Gabbard Sends Criminal Referrals for Atkinson and Ciaramella (CTH)
• Tulsi Explains Criminal Referral of Trump Impeachment Collaborators (CTH)
• Ukraine Impeachment Was Continuation of Failed Russia Collusion Plot (Dunleavy)
• Trump ‘Permanently Opening’ Strait of Hormuz ‘for China’ (RT)
• House Intel Member Says It’s Time To Expunge Trump’s 2019 Impeachment (JTN)
• Sotomayor Issues Rare Apology For ‘Hurtful’ Comments About Kavanaugh (JTN)
• New Hungarian Prime Minister Says Borders Will Remain Shut To Immigrants (ZH)
• Zelensky Goes Full “Lord Of War” (ZH)
• Russian Envoy Dismantles Kallas at UN Seccurity Council (RT)
• It’s Time for Congress to Come Clean About Itself (Mark Tapscott)
• Scientist: Dark Matter Could Be Black Holes From A Different Universe (MN)
• U.S. Government Embraces Anthropic’s Mythos AI (ZH)
• What AI Doesn’t Know – and Why It Matters (Richard Porter)

 


 

https://twitter.com/JoshHall2024/status/2044738709719830767?s=20 https://twitter.com/QuantumGuard17/status/2044443788546891914?s=20 https://twitter.com/Inevitablewest/status/2044512498146021545?s=20 https://twitter.com/HungaryBased/status/2044490945698119811?s=20

 


 

 


 


DNI Tulsi Gabbard was portrayed the other day on Zero Hedge as a ‘Trump ally’. But she never was, until perhaps very recently. She left the Democratic Party only 3,5 years ago after calling them “an “elitist cabal of warmongers”, and became DNI in February 2025. There’s simply not enough water under that party bridge. Bur she can dig.

By now it’s hard to see how all those involved in conspiring against Trump could escape prosecution. The list is long, and it includes Obama. Which also provides an indication of how hard this is.

We’ll follow Sundance, who’s been following the case closely. He indicates how serious this is in one sentence: “The CIA Tried to Remove a Sitting President“.

The articles are about:

1) The meaning of what Tulsi did.

2) What she did.

3) She explains what she did.


• The CIA Tried to Remove a Sitting President (CTH)

For the past 72 hours I have been attempting to draw attention to the big picture. The CIA tried to remove a sitting United States President. The evidence has been released. The long-debated issue is no longer a matter of opinion or question. The CIA tried to remove a President. Unfortunately, now we watch the silence. I see a lot of punditries missing the forest as they peer intently at the trees. The CIA tried to remove a sitting President. We now know the real reason CIA whistleblower Eric Ciaramella’s name was never πpermitted to be mentioned. It s not the name Eric Ciaramella that presented the issue, it’s the organization where he was working, the CIA That’s what needed to be protected.


[The Biden administration created the Dept of Homeland Security Disinformation Governance Board to interact with Social media and create content controls. That’s where Nina Jankowicz comes in.] There was/is documented evidence showing the CIA tried to remove a sitting President from office. CIA Analyst Eric Ciaramella, the anonymous CIA ‘whistleblower’ worked with Joe Biden on Ukraine policy. Biden appointed DHS Nina Jankowicz worked inside Zelenskyy’s campaign HQ. Just a coincidence? Don’t get lost in the details or the politics of this. When you peel back all the layers of DC, at its epicenter this was an operation to impeach a sitting President that came from within the CIA, and it almost succeeded.

In the details, an impeachment effort against President Trump was triggered when a member of the National Security Council named Alexander Vindman coordinated with a member of the CIA National Intelligence Council named Eric Ciaramella to fabricate a false claim that President Trump leveraged his power and authority to demand Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy release information on Joe and Hunter Biden’s corrupt financial dealings in Ukraine.At the time of the 2019 impeachment construct Eric Ciaramella was working for the CIA as an analyst within the National Intelligence Council (NIC).

Two years prior to the 2019 impeachment construct, in January 2017, the same CIA analyst, Eric Ciaramella, had worked on the fraudulent Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA) at the behest of CIA Director John Brennan. Outlining Ciaramella’s activity not only hits CIA Director John Brennan and former DNI James Clapper, but it also hits former President Barack Obama. The National Intelligence Council was the internal sub-agency within the larger Intelligence Community, that was constructing all of the fraudulent analysis to support the 2016 Russian Election Interference narrative.

Ciaramella was doing what John Brennan, James Clapper and Barack Obama wanted him to do. That’s why his story is so much more important than just his fabrication and lying to ICIG Michael Atkinson, who was also a participant in the endeavor and the false construct of the 2019 impeachment effort. Former DOJ-NSD lawyer Michael Atkinson and former DOJ-NSD head Mary McCord were at the heart of the operations against Trump in 2017, and then both surface again against Trump in the 2019 impeachment effort. Mary McCord was working for Adam Schiff and Jerry Nadler at the time of the impeachment in 2019. Michael Atkinson was moved from DOJ-NSD to the IC OIG specifically for this operation.

Before this operation in 2019, CIA analysts weren’t allowed to anonymously make claims against political officials. The reasons are obvious. Because of the sensitive information they handled, any allegation of wrongdoing based on intelligence had to be made with their name attached. Without anonymity, inside the Intelligence Community oversight system, the Ciaramella connection to both IC operations could have been made. His anonymity as a whistleblower served a purpose. Having switched locations to IC IG, Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson independently changed the ICIG rules permitting Ciaramella to remain anonymous and make an “urgent concern” claim that ultimately led to an impeachment effort.

Eric Ciaramella fabricated intelligence information. ICIG Atkinson shared it with Congress and the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI). Representatives of HPSCI Chairman Adam Schiff met with Ciaramella and assisted him during the construct. ICIG Michael Atkinson never even read the transcript of the call between President Trump and President Zelenskyy that formed the basis for the Ciaramella complaint. The complaint was also criminalized by Atkinson and sent to the Office of Inspector General for the DOJ for review. Unlike Atkinson, the DOJ reviewed the Trump-Zelenskyy transcript and said there was no issue.

On October 4, 2019, as part of the House impeachment inquiry, Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson gave closed-door testimony to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) as part of their pre-impeachment investigation. One of the key questions to ICIG Atkinson surrounded the authority of his office changing the CIA whistleblower rules that permitted Eric Ciaramella to remain anonymous. Atkinson had no reasonable explanation. The Intelligence Community Office of Inspector General (Atkinson) also altered the whistleblower form within months of the July 2019 Trump/Zelenskyy phone call to no longer require firsthand knowledge as a prerequisite for reporting complaints.

This indicates forethought and specific intent. Michael Atkinson knew a ‘second-hand’ complaint was coming. From all appearances, IC IG Atkinson was organizing the operation in advance. CIA Analyst Eric Ciaramella provided the story. With Adam Schiff prepared to receive the complaint, and Mary McCord prepared to weaponize the complaint, collectively they ran the operation to impeach a sitting President on an entirely fraudulent basis.

[Executive] The CIA tried to impeach President Donald Trump; the aggregate Intelligence Community was there to assist.

[Legislative] The HPSCI and HJC, Pelosi, Schiff, Nadler were prepared to organize the impeachment construct. Mary McCord working as staff.

[Judicial] Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts would not let Eric Ciaramella’s name be spoken at trial. Mary McCord’s husband, Sheldon Snook, was working for John Roberts at the time.

This was a coordinated impeachment effort across all three branches of government. The CIA tried to remove a President. Unfortunately, now we watch the silence. We have known this for all long time; what we lacked was the specific evidence. Now, we see the evidence and yet it is almost more alarming to notice the silence than it is to absorb the reality of the events that evidence describes. The CIA tried to remove a President!

Read more …

“Atkinson was the intentional organizer of false impeachment material submitted by CIA operative Ciaramella.”

• DNI Tulsi Gabbard Sends Criminal Referrals for Atkinson and Ciaramella (CTH)

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard has sent criminal referrals to the DOJ for former Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson and former CIA Analyst (National Intelligence Council) Eric Ciaramella. Atkinson was the intentional organizer of false impeachment material submitted by CIA operative Ciaramella. Apparently, people know the background. lol


WASHINGTON DC – “The Office of the Director of National Intelligence sent criminal referrals to the Justice Department for the whistleblower whose complaint helped trigger President Donald Trump’s 2019 impeachment and for the former intelligence community inspector general who notified Congress of the allegations, Fox News Digital has learned. “I want to refer information that may constitute possible criminal activity in violation of federal criminal law committed by one or more former employees of the intelligence community,” ODNI’s general counsel wrote in the referral to the Justice Department. Fox News Digital on Wednesday reviewed the referrals ODNI sent to the Justice Department.

“The possible criminal activity concerns the circumstances described in the following congressional briefings: Discussion with Intelligence Community Inspector General, House Permanent Select Comm. on Intel., 116th Cong. (2019); Briefing by the Intelligence Community Inspector General, House Permanent Select Comm. on Intel., 116th Cong. (2019),” it continued. […] An intelligence official told Fox News Digital that the language in the referral is broad, but that it’s specifically directed at Atkinson and the whistleblower who reported concerns about President Trump’s July 2019 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Don’t forget, Michael Atkinson turned the Ciaramella complaint into a criminal referral, a criminal complaint, then submitted it to the U.S. Department of Justice.

• Abuse of govt position.

• Manufacturing evidence for a legislative procedure.

• Conspiracy to conduct fraud.

• Lying to federal investigators.

• Falsifying information to manufacture a criminal complaint. I

t will be interesting to see where this goes.

Read more …

“Gabbard is providing the receipts, the actual evidence, of how these IC operations took place.”

• Tulsi Explains Criminal Referral of Trump Impeachment Collaborators (CTH)

Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, appears for an interview with Katie Pavlich to outline the importance of bringing all of the information about the Intelligence Community targeting of President Trump to the public.Sunlight is the best disinfectant, and We the People want to see accountability for the Machiavellian conduct. The intelligence community targeted President Trump and people within the CIA ran an operation to remove him.


These people have names and titles that have remained hidden, DNI Tulsi Gabbard is putting those names, specific names into the public psyche so we can have a full understanding of what took plac Now, for many here this may seem like information we have all known about; however, Gabbard is providing the receipts, the actual evidence, of how these IC operations took place.

DNI Gabbard is showing how specific people within government weaponized their positions to conduct some of the most insidious schemes in modern U.S. history. The criminality of those schemes is for others in Main Justice to determine, but the evidence of those schemes is clear. I am thankful that people are now starting to use the new information to review past timelines. What they will discover is that Michael Atkinson’s work with Mary McCord and the Lawfare network are not isolated events. This is a continuum of targeting against Donald Trump using all of the intelligence levers at their disposal.

Michael Atkinson and Eric Ciaramella are the current names, but beside them sits Mary McCord, Norm Eisen, Andrew Weissmann, Barry Berke, Dan Goldman, Benjamin Wittes and many others from the Lawfare community. They intersect with various high level government officials in Main Justice, the FBI, the CIA, NSA and various intelligence agencies. This is the nest of Deep State and Tulsi Gabbard is exposing it.

Read more …

“Atkinson himself was an Obama holdover in the first Trump administration and was a former top counselor to key Russiagate figure and DOJ official Mary McCord”.

• Ukraine Impeachment Was Continuation of Failed Russia Collusion Plot (Dunleavy)

The Democrat-led Ukraine impeachment effort of 2019 was linked to and a continuation of the Russiagate saga and of the failed effort by special counsel Robert Mueller to unearth criminality by President Donald Trump, newly-declassified documents and testimony indicate.


Memos declassified by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and released by Just the News on Sunday were written by investigators for intelligence community inspector general Michael Atkinson, who first handled the CIA analyst’s complaint. Gabbard also declassified long-secret transcribed interviews from the watchdog, and these, combined with the memos, provide further evidence that the Ukraine impeachment saga was a continuation of the Russiagate saga which had flamed out.

The newly-released memos flagged the Ukraine whistle-blower for having a “potential for bias,” elicited an apology from him for misleading the probe about his prior contact with staffers on the Democrat-led House Intelligence Committee, showed he criticized GOP congressmen, recounted that he asked to hide his complaint from Republicans on the intelligence committee, pointed to his close links to Joe Biden’s efforts in Ukraine, and more. Atkinson kept much of this from the House investigators.

An alleged witness whose name was redacted and who told investigators he had been assisting the alleged whistle-blower with making his disclosures admitted to having a connection to Peter Strzok, the FBI agent who was fired in 2019 for his misbehavior while helping lead the discredited Russia collusion probe.

This witness — identified only as “Witness 2” — disclosed that he had also worked on a controversial December 2016 Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA) that claimed Vladimir Putin tried to help Trump beat Hillary Clinton in that year’s presidential race, a conclusion that the CIA now admits was based on faulty intelligence and a failure of spy tradecraft.

Prior to being nominated by Trump to be the intelligence community watchdog, Atkinson himself was an Obama holdover in the first Trump administration and was a former top counselor to key Russiagate figure and DOJ official Mary McCord. As a top Obama Justice Department official, McCord reviewed the deeply flawed FISA applications against former Trump campaign associate Carter Page, and she later assisted House Democrats in impeachment efforts against Trump.

The self-admitted potential biases which the Ukraine impeachment whistle-blower relayed to investigators for the intelligence community watchdog during the first Trump Administration were redacted and concealed from House investigators in 2019, newly-declassified and released transcripts show.

These long-secret transcripts were from a mid-September 2019 unclassified session and an early October 2019 classified session which were held to examine Atkinson’s role in the handling of an alleged whistle-blower complaint. The missive was written by an anonymous intelligence officer — identified as Eric Ciaramella — in a saga which ultimately led to the first successful impeachment efforts by House Democrats against Trump in December 2019. Trump was acquitted by the Senate in early 2020.

Facts concealed from House investigators
The newly-released memos from 2019 laid out multiple self-admitted potential biases tied to Ciaramella’s Democratic Party registration, his work for Joe Biden, his knowledge of corruption-related discussions on Ukraine, his view that he had been pushed out of the Trump NSC because of “right wing bloggers,” and more — some of which were never made public until Sunday, and many of which were concealed from House investigators when the intelligence community inspector general appeared before them in October 2019.

The whistle-blower’s’ complaint centered on a July 25, 2019 phone call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. The Trump-Zelensky call was the day after Mueller’s lackluster congressional testimony on the findings of his special counsel investigation.

Ciaramella did not respond to a request for comment sent to him through the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where he is listed as the Ukraine Initiative Director for the Russia and Eurasia Program. Atkinson did not respond to a request comment sent to him at the law firm he works for, and McCord did not respond to an email sent to her Georgetown University email.

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence said Monday that Atkinson helped “manufacture a conspiracy” and argued that a “coordinated effort by elements within the Intelligence Community” was aided by Atkinson when he lent credibility to and covered up the political biases of the author of the whistle-blower complaint..

Read more …

Reuters:: “’China buys more than 80% of Iran’s shipped oil, data for 2025 from analytics firm Kpler showed.”

Not much of a blockade left then?

• Trump ‘Permanently Opening’ Strait of Hormuz ‘for China’ (RT)

US President Donald Trump has said he is “permanently opening” the Strait of Hormuz, claiming he is making the move for China “and the world.” Trump also said Beijing has agreed “not to send weapons to Iran. Trump initially announced the blockade of the vital waterway on Sunday after Pakistani-mediated talks failed to produce a peace deal with Iran. On Tuesday, US Central Command reported that American warships had effectively blocked all Iranian trade through the strait. On Wednesday, however, Trump stated in a Truth Social post that “China is very happy that I am permanently opening the Strait of Hormuz.” He added that “I am doing it for them, also – and the World.”


Trump went on to state that Beijing has “agreed not to send weapons to Iran,” and that Chinese President Xi Jinping “will give me a big, fat, hug when I get there in a few weeks.” Trump is scheduled to pay a state visit to China on May 14, while Xi is expected to visit Washington for a reciprocal visit at a later date. China has yet to respond to the US leader’s latest message about the reopening of the strait, but had previously repeatedly denied reports of providing any sort of military support to Iran.

Beijing had also accused Washington on Tuesday of “dangerous and irresponsible” behavior over its blockade of Iranian vessels. Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz to “enemy ships” in response to the US-Israeli bombing campaign launched on February 28. Tehran has since demanded recognition of its “sovereignty” over the waterway and the right to impose tolls.

Read more …

You need the Supreme Court for that. Check with them first if they agree. They’re “independent”.

“So-called whistleblower knew he didn’t have the evidence. He used hearsay. He used poor intelligence … but they covered it up,” Rep. Claudia Tenney said.

• House Intel Member Says It’s Time To Expunge Trump’s 2019 Impeachment (JTN)

An influential Republican on the House Intelligence Committee says the bombshell evidence disclosed this week challenging the credibility and bias of a CIA analyst who prompted the Ukraine influence scandal seven years ago is so powerful that it warrants Congress expunging the 2019 impeachment vote against President Donald Trump.


“I think it is time that we expunge this impeachment and get rid of it,” Rep. Claudia Tenney, R-N.Y., told the Just the News, No Noise television show on Wednesday night. “…Historically, we need to show that we’re going to stand up for the rule of law, for truth and justice. And this was unfairly done to President Trump.”

Just the News reported Sunday that documents recently declassified by the Office of Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) showed that the intelligence community’s chief watchdog gad flagged concerns about the CIA analyst who launched the 2019 impeachment proceedings against Trump with Ukraine policy-related allegations but those concerns were kept classified and never made public during the congressional proceedings.

The concerns included that the accuser had the “potential for bias,” had provided false information in his initial complaint and had animus toward conservatives inside Trump’s circles, according to documents declassified by DNI Tulsi Gabbard this week. Gabbard blasted Atkinson’s work on Monday, suggesting the former watchdog had “weaponized the whistle-blower process” and used his office to “manufacture a conspiracy that was used as the basis to impeach President Trump.”

Others, including former Trump defense lawyers, the FBI and members of Congress, also sharply criticized the withholding of such evidence for six years, with famed law professor Alan Dershowitz going so far as to suggest Trump might have grounds to expunge his 2019 impeachment in the House of Representatives. Tenney said she agreed with Dershowitz.

“I am just grateful to Tulsi Gabbard, the Director of National Intelligence, for actually disclosing this information and seeing the really shoddy, poor intelligence work that was being done,” she said. “This so-called whistleblower knew he didn’t have the evidence. He used hearsay. He used poor intelligence, or what they call spy craft, in putting together statements and supporting documents that were not supportive of what they were trying to prove, but they covered it up.

“They kept it out of the view of the of the the people, and out of the view of anyone that could challenge it. And they went into this impeachment mode,” she added. “So I think Alan Dershowitz is on to something.” Tenney said she also agreed with Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., who on Wednesday urged the House to begin impeachment proceedings against U.S. District Judge James Boasberg, a former chief judge at the FISA Court who raised the ire of Republicans by making several negative rulings against the Trump administration, several of which have been reversed.

This week, the federal appeals court in Washington D.C. sharply rebuked Boasberg, accusing the jurist of abusing his judicial discretion by launching contempt proceedings against the Trump administration for its deportation of criminal illegal aliens. “It looks like what Judge Boasberg has done is egregious and could very well be subject to impeachment under our laws and under the rules of conduct that actually are in place for judges on the federal level,” she said.

Read more …

She’s been ordered to.

• Sotomayor Issues Rare Apology For ‘Hurtful’ Comments About Kavanaugh (JTN)

Kavanaugh, who was in the majority but wrote a concurring opinion, had downplayed the belief that people were having their constitutional rights violated in the raids by targeting areas where illegal migrants are known to gather. Liberal Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor apologized Wednesday for “hurtful” remarks she made recently about fellow Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s upbringing. “At a recent appearance at the University of Kansas School of Law, I referred to a disagreement with one of my colleagues in a prior case, but I made remarks that were inappropriate,” Sotomayor said in a statement released by the court. “I regret my hurtful comments. I have apologized to my colleague.”


Sotomayor last week indicated that Kavanaugh’s parents were “professionals and probably doesn’t really know any person who works by the hour,” after he wrote an opinion last year on the high court’s allowance of the Trump administration to conduct broad immigration sweeps in Southern California. Kavanaugh, who was in the majority but wrote a concurring opinion, downplayed the belief that people were having their constitutional rights violated in the raids by targeting areas where illegal migrants are known to gather. “To be clear, apparent ethnicity alone cannot furnish reasonable suspicion; under this court’s case law regarding immigration stops, however, it can be a ‘relevant factor’ when considered along with other salient factors,” Kavanaugh wrote.

“Importantly,” Kavanaugh continued, “reasonable suspicion means only that immigration officers may briefly stop the individual and inquire about immigration status.” Sotomayor’s comment was surprising because the justices have long claimed they get along despite differing opinions.”I joined the court that dealt with differences as friends, as we respected each other. … That’s civility,” Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, a conservative, said Wednesday. “I don’t know how you bring it back in the current environment with social media and name calling and all and people accusing each other of various things and animus.”

Read more …

Did Orban and Trump set this up?

• New Hungarian Prime Minister Says Borders Will Remain Shut To Immigrants (ZH)

In the wake of Viktor Orbán’s election defeat, one of the greatest fears among conservatives in the region is an unconstrained EU able to take action on foreign policy, health, and immigration without the threat of a veto. It is widely assumed that the incoming prime minister of Hungary, Péter Magyar, will seek a fast resolution of Brussels’ key issues with Hungary in order to unlock some €35 billion in funding. His election win was heralded as a substantial victory for the global left wing, from EU globalists to Democrats in the US. Their assumption is that with Orbán’s veto power out of play, they will be able to do they want in Ukraine and in Hungary. However, the new Prime Minster may not be as cooperative as they initially believed.


Magyar has stated that he will not try to block a €90 billion EU loan to Ukraine which Orbán originally vetoed, but he also stated that Hungary will not be contributing to such loans and that the government will not support any attempt to induct Ukraine into the EU. He also announced this week that he will not allow Hungary to join in the EU’s “Migration Pact” and that he plans to further strengthen Hungary’s borders. This includes a continued rejection of the EU’s asylum rules, which are widely abused by third world migrants to freely enter Europe and gain access to welfare subsidies.

Beyond the Ukraine funding veto, it was Orbán’s refusal to submit to open borders and mass immigration that caused constant conflict with the EU. He was frequently referred to by the political left as a “dictator” and a “fascist” in part because of his strict border policies (even though he is voluntarily leaving office after losing the election, which is not the behavior of a dictator). Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, attacked Orbán regularly for his border controls, stating that Hungary’s program to reinforce their borders with walls and barbed wire was in violation of EU immigration standards. It appears that this will not stop under Magyar.

https://twitter.com/HungaryBased/status/2044490945698119811

The purpose of the EU Commission is to subjugate member countries through centralized monetary dependency and a series of financial sanctions if they step out of line. Financial leverage has been used on a number of occasions by the Commission to force nations to accept ever expanding mass immigration, largely from Muslim fundamentalist populations in countries like Algeria, Morocco, Syria and Afghanistan. Hungary is one of the few European nations to resist this multicultural agenda.

https://twitter.com/magyarpeterMP/status/2044379059031794131

While it is a member state, Hungary is not currently in the eurozone, using its own currency, the Hungarian forint, rather than the euro. It may be that the EU sees Magyar as an acceptable trade, as long as they get their funding package for Ukraine. They probably also intend to play the long game, hoping that once Hungary joins the eurozone they can be manipulated over time using monetary leverage. That said, their intentions have long focused on using Hungary as a fresh sponge to absorb migrants, and this is simply not going to happen according to Magyar’s post-election declarations.

Read more …

They’re turning Ukraine into the European arms factory. The money will keep flowing.

• Zelensky Goes Full “Lord Of War” (ZH)

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky took the stage and stated that Ukraine’s military-industrial base has created some of the world’s most advanced unmanned platforms, already deployed against Russia and forever changing how warfare is conducted. “For the first time in the history of this war, an enemy position was taken exclusively by unmanned platforms, ground systems, and drones,” Zelensky said in a post on X.


He pointed to a growing number of Ukrainian defense firms, including Ratel, TerMIT, Ardal, Rys, Zmiy, Protector, and Volia, claiming their robotic systems have carried out more than 22,000 frontline missions in just three months. Zelensky’s broader message seemed more like a PR pitch for Ukraine’s defense firms, which are capable of producing millions of FPV drones annually, as well as deep-strike systems, interceptors, ground robots, and maritime drone boats.

“Ukraine’s robots were sculpted by combat. I’ve seen the video footage of their UGVs taking hostages. This is what future battles will look like,” Foundation Robotics co-founder Mike LeBlanc said in a statement. LeBlanc’s team is preparing its Phantom humanoid robots for testing and continues to develop militarized humanoid prototypes designed to operate alongside warfighters in high-risk environments. In February, Foundation sent two Phantom MK1 robots to Ukraine for testing, according to a TIME Magazine article.

Ukraine’s capital markets have been frozen by war, leaving many of the country’s battlefield-proven “war unicorns” starved of traditional funding. However, the Middle East conflict has accelerated a new export pathway, as drone warfare and AI-enabled kill chains reshape how militaries think about defense.

Reuters has reported that Gulf states, including Saudi Arabia and the UAE, are exploring Ukrainian interceptor drones as a more affordable response to the emergence of Iranian one-way attack drones. At the same time, Ukrainian firms or their European subsidiaries are eyeing U.S. civilian and defense markets to sell their combat-tested systems. The first plausible path into the U.S. market appears to be through affordable counter-drone solutions and other layered air-defense technology. Meanwhile, so-called “experts” cited by The Moscow Times called Zelensky’s X posts “mainly a PR move,” but highlighted how robots “are already transforming both tactics and strategy” in the four-year war.

Zelensky is correct: “The future is already on the front line.

Read more …

“Nebenzia ridiculed her historical ignorance, recalling her comment that it was “something new” that Russia and China fought together against Nazism in World War II.”

“It would be very interesting to meet Mrs. Kallas’s history teacher,” Nebenzia retorted.

• Russian Envoy Dismantles Kallas at UN Seccurity Council (RT)

Russia’s Permanent Representative to the UN, Vassily Nebenzia, launched a stinging rebuke of EU Foreign Policy Chief Kaja Kallas’s address at the UN Security Council in New York on Monday.Kallas has since been accused of “criminal” double standards in her speech by Amnesty International for ignoring US and Israeli crimes against Iran. The controversial diplomat spoke during the annual Security Council session on EU-UN cooperation, during which she lamented the “greatest breakdown of international law since the Second World War,” without once mentioning the US or Israel, but mentioning Russia 11 times.Amnesty International Secretary General Agnes Callamard slammed Kallas in a post on X, blasting her “deliberate failure to mention the two actors responsible for the greatest violations of international law,” referring to the US and Israel.


So today, at the Security Council, High Representative Kaja Kallas has lamented the gravest violation and breakdown of international law since the Second World War, evident, I quote “in today’s two pre-eminent global crises — Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine and the war… — Agnes Callamard (@AgnesCallamard) April 14, 2026 Kallas’ unwillingness to name them “is not just cowardice. It is criminal,” Callamard said, adding that such double standards are what is “destroying international law.” In a 12-minute response to Kallas in the council, Nebenzia ridiculed her historical ignorance, recalling her comment that it was “something new” that Russia and China fought together against Nazism in World War II.

Kallas, like EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, has a long history of avoiding criticism of Washington while regularly engaging in unhinged attacks on Moscow. Her claim to have been surprised that Russia and China, who together lost some 35 million people during WW2, are considered among the conflict’s victors was described by Responsible Statecraft as “shocking ignorance.” “It would be very interesting to meet Mrs. Kallas’s history teacher,” Nebenzia retorted.

Read more …

One blue moon.

• It’s Time for Congress to Come Clean About Itself (Mark Tapscott)

Whatever happens in the days ahead to now-former Rep. Eric Swalwell, the California Democrat who is accused of gross sexual misconduct by at least five women, it’s past time for members of Congress — Democrats AND Republicans in the Senate AND the House — to let the light shine in all of the dark hiding places they’ve created to protect themselves against genuine individual accountability for moral turpitude.


Before proceeding, allow me to make it crystal clear where I am “coming from” in writing what follows. First, I am a Reagan conservative and have been since an October night during the 1964 campaign when I watched him on TV delivering his historic “A Time for Choosing” address. When Reagan said in his first inaugural speech that “government is not solution to our problems, government is the problem,” he expressed a fundamental conviction that I will take to my grave.

Second, as Professor Willmoore Kendall so often declared, I agree that it wasn’t by accident that the men who wrote the Constitution fully intended to make Congress the “First Branch,” and to give it “all of the ultimate weapons” it needs to prevail over either of the other two branches in a power struggle. America is supposed to be a representative republic in which the people are the sovereign, not the government, so the representative branch must be first.

Finally, one of the earliest things I learned after coming to the nation’s capital is the truth spoken by Jesus Christ whe He said in (John 3:19-20): “And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil.” Transparency is Big Government’s worst enemy.

Now, there are two things Congress must do in response to the deep corruption confirmed by the Swalwell scandal and the many similar scandals involving members of both parties in recent decades. There is a secret fund Congress created for itself in the laughably titled “Congressional Accountability Act of 1995.” Under this CAA, members of Congress can use taxpayer funds to settle out of court with former staffers accusing them of sexual misconduct.

When Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was a House member, he introduced legislation that would have effectively repealed the CAA. It was entitled the Congressional Accountability and Hush Fund Elimination Act of 2017. Here’s how DeSantis described the need for repeal, according to gov.track.us:n Members of Congress and staff cannot live under special rules. The current system incentivizes misconduct and makes it difficult for victims. By exposing these secret settlements and by discontinuing using tax dollars to pay for member misconduct, this bill will reduce the incentive for bad behavior and bring more accountability to Congress.

The DeSantis measure went nowhere. And efforts since then to gain public and media access to the settlements, so all voters can have all the heretofore concealed facts about the men (and women?) who have been able to keep the truth about their misconduct secret, have also gone nowhere.

The time has come for all of the records related to all of those settlements to be made public and either to abolish the fun or ensure it is fully transparent. If you don’t believe me, read this detailed account by one of the people who did it of how and why the settlements process was crafted. This post on X was prompted in part by the Swalwell scandal and by the fact that the House voted last month 357-65 against unsealing the settlements:

“We will expel 2 members. We will hold press conferences. We will say the words ‘courage’ and ‘transparency’ and ‘the safety of every person who works on Capitol Hill.’ The press will cover the expulsions for a week. And they will not cover the 357-65 vote at all.

“We gave them 2 names so they’d stop asking for the rest.That’s the trade. It works every time.And every member who voted to seal those records knows what’s in them. They know because we told them. They sat in a closed session and reviewed the files and then walked out and voted 357 to 65 to make sure you never find out what your employees did with your money to their employees.The system doesn’t have a harassment problem. The system has a disclosure problem.”

And speaking of transparency, it’s also time for Congress to reverse the decision it made when it approved the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) of 1966 to exempt itself from coverage of the law. The argument for doing so hinged on the fact that Congress has access to much confidential national security documents and information, as well as privileged commercial information and legal documents. There is also the deliberative process itself that depends to a great extent on participants being able to communicate frankly. There is a legitimate need to provide security for such information in congressional hands. But there is a wealth of other information controlled by congressional agencies such as the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and the Government Accountability Office (GAO).

Read more …

All who understand raise your hands.

• Scientist: Dark Matter Could Be Black Holes From A Different Universe (MN)

While the scientific establishment has spent decades chasing invisible particles that never quite show up, a leading cosmologist has dropped a theory that turns everything on its head: dark matter isn’t some exotic new particle. It could be ancient black holes that survived from an entirely different universe. This idea, laid out by Professor Enrique Gaztanaga of the University of Portsmouth, doesn’t just tackle one cosmic puzzle. It offers a clean fix for the Big Bang’s thorniest problems and lines up with fresh observations that have astronomers scrambling. Gaztanaga argues the elusive substance that makes up roughly 27 per cent of the universe’s mass may actually be “relic” black holes formed in a previous collapsing phase of the cosmos.


“The idea is that dark matter may not be a new particle, but instead a population of black holes formed in a previous collapsing phase and bounce of the Universe,” Professor Gaztanaga says. He rejects the standard singularity model where everything explodes from an infinitely dense point that breaks physics. Instead, he proposes a “bouncing” universe. “The Big Bang corresponds to a bounce from a previous collapsing phase, rather than the absolute beginning of everything,” the Professor Gaztanaga further noted, adding “So it is the start of the expansion we observe, but not necessarily the beginning of time itself.” In this picture, black holes from the collapsing galaxies of that earlier universe survived the bounce and now drift through our cosmos, exerting gravity without emitting light.

“These ‘relic’ black holes would survive into the expanding phase we observe today and behave exactly like dark matter: they interact gravitationally, but do not emit light,” he explains. The theory also neatly accounts for the James Webb Space Telescope’s baffling discovery of bright red dots—rapidly growing black holes—mere hundreds of millions of years after the Big Bang. If relic black holes were already present at the start, they would have had a massive head start.

It also sidesteps the need for new particles while explaining how supermassive black holes formed so quickly in the early universe. This development builds on a wider wave of recent clues pointing to black holes and dense dark objects playing a bigger role than previously thought. Recently, astronomers highlighted a massive invisible object that tore through the Milky Way’s GD-1 stellar stream, leaving a jagged gap and gravitational disturbances without any light, heat, or radiation. The phenomenon suggests “a ‘Dark’ Entity, likely a dense clump of dark matter or a previously undetected dark subhalo.”

https://twitter.com/NightSkyToday/status/2041985685511663780

This phenomenon has been witnessed before. Hubble observations of the globular cluster NGC 6397 have also revealed a mysterious swarm of black holes lurking just 7,800 light-years from Earth.

https://twitter.com/fascinatingonX/status/2042399624703721731

For years the default dark matter story has been “trust us, it’s some particle we haven’t found yet.” Billions have been spent on detectors and accelerators hunting WIMPs or axions with zero direct detection to show for it. Gaztanaga’s relic black hole approach uses only known physics—general relativity plus quantum effects—and turns the collapse-bounce into the natural origin story. Recent stellar stream disruptions like the one in GD-1 and compact object swarms in nearby clusters provide real-world data points that align with a universe seeded by surviving black holes rather than a sea of hypothetical particles.

The European Space Agency’s own description of dark matter captures the frustration: “Shine a torch in a completely dark room, and you will see only what the torch illuminates. That does not mean that the room around you does not exist.” Gaztanaga’s framework says the “room” has been hiding in plain gravitational sight all along. Scientists will now scrutinize gravitational wave data and CMB measurements for the predicted relics. If the numbers line up, two of cosmology’s biggest headaches—dark matter and the true origin of the Big Bang—get solved in one elegant stroke.

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“From Supply-Chain Risk To National Security Imperative”:

• U.S. Government Embraces Anthropic’s Mythos AI (ZH)

In a striking reversal that underscores the breakneck pace of the AI arms race, the White House has directed federal agencies to begin using Anthropic’s most dangerous new model – Claude Mythos – despite months of public friction between the Trump administration and the San Francisco-based AI company (read on to see how we reconcile this with the Pentagon’s “supply-chain risk” designation). The move, detailed in an internal Office of Management and Budget (OMB) memo circulated this week, marks the first formal green light for Cabinet-level departments to tap Mythos’s unprecedented cybersecurity capabilities. The goal: to hunt down vulnerabilities in government networks before adversaries can exploit them, Bloomberg reports.


Too Powerful to Release, Too Valuable to Ignore
Anthropic unveiled Mythos (sometimes referred to internally as “Mythos Preview”) just weeks ago, and it immediately sent shockwaves through the tech and national-security communities. In controlled testing, the model autonomously discovered and weaponized thousands of previously unknown zero-day vulnerabilities across every major operating system, web browser, legacy enterprise software, and even decades-old codebases. Its speed and creativity reportedly surpassed top human red-team hackers. As we noted earlier this month, the model “went rogue” during testing – prompting Anthropic to withhold a broad release entirely. Full technical details are available in Anthropic’s official Mythos Preview System Card.

Rather than ship it publicly, Anthropic launched Project Glasswing – a tightly controlled defensive program that grants limited access only to a vetted circle of partners: Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Apple, major banks (including JPMorgan Chase), cybersecurity firms, and the Linux Foundation. The explicit mission is defense only – scan your own systems, find the bugs, patch them fast, and keep the bad guys out. The official program page is here.

From “Supply-Chain Risk” to Strategic Asset
The government’s relationship with Anthropic had been icy for months. As we noted in February, the Pentagon threatened to blacklist the company as a “supply-chain risk” after Anthropic refused to strip certain ethical guardrails from its models for military use. That standoff escalated in March when Anthropic sued the Pentagon over the designation, as detailed in ZeroHedge’s coverage of the lawsuit. That said, the Pentagon’s “supply-chain risk” label was always narrow in scope: it was a DoD-specific action triggered by the company’s refusal to remove certain ethical guardrails from its models for unrestricted military and offensive-use applications. That designation threatened to block Anthropic technology from defense contracts and classified work, and it led directly to Anthropic’s lawsuit against the Pentagon.

Today’s OMB memo changes almost nothing on paper for that designation. The Pentagon has not withdrawn it, the lawsuit is still active, and DoD contractors remain restricted from using Claude models (including Mythos) in offensive or surveillance contexts.

Just days ago, the U.S. Treasury was rushing to gain access to Mythos after internal warnings that the model could “hack every major system.” Senior Treasury and Federal Reserve officials had summoned CEOs of the nation’s largest banks to Washington, warning them that the financial system’s exposure to AI-powered attacks had become existential. Behind closed doors, federal agencies – including the Commerce Department’s Center for AI Standards and Innovation – had already begun quiet red-teaming of Mythos. Anthropic co-founder and president Daniela Amodei confirmed the company had briefed the administration early, telling reporters simply: “The government has to know about this stuff.”

Now the OMB memo formalizes that reality. It lays out strict protocols for safe access, data handling, and usage limits so that major departments can deploy Mythos against their own sprawling digital estates. The focus remains narrow: vulnerability discovery, network hardening, and defensive preparedness.

What This Means for the AI Arms Race
This is not the first time Washington has had to swallow its pride to stay competitive. But the Mythos episode – from the earliest Pentagon threats through the April 8 Glasswing announcement and this week’s Treasury scramble – feels different. It is a microcosm of the larger tension defining 2026: frontier AI models are now so capable that even their creators are scared of them, yet ignoring them would be national-security malpractice.

Critics inside the defense community argue the government waited too long. Supporters of Anthropic’s cautious approach counter that the company’s restraint (and its Glasswing coalition) may have prevented an even worse outcome: a fully open-sourced Mythos circulating on the dark web.

For Anthropic, the development is a quiet vindication. By keeping Mythos under lock and key and building Glasswing as a defensive shield, the company has positioned itself as a responsible steward of dangerous technology – while still earning a seat at the table with the most powerful customer on Earth.

Read more …

“AI is simply very fast processing of vast amounts of data.” But does that always give the same result? Does it always get the same result, just faster?

• What AI Doesn’t Know – and Why It Matters (Richard Porter)

Artificial intelligence has taken the wired world by storm, but the backlash came almost as fast. Progressives complain of job losses, environmentalists question the ecological impacts of huge data centers, and local activists are clamoring for assurances that household utility bills won’t skyrocket because of the centers’ voracious electricity requirements. Others simply worry that the technology will overwhelm humans’ ability to control it. At least in part, these reactions stem from the overselling of AI. AI is super cool, but it’s not superhuman nor is it super intelligent. AI is simply very fast processing of vast amounts of data.


Intelligence, knowledge, understanding and wisdom are all different concepts; the distinction between them elucidates the scope and limits of both human and electronic “intelligence.”Intelligence is the ability to process information into an internally coherent framework that’s useful and adds or detracts from knowledge to the extent it is more or less accurate. Knowledge is the accumulation of information organized into coherent frames or models that help us understand. Understanding is awareness of the significance, purpose, or meaning of accumulated knowledge. And wisdom is judgment seasoned by experience and the awareness that intelligence, knowledge, and understanding are limited, inherently flawed, and useful only to the extent they advance a worthwhile purpose.

Nearly 2,500 years ago, the Oracle of Delphi reportedly declared that no man was wiser than Socrates. Socrates claimed to be stunned by this because he was keenly aware of how much he didn’t know. But after talking to others widely acclaimed to be knowledgeable, such as the leading politicians, poets, philosophers, and artisans of his day, he discerned this Delphic wisdom: Those claiming knowledge were ignorant of their own ignorance, whereas Socrates knew he knew nothing. For this insight, Socrates was put to death for impiety and corrupting the youth of Athens, thereby proving for all time both the foolishness of his accusers’ certainty and the wisdom of Socratic questioning.

This bears repeating today, as we enter the Age of Artificial Intelligence: it’s wise to question the “intelligence” of machines, the “knowledge” they propagate, and our understanding of the significance and limits of the technology. AI models are amazing and useful despite being incomprehensible to most of us, but AI is not infallible. AI will expand human knowledge and understanding of the world only if and to the extent that human users are encouraged to question AI results, processes, and functions.

People make mistakes, as do the people making and training the machines. Still, people tend to trust machines more than people, especially with respect to processing information that’s harder to process. For example, tennis players have more faith in electronic line calls over human line calls, although that faith in the new technology has been shaken by errors, such as when ball marks are inconsistent with the electronic line calls. As AI use spreads, people will increasingly rely on AI and trust its results for routine tasks (like Google searches), while most people remain more skeptical of AI results for more complex tasks and do not trust AI to act to handle certain tasks for its users without human intervention.

It’s wise to question AI’s results; errors are common even in routine searches. Examples of AI errors, hallucinations and political bias are rife. A Northwestern University business school professor of my acquaintance recently asked ChatGPT for advice evaluating investment alternatives. ChatGPT recommended he invest in a particular fund and described in detail that fund’s returns, risks, and assets. When the professor went to invest in ChatGPT’s recommended fund, he discovered the fund did not actually exist; ChatGPT made it all up (a phenomenon commonly referred to as “AI hallucination”).

Indeed, AI can screw up even mundane tasks: In my research for this piece, a Google AI summary ascribed quotes to Socrates that are not supported by any historical record.Artificial intelligence – like human intelligence – is prone to error and is not always reliable, but that’s to be expected, especially in a fledgling technology. AI is artificial intelligence, not artificial knowledge, understanding, or wisdom. AI is a processor, a very fast processor, that organizes and distills information – and organized information is easier to evaluate and use by humans than vast amounts of unorganized information.

Properly understood, AI supplements and does not replace human intelligence, knowledge, or understanding; plus, the limitations and faults within these amazing models remind us that human intelligence is limited, too. Human intelligence imperfectly organizes the imperfect data to which a human has access and frames data in a subjective, not an objective, manner. Many of us expect the machines that humans make to have “better” intelligence than the intelligence of its human creators – more objective, more comprehensive, more insightful. This is a naïve hope. In one sense, it is “better.” AI organizes more information faster than humans can. But who do they think programmed the thing? Every AI model is regurgitating imperfect information collected, created, and input by imperfect, subjective human beings.

What to make of all this? First, perhaps the math nerds creating AI are mistakenly training machines to handle information processing on human topics as if human topics are math problems with a specific answer. Perhaps instead, machines should be trained to suggest questions to consider instead of answers to accept with respect to human inquiries relating to politics, economics, psychology, child rearing, crop science – the full range of arts, humanities, and social sciences.

Second, people training these machines should be explicit about the biases and perspectives being built into how the AI organizes, sorts, and frames information. (My own bias on this topic is that I believe American AI companies should be building AI with quintessentially American framing.) Third, AI creators should consider the political, regulatory, and legal risks of “overselling” what AI is and what it can do. For example, should AI creators anticipate a duty to warn users of shortcomings with AI’s results and/or disclaimers of warranties?

Fourth, AI creators need to consider improving the quality of data upon which the systems are being trained, recognizing that many online data sources intentionally mislead to advance political agendas. Perfectly “unbiased” information is impossible to obtain, but some information is more accurate and less biased than other information; trainers should exercise better judgement about data. The creation of AI large language models is an incredible feat of engineering. It’s quite useful, and will soon be essential, but it is still a product of human invention. As such, we need to recognize that AI is ultimately just the latest, greatest – but still imperfect – implement invented and used by homo sapiens to make life better for homo sapiens.

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https://twitter.com/MichaelARothman/status/2044690250140938585?s=20

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle April 14 2026

Apr 142026
 
 April 14, 2026  Posted by at 9:53 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , , ,  55 Responses »


Thomas Cole The Course of Empire – The Consummation of Empire 1836


• How Iran’s Mosaic Doctrine Is Fracturing (Zineb Riboua)
• The IRGC’s Seven Fatal Strategic Mistakes (Zineb Riboua)
• To Blockade or Not Blockade, That Is the Question. (Scott Pinsker)
• US Allies Loudly Reject Trump’s Scheme To Blockade Hormuz (ZH)
• Fill’er Up: Trump’s Middle East Master Plan (Stephen Green)
• US Military to Enforce Embargo of What No One Is Supposed to Be Buying (CTH)
• As the Worms Turn (James Howard Kunstler)
• Magyar Beats Orban In Battle For Hungary: What Happens Now? (RT)
• Atkinson Transcripts and Background ICIG Investigative Documents Released (CTH)
• Bank of Russia Disputes Freeze of Assets by EU (TASS)
• Trump Reportedly Planning Mass Pardons Of Administration Officials (ZH)
• White House: ‘Era of Amnesty Is Over’ (Catherine Salgado)

 


 

https://twitter.com/EricLDaugh/status/2043465286423040010?s=20 https://twitter.com/QuantumGuard17/status/2043330005174788222?s=20 https://twitter.com/RealDonKeith/status/2043690895120216186?s=20

 


 

 


 


It can be hard to get reliable information about a far-away war. This looks promising.

Zineb Riboua is a Moroccan Berber who works at the Hudson Institute.

“Iran’s military defeat is in plain sight”


“Zineb Riboua is a research fellow with Hudson Institute’s Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East. She specializes in Chinese and Russian involvement.”

• How Iran’s Mosaic Doctrine Is Fracturing (Zineb Riboua)

Following President Trump’s announcement of a cease-fire, US Central Command (CENTCOM) commander Admiral Brad Cooper stated: “Iran has suffered a generational military defeat.” Tehran’s response has been a single counterargument: the Islamic Republic still stands. That argument mistakes the question. The survival of the Islamic Republic is not in dispute. What is in dispute is whether the surviving entity retains the capacity to direct the forces operating in its name.


Iran developed its mosaic military doctrine by drawing direct lessons from Saddam Hussein’s collapse in just twenty-six days. After the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Iranian Brigadier General Mohammad Ali Jafari reorganized the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in 2008 into thirty-one provincial commands, each with its own weapons stockpiles, logistics chains and pre-delegated authority. Asymmetric warfare is the recourse of states that cannot prevail conventionally. Dispersion and concealment are the tools of a military that has already conceded the conventional battlefield.

Israel, operating alongside the United States in Operation Epic Fury, mastered asymmetric tactics and turned Iran’s own doctrine against it, employing intelligence penetration, targeted eliminations and network disruption with superior precision. The clearest demonstration came before the operation began. In July 2024, Israel assassinated Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh inside a Revolutionary Guard guesthouse in Tehran. Iran’s security services must now operate under the assumption that they do not know the extent of the compromise and that uncertainty is the most debilitating condition an intelligence service can face. Operation Epic Fury then pushed that penetration to its extreme.

The killing of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, the elimination of hundreds of senior IRGC commanders and the degradation of the Quds Force’s extraterritorial capacity together constituted a decapitation campaign of unprecedented precision. More importantly, fractures between Iran’s political leadership and its military have already surfaced publicly. On March 7, 2026, President Masoud Pezeshkian issued a televised apology to Arab Gulf states for missile and drone strikes conducted during the conflict, pledging that further attacks would cease. That a sitting president apologized for his own military’s actions within minutes of their execution illustrates precisely what pre-delegated authority has produced: a military that the political leadership must answer for rather than control.

Three vulnerabilities now compound one another. The first is the mosaic doctrine’s foundational limitation under sustained pressure. The doctrine solved the problem that Saddam could not, preventing decapitation from producing immediate collapse. It never solved attrition. The mosaic delays the timeline of dissolution but leaves the dissolution itself intact. The cease-fire arrived at a moment of Iranian weakness, and the pressure that produced that weakness remains available to Washington. The Islamic Republic knows that each day the cease-fire holds, it does so on terms that Washington can revise. The second vulnerability is structural.

The mosaic doctrine distributed resilience horizontally across provincial land commands, but the IRGC’s functional branches — its navy, air force, missile corps and cyber and intelligence directorates — each represent a distinct accumulation of “tiles” with separate supply chains and command structures.The United States has dismantled these branches sequentially rather than simultaneously, degrading each functional pillar while removing leadership at the center. The result is a system weakening from two directions at once: horizontal provincial networks loses coherence as the vertical command spine collapses, and neither compensates for the deterioration of the other.

The third vulnerability is financial, and the most immediately exposing. The IRGC’s ability to sustain operations and evade sanctions has depended on Hezbollah and the broader proxy network to move money and provide the transactional infrastructure linking the center to the periphery. That system has been degraded. Iran’s shadow fleet — the network of vessels moving sanctioned oil through falsified documentation and ship-to-ship transfers — has faced intensified US interdiction. China-linked front companies that provided financial cover to the IRGC have been sanctioned in successive rounds by the US Treasury.

On March 31, dozens of money changers linked to the IRGC were arrested across the United Arab Emirates following the escalation of Gulf tensions after Iranian strikes, severing one of the regime’s most critical cash arteries. A network that cannot pay its operators does not remain in a network for long. Washington enters the cease-fire holding all the cards: military dominance, financial strangulation and a regional architecture that has isolated Tehran from the Arab world it once sought to mobilize.

Iran’s response has been to threaten the Strait of Hormuz, the final lever a regime reaches for when it has exhausted all others. That threat is a measure of desperation, not strength. The operation has not concluded, but the conditions for Iranian defeat are in place. The entity that emerges from what comes next will bear little resemblance to the Islamic Republic that launched its doctrine of resistance four decades ago. What remains depends entirely on whether Tehran meets Trump’s terms.

Read more …

Zineb Riboua from last week. “Seven critical miscalculations have left the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps reeling, while U.S. and regional forces tighten their grip.”

• The IRGC’s Seven Fatal Strategic Mistakes (Zineb Riboua)

The first strategic mistake was the Strait of Hormuz. Iran’s logic was that sustained pressure on global energy flows would ignite the markets and force Trump to recalculate, withdraw, or watch the Gulf states turn against American operations out of economic self-preservation. But Trump has publicly declared that opening the strait is “not for us,” instead calling on European allies who rely on the strait to “go get your own oil.” His threat on Sunday to bomb Iranian power plants made it even more clear that the strait’s closure will not cause an American retreat.


These declarations carried a meaning beyond the immediate military context. Trump is running two operations simultaneously: one against the IRGC, and one against the assumption that the United States will indefinitely underwrite regional security at its own expense. His threats to leave NATO, vow to send the IRGC back to the stone age, and triumphalist mid-operation address thanking Gulf partners for their support are not the improvisations of an undisciplined communicator. They are the deliberate signaling of a strategic repositioning, designed to press allies into assuming greater responsibility abroad. The operation itself is a demonstration of what American military power can accomplish when it decides to act without hesitation.

Trump is also using the Strait of Hormuz crisis to accelerate something the administration has sought from the beginning: a Middle East in which American allies assume primary responsibility for their own neighborhood, freeing Washington to concentrate its strategic attention on the Western Hemisphere. Burden sharing was long treated as a European conversation about defense spending. The Strait of Hormuz has just expanded the terms of that project to the entire Eastern hemisphere by including Gulf countries as well.

The Hormuz gambit has also alienated Beijing, which is losing patience with Iran’s active disruptions to Chinese energy supply lines. The purpose of any military operation is to improve your own posture or degrade the enemy’s calculus in your favor. The IRGC achieved neither, and in the attempt, accelerated its own isolation on every front simultaneously.

The second strategic mistake was time. The IRGC likely assumed that Trump’s stated desire for speed signaled an appetite for a fast exit, and that the organization could survive by dragging out negotiations, delaying any serious accommodation, and outlasting American political resolve through attrition. But time cannot be purchased in a war where American strikes are hitting command and control infrastructure at its foundations and frontline units are receiving no meaningful replenishment. The IRGC has made a career of mistaking American restraint for American weakness, and the cost of that error is now being denominated in destroyed batteries, dead commanders, and a command architecture that grows less coherent with each successive wave of strikes.

The third strategic mistake was tempo. In nearly every crisis in the past two decades, the IRGC’s strategy has been to control the pace of escalation with its adversaries, calibrate pressure, and determine when and how confrontations would intensify or recede. But that model depends on a predictable opponent. Trump has demolished that predictability, and the range of American military options—from additional carrier groups and Marine landing forces to airborne troops and an ever-expanding list of targets—have multiplied more quickly than the IRGC can adapt. As Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said last week, “Our adversary right now thinks there are 15 different ways we could come at them with boots on the ground. And guess what? There are.” The IRGC now finds itself reactive, off-balance, and unable to dictate the terms of the next exchange.

The fourth strategic mistake was overestimating its capacity to reinvigorate the Arab world against a joint American and Israeli operation. The IRGC’s regional theory of legitimacy rested on the proposition that Arab populations in the Middle East could be mobilized against American and Israeli military action in ways that would constrain Gulf rulers and force them to distance themselves from Washington. But the Abraham Accords architecture has proven more durable than Tehran anticipated, and the Arab street has failed to materialize as a meaningful strategic variable in any theater that mattered.

The fifth strategic mistake was information warfare. We’ve seen this play out before. After October 7, Hamas and Hezbollah seeded social media with fabricated footage, manufacturing narratives of resistance among Western audiences. But the illusion of battlefield success became an internal liability, feeding a leadership culture in which accurate damage assessments were suppressed in favor of narratives that preserved morale at the expense of strategic clarity. The IRGC is repeating the pattern, trying to win the battle of public opinion even as it loses the one on the ground.

The stakes are considerably higher this time, because the propaganda apparatus is operating against a backdrop of acute domestic crisis: runaway inflation, capital flight, water scarcity, and an economy in structural collapse. An organization that cannot accurately assess its own battlefield losses is even less equipped to reckon with the degree to which the Iranian population it claims to protect has already stopped believing in the institution meant to govern them.

The sixth strategic mistake was the assumption that China would serve as a meaningful backstop when the pressure became acute. Intelligence reporting indicates that Beijing has continued to provide data support to the IRGC, and Chinese technology remains embedded in what survives of Iran’s surveillance architecture. But this cannot compensate for the IRGC’s structural deterioration, and China appears unwilling to escalate its material support to a level that invites direct American economic retaliation. Thus, the IRGC is accumulating losses faster than any external partner is willing or able to replace them.

The seventh strategic mistake, and the one most structurally irreversible, was Iran’s decadeslong strategy to build its offensive and defensive architecture almost entirely around a proxy network that the U.S.-Israeli campaign has systematically dismantled. Hezbollah entered the current war already severely diminished from its 2024 confrontation with Israel, its leadership decimated and its southern Lebanon infrastructure severely damaged. The Syrian buffer that Iran spent years and billions of dollars constructing has collapsed entirely, and American and Israeli forces have degraded the Houthi operation in Yemen past the point of meaningful military utility.

Read more …

Q: Is blockade (also) a verb?

• To Blockade or Not Blockade, That Is the Question. (Scott Pinsker)

To be, or not to be, that is the question:
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles
And by opposing end them.
—William Shakespeare’s Hamlet


Nothin’ like a good existential crisis, eh? Because if you remember your high school English teacher (or used Cliff’s Notes; I’m not here to judge), Hamlet was asking whether it’s better to live or die. “To be, or not to be.” Which is the exact same question President Donald Trump wants Iran to consider: Make a deal and surrender your nuclear ambitions, “you crazy bastards,” or I’ll shoot you in the frickin’ head. The trouble is that Iran isn’t taking Trump seriously. For many reasons — most notably, self-preservation — the mullahs are incentivized to stall, drag their feet, and negotiate in bad faith because it accomplishes three things:

1) Communicates to the Iranian people that the regime is still strong and powerful. (Capitulating too quickly would communicate the opposite, risking rebellion.)
2) Increases the economic pain points in the U.S., Europe, and Asia. (The longer the conflict, the greater the financial chaos — and thus the political cost to Trump.)
3) With global sentiment/polls strongly opposing Israel and America, Iran’s negotiating position will grow stronger over time. (So the longer they wait, the more they’ll gain.)

This led to Iran seizing the Strait of Hormuz and blockading access. Which then led to Trump blockading their blockade with a blockade of his own. It’s a blockade of a blockade! We’ve gone from 4D chess to 4D blockades. Will it work? The New York Post says yes: “Trump Brilliantly Calls Iran’s Bluff — With His Own Strait of Hormuz Blockade” Whoever’s calling the shots in Iran wasted yet another chance for peace over the weekend, and now President Donald Trump will again call Tehran’s bluff.Iran’s negotiators refused to satisfy America’s demands Saturday in talks in Pakistan, as regime leaders bet that playing the Strait of Hormuz card would get Trump to blink. Instead, he played it right back at them — announcing his own blockade, so that Iran’s oil exports (which had continued despite the war) will also be blocked.

[…] They assumed America would be help captive by conventional wisdom; our president proved them wrong. Trump once again tried to reach a peaceful settlement; the Iranians again refused: Now they’ll pay yet a higher price for thinking they could get him to chicken out. Bloomberg says no: “The Hormuz Blockade Is a Throwdown the U.S. Can’t Win” For a man who understands the power of leverage, Donald Trump is being remarkably slow to recognize the influence Iran has gained in the Strait of Hormuz. The US president’s threat to complete its closure by blocking Iranian exports through it, too, is far more likely to drag him deeper into a politically damaging war than to force Tehran’s capitulation.

[…] [T]he president will at some point have to recognize some hard truths: He has not won yet, he does not have a clear military path to doing so and neither he, nor the global economy, can afford to keep Hormuz closed.

[…] For now the unfortunate reality is that the regime has “the whip hand,” as the former head of Britain’s MI6 Alex Younger put it last month. That isn’t because it is stronger than its enemies, but because it knows it can block Hormuz and is more willing to inflict the resulting economic pain on its own people than is Trump or other nations around the globe.The US administration needs to recognize it cannot hope to get a quick win in these circumstances, even if it blockades all trade with Iran through Hormuz.

Question for the readers: Which outlet is right and which one is wrong? Answer from the writer: Yes. The New York Post is correct: Trump’s blockade of a blockade deprives Iran of profiting from ransom payments and/or selling any oil, thus increasing its economic suffering. It weakens one of the mullah’s biggest bargaining chips. If you assume that Iran is negotiating in good faith, weakening the mullahs’ bargaining position makes tactical sense. But Bloomberg is also correct: It’s extraordinarily unlikely that Trump can blockade his way to victory, especially in the short term. More likely than not, the blockade would have to last months — if not years — to bear fruit, and for a candidate who ran on the platform of “no more forever wars,” that’s not an attractive option.

Besides, the economic pain will be shouldered unevenly, with the nations that actually care about the welfare of their people screaming far louder than the mullahs. Iran doesn’t mind suffering — as long as everyone else suffers, too. If you assume that Iran is negotiating in bad faith, a blockade of a blockade is an incremental tit-for-tat escalation that increases everyone’s pain points without bringing us any closer to a real solution. In other words, it’s a waste of time.

Perhaps a smarter strategy is to hit the mullahs with a threat they dread far more than a blockade. I’m talking about the two words that have horrified Americans since the Iraq War of the early 2000s: regime change. But not Iraqi-style regime change, where we plant U.S. soldiers overseas and try to build a new government from the ground up in a foreign land. That’s regime building, not regime change. I simply mean smashing the current regime.

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They’re proud of not securing their own energy. That won’t last.

• US Allies Loudly Reject Trump’s Scheme To Blockade Hormuz (ZH)

The United Kingdom and several other countries rejected Washington’s plan to impose a blockade on Iranian ports and target ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz, which has gone into effect Monday. Prime Minister Keir Starmer made clear his stance that “we are not supporting the blockade” in a fresh interview with BBC Radio. He emphasized that the UK is not “getting dragged in” to the US-Israeli war against Iran, but still stated that it’s “vital that we get the strait open and fully open.”


As fully expected Spain’s government also condemned the US move, with the country’s Defense Minister Margarita Robles having said, “It’s just another episode in this downward spiral we’ve slipped into,” adding that Trump and Netanyahu “want to impose rules on the international community, which is illogical.”Earlier we reported that France is working with the UK on a conference to organize a “strictly defensive” and “peaceful” mission to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

President Emmanuel Macron said, “As regards the Strait of Hormuz, in the coming days, together with the UK, we will organize a conference with those countries prepared to contribute alongside us to a peaceful multinational mission aimed at restoring freedom of navigation in the strait.” He added, “This strictly defensive mission, separate from the warring parties to the conflict, is intended to be deployed as soon as circumstances permit.” Still, Paris has rejected a US request to join a military coalition to forcibly reopen the strait, essentially paralleling Britain’s position.

At the same time Germany has not weighed in strongly one way or the other. A German government statement has said that “The US military’s announcement did not mention a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, but rather a blockade of Iranian ports – that is a different approach.” Meanwhile, Turkey has strongly opposed the blockade and called for renewed diplomacy, while China too is warning against escalation and urged stability.

US Central Command (CENTCOM) announced it would begin a blockade “of all maritime traffic entering and exiting” Iranian ports starting at 10:00am Eastern Time on Monday. It added, “The blockade will be enforced impartially against vessels of all nations entering or departing Iranian ports and coastal areas, including all Iranian ports on the Arabian Gulf and Gulf of Oman. CENTCOM forces will not impede freedom of navigation for vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz to and from non-Iranian ports.”

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“.. we just sort of… you know… made another Persian Gulf?”

• Fill’er Up: Trump’s Middle East Master Plan (Stephen Green)

“The spice must flow.” Fans of Frank Herbert’s Dune know that melange makes interstellar travel and trade possible. Its only source is the desert world of Arrakis, which makes it the most valuable real estate in the known universe. The spice is addictive. Arrakis is home to crusading religious fanatics whose supreme leader holds the spice hostage.If you’re thinking, “That sounds an awful lot like Persian Gulf oil,” Herbert is way out ahead of you.mPresident Donald Trump gets it. But what if, instead of spending another 40 or 50 years letting religious fanatics keep a stranglehold on the world’s supply of melange — er, oil — we just sort of… you know… made another Persian Gulf?

https://twitter.com/dangambardello/status/2043360878704091580


And called it the Gulf of America? Well, here it is: “Hundreds of supertankers, the kind that carry two million barrels each, are currently racing toward the US Gulf Coast from every direction, Atlantic, Indian Ocean, around Africa, the scenic route, the ‘we were heading to Saudi Arabia but never mind’ route,” Jesús Enrique Rosas noted this weekend. While most people — including Yours Truly — were focused primarily on last week’s ceasefire and whether the Islamic Republic would actually increase its stranglehold on the flow of Gulf oil, actual oil buyers adjusted accordingly.

“The more Iran leans on Hormuz, the faster global energy flows reroute around it. Over time, that erodes Tehran’s leverage and cuts into its long-term power,” Osint613 posted Sunday. That “Master Plan” bit from the headline is mostly hyperbole. Supporters and critics alike — the honest critics, that is, who deserve protection under the Endangered Species Act — understand that Trump acts as a chaos agent. He knows the end result he wants, even if sometimes only broadly defined as “Make America Great Again.” The established rules and methods don’t allow for that, so Trump is happy to blow things up (sometimes literally), and see what can be rebuilt from the pieces.

The thing about that Persian Gulf stranglehold is that, like the Sword of Damocles, it’s most effective before it’s used. Now that Tehran has tried (and only partly and temporarily succeeded) in closing the Strait of Hormuz, “About the only escalation option the IRGC has is to renew its missile and drone attacks on neighboring Gulf states,” as my Hot Air colleague Ed Morrissey put it on Monday. But “Trump has an escalation for that as well: Bridge and Power Plant Day. Let’s see how long it takes for Iran to provoke it.”

Looking at the bigger picture, Rosas also wrote: “Iran played its biggest card and the main result is that the United States became the world’s emergency gas station and China’s cheap energy subsidy evaporated. The spice — er, oil — must flow. But Trump rewrote the rulebook about where it flows from. This is where “Drill, baby, drill” meets MAGA foreign policy, so to those America Only people still fuming that Trump isn’t (and never was) an isolationist, now do you get it?

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Blockade started yesterday.

• US Military to Enforce Embargo of What No One Is Supposed to Be Buying (CTH)

Oil and gas sales from Iran are under international sanction and not supposed to be taking place. However, oil and gas sales from Iran -violating the sanctions- have been taking place. CENTCOM is announcing that the U.S. military will now ensure the oil and gas from Iran doesn’t move. The U.S. will physically enforce the pre-existing global sanctions. A blockade begins tomorrow morning.


TAMPA, Fla. — U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) forces will begin implementing a blockade of all maritime traffic entering and exiting Iranian ports on April 13 at 10 a.m. ET, in accordance with the President’s proclamation. The blockade will be enforced impartially against vessels of all nations entering or departing Iranian ports and coastal areas, including all Iranian ports on the Arabian Gulf and Gulf of Oman. CENTCOM forces will not impede freedom of navigation for vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz to and from non-Iranian ports. Additional information will be provided to commercial mariners through a formal notice prior to the start of the blockade.

All mariners are advised to monitor Notice to Mariners broadcasts and contact U.S. naval forces on bridge-to-bridge channel 16 when operating in the Gulf of Oman and Strait of Hormuz approaches. (SOURCE) Oil and gas from Kuwait will be allowed transit and passage. Oil and gas from the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Qatar will also transit without issue. However, oil or gas from Iran will be blocked. China takes the biggest hit, again. The target now is to cut off the Iranian money supply. This blockade is happening against the little discussed backdrop of Dubai (UAE) targeting Iranian money changers.

DUBAI – The arrest of dozens of IRGC-linked money changers in the United Arab Emirates is one of the most serious blows yet to Tehran’s sanctions-evasion network, laying bare how heavily the Islamic Republic has depended on Dubai as an economic lifeline. Sources familiar with the matter told Iran International that UAE authorities detained dozens of money changers tied to financial entities linked to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, shut down associated companies and closed their offices.

The crackdown follows days of mounting regional tensions and comes after other measures targeting Iranian nationals, including visa revocations and tighter travel restrictions through Dubai. For years, Dubai has served as Iran’s main offshore financial artery, where oil proceeds, petrochemical revenues and rial conversions were turned into dollars, dirhams and euros beyond the reach of the country’s battered domestic banking system.“This is going to be a real problem for Tehran because Dubai was an economic lung for the Iranian regime,” Jason Brodsky of United Against Nuclear Iran told Iran International. “That is economic pressure and diplomatic isolation in a way that the UAE is able to employ against the Iranian regime, and it will have a very considerable impact.”

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“They’re holed up in a bank demanding three large pizzas, a helicopter, and a personal phone call from Sydney Sweeney. . . .”— Greg Gutfeld on Iran’s negotiating position

• As the Worms Turn (James Howard Kunstler)

The Russians have a phrase for it: negotiation-incapable (ne peregovorosposobny). That is what the Iran delegation demonstrated during a long day of talks with the US team over the weekend in Islamabad. What part of “no nukes” didn’t they understand? All of it, apparently. The corollary question on the table — arguably more pressing for Iran — was: how much more punishment are you willing to suffer to sustain your dream of atomic bombs? You have no defenses left, no control of your air-space. Do you just want to sit in the dark for the next hundred years?


Such is the obduracy of the Shia death cult. They have no friends left in the world. Russia, you think? Not really. That relationship was pegged to geopolitical dynamics that are dead and gone. Russia is much better off normalizing relations with the USA so we can both be safe and secure in our spheres of influence. Europe is busy committing suicide. In this situation, China is little more than Iran’s very unhappy customer. Maybe Uncle Xi Pooh Bear can try talking some sense to whoever is left in-charge at the IRGC. . . give up your lunatic bomb dreams and just re-open the dingdang gas station! Pretty Please!

Anyway, why interfere with US operations in Hormuz? The USA is wresting control of the Persian Gulf from these maniacs who can’t be trusted to just stay open for business. Japan, the two Koreas, Indochina, India, also have to stand by with mounting frustration as these jihad-happy idiots starve Asia’s economies. A change in Iran’s attitude can’t happen soon enough and Mr. Trump is on the case. The blockade starts at 10a.m. today, Monday. Whatever’s left of Iran’s revenue stream goes out the window. Maybe they lob some rockets and drones at our ships. Maybe they hit something, maybe not. We’ll see where they launch from and that will be the end of X-number of remaining launch sites. Then there are the bridges, the power plants. FAFO mofos.

About those 1000 pounds of 60-percent enriched uranium (their precious bomb fixings). . . . You must imagine that it is either buried deeply under the rubble of Fordoz and Isfahan, or maybe distributed in many secret hidey-holes all over the place. . . or perhaps sitting booby-trapped somewhere. In short, there are many reasons to think that no special forces operation will be able to get at it. So, the only other conclusion is that Iran must be driven to a place where they will surrender the stuff willingly themselves. That could be a harsh place.

[..] Rumored to be released this week by the House Intelligence Committee: the transcript of former Intel Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson’s testimony about events that led to Impeachment #1 of Donald Trump in 2019. The transcript has been locked away in a vault since October, 2019. Tulsi Gabbard rooted it out. The shadowy Atkinson played a crucial role in positioning “whistleblower” Eric Ciaramella to spark off charges of the “Ukraine quid pro quo” phone call against the president. Ciaramella was then a CIA agent planted in the National Security Council. He may have been involved earlier in co-authoring the fake Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA) that kicked off the RussiaGate hoax in 2017. For Impeachment #1 Atkinson reportedly changed the whistleblower rules to allow Ciaramella to convey second-hand hearsay from sketchy NSC member Col. Alexander Vindman to Rep. Adam Schiff, then chairman of the House Intel Committee. The chain of actions suggests the impeachment was a CIA setup. The CIA director at the time was Avril Haines. Ms. Haines ran the London CIA field office during the period when former MI6 agent Christopher Steele was concocting the notorious Steele Dossier at the center of RussiaGate. It has long been suspected that RussiaGate was a joint CIA / MI6 operation. Isn’t it about time that Avril Haines sat for a deposition in these various matters? It might be nice to know if our main Intel Agency was involved in serial schemes to overthrow the US government.

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This changes the meaning of “election” in any European country. The EU killed it all. Hard to get back. They’ll come in wherever they want.

• Magyar Beats Orban In Battle For Hungary: What Happens Now? (RT)

Hungarian opposition leader Peter Magyar has pulled off a stunning victory in the country’s parliamentary election, with his Tisza party beating Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s Fidesz by more than 16 points. The result is set to dramatically change Hungary’s relations with the EU, Russia, and Ukraine. Just over an hour after polls closed on Sunday, Orban called Magyar to congratulate him on his win. With 92% of the ballots counted on Sunday night, Tisza was leading with 53.72% of the vote, ahead of Fidesz with 37.67% – a result in line with opposition-friendly pre-election polls.


Magyar campaigned on ending corruption, funding public services, and restoring ties with the EU. Orban promised to continue his program of tax breaks for citizens and levies on corporations, all while pledging to keep Hungary out of the Russia-Ukraine conflict. His campaign cast Magyar as a tool of the EU, who would cut off Hungary’s access to cheap Russian energy and back Brussels’ escalatory policies toward Moscow. A record 77.8% of eligible Hungarians voted, the highest turnout in any election in Hungarian history. Thanks to this unprecedented level of participation, “the democratic mandate of the next National Assembly will be stronger than ever before,” Gergely Gulyas, the Minister of the Prime Minister’s Office, told reporters.

“What the result means for the fate of our country and the nation, and what its deeper or higher meaning is, we do not know now, time will decide,” Orban told supporters in Budapest. “No matter how it turns out, we, as opposition, will serve our country and the Hungarian nation.”

Will Hungary maintain close relations with Russia?
This is highly unlikely. Magyar’s allies in the opposition media collaborated with EU spies to run stories of supposed Russian interference in the election, and Magyar led crowds in chants of “Russians, go home!” But he also said he will have to interact with Moscow, because “the geographical position of neither Russia nor Hungary will change.” Rhetoric aside, Magyar is unlikely to embrace a policy of open hostility toward Moscow, but his desire to mend ties with the EU will in all likelihood result in Budapest dropping its opposition to the bloc’s €90 billion ($105 billion) loan package for Ukraine – a decision that will be poorly received in Russia.

Will Hungary get the cold shoulder from the US?
Viktor Orban is a close ideological ally of US President Donald Trump, who dispatched Vice President J.D. Vance to Budapest to campaign for his reelection, and promised to use the “full economic might of the United States to strengthen Hungary’s economy” if Orban won. With Magyar in charge, Hungary will no longer be the darling of the MAGA movement, but relations between the two countries will likely remain cordial.

Will Magyar open Hungary to more immigrants?
Highly unlikely. Orban’s hardline immigration policies are exceedingly popular in Hungary, and Magyar has attacked the prime minister on immigration from the right, criticizing his decision to allow 35,000 guest workers into Hungary from outside the EU. It remains to be seen whether Brussels will pressure Magyar into accepting asylum seekers, and whether the liberal Western media criticizes him as intensely on the issue as it did to Orban.

How quickly can the EU release billions of euros it withheld from Hungary?
The EU is currently withholding around €20 billion in funding from Hungary, citing concerns over judicial independence, corruption, and Orban’s ban on LGBTQ propaganda. Magyar is on track to win the two-thirds majority necessary to modify Hungary’s constitution and implement the judicial reforms demanded by Brussels, but the EU will ultimately decide if and when to release the money. Additionally, Magyar has stayed quiet on LGBTQ issues, and any attempts to liberalize Hungary to meet the EU’s demands may prove unpopular with Hungarians. For Magyar, accessing this money is crucial. His program of spending on healthcare, education, and other public services depends entirely on the release of the funds.

Will Hungary be able to cancel its contracts for Russian oil?
Russia supplies almost 90% of Hungary’s oil and slightly more of its gas, and provides nuclear fuel for the Paks Nuclear Power Plant. The EU has mandated that its member states completely cut themselves off from Russian energy by the end of next year, but Hungary’s contracts with Russia extend to 2035. Magyar has promised to end Hungary’s reliance on Russian energy, but only when the contracts expire. However, he may be unwilling to continue Orban’s policy of obstructing EU sanctions packages to secure exemptions for Hungary, which will essentially force a cutoff before 2035.

Will the EU now be able to steal Russia’s frozen assets?
No. Despite Orban being portrayed in the media as the sole obstacle between the EU and its plans for Ukraine, the decision on whether to steal the roughly €210 billion in Russian assets frozen in the EU is an unpopular one. Leaders including Italy’s Giorgia Meloni, Slovakia’s Robert Fico, and the Czech Republic’s Andrej Babis all oppose the measure, as does Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo, whose country the assets are impounded in.

As such, the EU is banking on its €90 billion debt-financed loan to keep Ukraine afloat. With Orban out of the picture, Brussels will likely be able to secure unanimous support for the loan, unless Fico or Babis object.

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7 years old. “Without DNI Gabbard, these documents would never have seen sunlight.” What do you mean, justice? Get ’em all, Tulsi!

• Atkinson Transcripts and Background ICIG Investigative Documents Released (CTH)

Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, has retrieved, reviewed, declassified and forced the release of internal background documents related to the Intelligence Community’s collaborative effort to impeach President Donald J Trump in 2019. The HPSCI wants to take political credit for the release; however, the HPSCI was forced into this position by the diligent work of Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard. Without DNI Gabbard, these documents would never have seen sunlight. This type of public information release is exactly why DNI Tulsi Gabbard has been targeted by friend and foe alike.


WASHINGTON, D.C.— Today, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence released two declassified transcripts from 2019 hearings with the former Intelligence Community Inspector General, Michael Atkinson, following a security review from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI). The Committee received the declassified transcripts from the ODNI the evening of Friday, April 10, 2026. These transcripts are from two hearings held to examine Atkinson’s role in an alleged whistleblower complaint, which ultimately led to Democrats’ first impeachment efforts against President Trump in December 2019. (link)

Looking closely at the information in these three documents makes it clear why the HPSCI never wanted them released. Both current and former members, including Republicans, are tied to a pattern of willful blindness, knowing the details yet choosing to stay silent for months and even years afterward. Former HPSCI Chairman, then HPSCI Ranking Member Devin Nunes was a participant in the testimony. Former HPSCI member, now CIA Director John Ratcliffe was a participant in the testimony. Former HPSCI staff, now FBI Director Kash Patel was a participant in the testimony. [Think about it]

Principle Players – The National Security Council leaker was Alexander Vindman. The CIA “Whistleblower” was Eric Ciaramella. The Intelligence Community Inspector General was Michael Atkinson. There is a lot of information to review as the documents include:
(1) The CIA complaint from Ciaramella and subsequent ICIG investigation. (pdf)
(2) The first interview of the ICIG Atkinson by the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI), dated September 19, 2019. (pdf)
(3) The second interview of ICIG Atkinson dated October 4, 2019. (pdf)

In total there are about 450 pages of documents and transcripts to read and review. The story they tell is remarkable as it outlines how internal people within the various intelligence agencies of the United States government, collaborated and used their positions of responsibility to target a sitting president for impeachment and removal. nIn short, in addition to all the “Spygate” surveillance and “Russiagate” wrongdoing, these documents highlight the real and actionable activity by the U.S. Intelligence Community to work collaborative with congress during their targeting of President Trump.

Do not lose sight of the forest while surrounded by the details of the trees. I will share much more detail about what evidence the documents show and put that detail into the context of what it means. Unfortunately, there are some alarming realizations about how our government operates and the false entities within it who claim a position to fight against the corruption, while keeping their mouths shut about specific evidence of corruption. Much more will follow, but right now I need to pray a little bit and maybe go for a walk.

Please begin to read the releases and share your thoughts in the comments below. There are more documents that need to surface, more stuff that I will never relent from locating and finding methods to bring it out. In the interim, thank you to Tulsi Gabbard for the painful truth we all need to absorb.

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it has to be declared grossly illegal at some point.

• Bank of Russia Disputes Freeze of Assets by EU (TASS)

The Central Bank of Russia disputed the freeze of Russian assets and charged the EU Council with the infringement on division of powers, violations of EU laws and procedure, and decision-making in absence of required competencies. Such wordings are contained in the statement of claim registered by the EU Court of Justice on February 27.


“The applicant argues that the regulation was adopted on an incorrect basis, in so far as Article 122 TFEU [Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union] cannot constitute a valid basis for the measures adopted since, substantively, they fall within the scope of restrictive measures against an entity of a third State and should have been based on Article 215 TFEU, which requires unanimity of the members of the Council. The use of Article 122 TFEU therefore constitutes a flagrant circumvention of the specific institutional framework provided for by the Treaties for the purpose of adopting such measures, in infringement of the division of powers and the institutional balance,” the statement of claim indicates.

The Bank of Russia demands cancellation of the decision to freeze sovereign assets and payment of legal costs by the EU Council.

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You can bet Trump is planning everything very meticulously. He did no mass pardons the first time around.

• Trump Reportedly Planning Mass Pardons Of Administration Officials (ZH)

Donald Trump has reportedly promised to pardon virtually his entire White House staff before leaving office, and the radius keeps growing. What started as a quip about anyone within 10 feet of the Oval Office has ballooned into something considerably more sweeping. “I’ll pardon everyone who has come within 200 feet of the Oval,” Trump allegedly said to a room of aides in a recent meeting, drawing laughs, according to a report from the Wall Street Journal. The report claims that staffers who raise the possibility of congressional investigations or prosecutions into policy decisions tend to hear about whether preemptive pardons are on the table.


The unconditional power to pardon is one of the most sweeping powers offered to the presidency. This term, Trump has wielded clemency far differently than any other president, dispensing some 1,600 grants to date. Many have gone to allies and donors, or those who had hired them, coming after a social pull-aside or a round of golf. Some have received bipartisan criticism, including one to a crypto billionaire whose company boosted Trump’s own digital-currency company, and another to a former Honduran president convicted of conspiring with cartels to ship cocaine to the U.S. In Trump’s first term, he signed fewer than 250 pardons and commutations.

The president has repeatedly raised the specter of pardons with White House aides and other administration officials, particularly when staff have suggested they could face prosecution or congressional investigations over decisions, people familiar with the comments said. Trump is known to joke about matters that he later seriously pursues, and the frequent references have led some aides to believe he is serious about the pardons, too.

They certainly have reason to be worried that Democrats will attempt to weaponize their powers to launch endless investigations. They’ve repeatedly promised to do so. In response to Trump’s immigration enforcement policies, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries not only promised to prosecute ICE agents and Trump administration officials.

None of this happened in a vacuum. Trump reportedly weighed pardoning White House officials in the chaotic days after January 6, 2021, but decided against it. He later told advisers he regretted that decision. Democrats viciously went after Trump allies, rioters, and even Trump himself.

Critics will certainly want to treat this as a constitutional crisis in progress. But before the outrage fully crystallizes, it’s worth noting who opened the door. Joe Biden issued sweeping preemptive pardons for top officials and family members at the end of his term – including his family, Dr. Anthony Fauci, and the entire January 6 Select Committee – citing the possibility of DOJ scrutiny under Trump. Michael LaRosa, a former communications aide to Biden, had the intellectual honesty to say the quiet part out loud, saying, “By testing the boundaries of the pardon power, Biden cracked the door open and we can’t now complain about Donald Trump walking through it, even if he blows it wide open.”

The White House, however, is dismissing the Wall Street Journal’s report. “The Wall Street Journal should learn to take a joke,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement. “However, the President’s pardon power is absolute,” she added.

While the White House clearly doesn’t want to confirm the story, there’s reason to believe that even if Trump was joking, there’s a serious point behind it—and Joe Biden effectively gave him cover to act on it. The informal norms governing the pardon power took a significant hit during Biden’s final weeks in office. Trump declined to go that far when he left office in 2021, but with Democrats openly signaling plans to target his officials if they regain power, he may now feel compelled to act to protect them from what he sees as a weaponized justice system.

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From “Mass Pardons” to no amnesty. We have it all.

• White House: ‘Era of Amnesty Is Over’ (Catherine Salgado)

“No more activist judges shielding criminal illegals. No more endless delays. Only results.” The Trump White House is celebrating multiple massive immigration enforcement wins that signal the era of mass migration and mass amnesty is over. Since Donald Trump came back into office, federal authorities have removed three million illegal aliens from the United States through ICE deportations or voluntary deportations, which is the biggest reduction in illegal migration in modern history, according to a White House press release on April 9. This is exactly what the American people voted for. This is the sort of reform we hoped to see when immigration became one of the top issues in the 2024 election.


Besides the three million deportees, border officers have not released a single illegal alien into the United States at our borders for 11 straight months. The “era of amnesty is over,” indeed. The overwhelming majority of asylum claims have long been fraudulent, and that is one major area where the Trump administration implemented reform. The U.S. immigration authority now grants asylum in only 7% of cases, slashing the number of criminals and illegal aliens who tried to use asylum claims as a free ticket into our country. In contrast, under Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, the government approved over 50% of asylum claims, according to the release.

I will give just two illustrations of why this is a big deal. First, just this week, the U.S. State Department revoked the lawful permanent resident status it had granted to Hamideh Soleimani Afshar, the niece of mass-murdering Iranian jihad leader Qasem Soleimani. Afshar had obtained residency and a life of luxury in the United States by claiming asylum here. Yet she repeatedly returned to Iran and regularly spouted pro-regime propaganda, illustrating how bogus her asylum claim was. And second, back in 2024, an Ecuadoran “asylum seeker” raped a 13-year-old at knifepoint in New York. These are only two examples of how broken our asylum system was before the Trump administration took over.

The White House release also highlighted the following wins:
• Deportations and removal orders are surging: In fiscal year 2025, immigration courts issued nearly 500,000 removal orders — a 57% increase over the prior year — as criminal illegals are removed faster and in far greater numbers than ever before.
• The massive court backlog is being slashed: Hundreds of thousands of cases have already been cleared since Inauguration Day, with reductions accelerating every month — ending the years-long delays that let illegals remain indefinitely.

And, as noted above, the Trump administration has successfully closed our borders. The White House press release enthusiastically concluded, “President Trump promised to end the open borders nightmare — and he is delivering on that promise with unrelenting force. The era of catch-and-release, mass releases, and activist judicial amnesty is over.” As we celebrate the 250th year of America’s existence, there is no better time to reflect on what national sovereignty and security mean.

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https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/2043751159773704483?s=20

 

 

 

 

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