Nordic Leaders United w/Merz vs. Russia! Russia! Russia!

A meeting in Turku, Finland, shows the utter depravity of Western leaders whose plan™ to avoid a crash is: up the ante vs. Moscow

And now this happened—unlike the Norwegian Kripos [National Criminal Investigation Service (Wikipedia), which considers ‘gangs from Sweden’ (meant is organised crimes with deep ties to the Islamists and other crazies in the Middle East), Nordic heads of gov’t just met with the new German muppet-in-chief and former Blackrock bankster Friedrich Merz.

As to the background of Norwegian Kripos and its 2025 threat assessment, the reader is referred to the piece from two days ago:

'Gangs from Sweden' are 'the Biggest Threat' to Norwegian Society

For today’s main course—which was, incidentally, graced with a both a legacy media blackout in Norway (see here results from state broadcaster NRK’s website) and, even though PM Støre went abroad on official gov’t business, apparently didn’t concern the official gov’t press people (there is talk about foreign minister Eide going to Israel and finance minister Stoltenberg trying out new ideas [sic] w/respect to taxes, both news items are dated 27 May 2025)—we must therefore turn to one of the chief purveyors of nonsensical BS and misinformation, Germany’s Der Spiegel (online). Relatedly, at the time of this writing on 28 May 2025), the most recent piece on the website of the Office of the Prime Minister (Statsministerens kontor) dates to 22 May 2025.

Hence, the below content comes to you in my translation, with emphases and [snark] added.

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Meeting with Chancellor Merz: Nordic States call Russia a ‘Long-Term Threat To Us and the Whole of Europe’

The warning is clear: the heads of government from Northern Europe see Vladimir Putin as a threat to the entire continent. The meeting also centred on Donald Trump’s desire for Greenland.

Via Spiegel Online, 27 May 2025 [source; archived]

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz was not the only person present at the meeting of the heads of government from Northern Europe. Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin were also omnipresent. The US President, because he repeatedly asserts claims to Greenland. And the Kremlin ruler [note the none-too-subtle distinction between the US president (orig. US-Präsident) vs. the Kremlin ruler (orig. Kremlherrscher)], in addition to the invasion of Ukraine, due of the activities of the Russian army near the Finnish border [more on this below; Spiegel doesn’t provide any more information].

The heads of government also clearly warned of the dangers posed by Russia. ‘The terrible attacks at the weekend prove what we unfortunately already know: that Russia is not interested in peace’, said Denmark’s Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen after a meeting with her counterparts in Finland. During the day, President Vladimir Putin talks about negotiations, but at night he bombs Ukraine [that sentence is editorialising by the Spiegel staffers; while I doubt that this sentiment isn’t shared by the heads of gov’ts assembled—well, where? Spiegel Online never mentions it—in Turku, Finland].

Ukraine must receive even more support [that’s similarly coming from Der Spiegel, but I’m confident this sentiment is shared by those present]. At the weekend, Russia launched its most serious attacks since the start of the war.

Finland’s Prime Minister Petteri Orpo said that Russia posed a ‘long-term threat to us and the whole of Europe’. Not only militarily, but also through cyber attacks and incidents in the Baltic Sea, where undersea cables have been damaged several times [although it is unclear who did that, why not throw it in there, too? Perhaps one wishes to add that waging war means massive CO2 emissions, too? But, wait, that would also apply to the ‘good cops’ from the West…].

Authorities in Finland are currently monitoring the development of military infrastructure on the eastern border by Russia [again, no evidence is cited]. Together with its [NATO] allies, Finland is ‘closely monitoring and evaluating Russia’s activities and intentions’, explained Defence Minister Antti Häkkänen recently.

The Finnish army and international media had previously reported on the events on the Russian side of the border [again, while accurate as far as these events are concerned, no evidence is provided]. Häkkänen emphasised that Finland has a ‘robust national defence’ based on compulsory military service and large reserve forces. ‘Our entire society has invested heavily in preparing for all kinds of disruptions and crises’, he added.

Merz Meets Five NATO Partners

The heads of government of Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Iceland met in south-west Finland. Chancellor Merz (CDU) joined them later and was due to attend a dinner with his colleagues. Finland would not normally be at the top of a new chancellor’s travel list [ah, it’s a destination of opportunity]. However, the Nordic summit offers him an opportunity to meet the heads of government of five NATO partners at the same time [what a prudent chancellor Mr. Merz is: that surely saves some money, which can be re-dedicated to bolstering defence spending].

Greenland’s Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen also took part in the meeting. US President Donald Trump had repeatedly expressed an interest in taking control of Greenland, which belongs to Denmark. Nielsen clearly dismissed these rumours.

‘You can be absolutely certain that we stand in solidarity with you and Denmark’, said Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre at a press conference on Monday, addressing the Greenlandic head of government, adding:

We will proclaim this message everywhere: whether in Washington, in Brussels, in Beijing, or wherever.

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Chancellor Merz in Turku

At this point, I thought it interesting to check with Finnish legacy media if there’s a bit ‘more’ on this summit. Surely, even if the Norwegian gov’t doesn’t wanna talk about it (yet), five heads of gov’t—including Europe’s big b(r)other Germany—that would make a splash there.

And I wasn’t disappointed.

Since I don’t read Finnish, here’s what the Helsinki Times (Wikipedia), which is the ‘first English-language daily online newspaper in Finland’. Some more lines of background about the paper’s orientation are in order:

Established in April 2007 by Iranian-born doctor, writer, journalist and director Alexis Kouros, who settled in Finland in 1990…Helsinki Times has had partnerships with The New York Times, The Washington Post, CNN, Reuters, Inter Press Service, People’s Daily, and other prominent international media outlets.

Translation: it’s about as mainstream (brainwashed) as they come.

Nowadays, Helsinki Times is a free online newspaper published by media company Dream Catcher. Notable guest columnists included Mikhail Gorbachev, Dilma Rousseff [and many others]…

The website has republished articles from the People’s Daily, the official newspaper of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. [here is endnote 8] In 2020, the Helsinki Times published an article from the People's Daily which included a conspiracy theory about the origins of COVID-19.[here is endnote 8, too] The Helsinki Times said the ‘barter-exchange’ arrangement with the People’s Daily was an attempt to balance western media coverage which it said was ‘at times extremely one-sided and biased’.

As an aside, that endnote 8 links to this piece by Erika Kinetz about Covid ‘conspiracy theories’ from the Associated Press, first published on 15 Feb. 2021: it is a wild trip back, almost like a ‘time warp’ (in short: Ms. Kinetz’ piece proposes that Sars-CoV-2 originated in China and a CCP conspiracy; to be fair to Ms. Kinetz, she is open that her piece was ‘conducted in collaboration with the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab’: talk about foxes and hen-houses, I suppose…).

Back to the Turku meeting, then, via coverage in the Helsinki Times:

‘I haven't had any illusions from the beginning that this would happen quickly,’ Merz said. ‘The Russians are not responding to invitations from the Vatican or other mediators. That shows Russia and Putin are not currently interested in a truce or ceasefire’…

In response to recent criticism from Moscow, Merz reiterated his support for Ukraine’s right to use Western-supplied weapons against military targets in Russia. The German chancellor referenced weapons sent by Britain, France, Germany, and the United States…

Prime Minister Orpo welcomed Germany’s stance, highlighting shared strategic priorities in Europe and the Baltic Sea region. He also praised Germany’s increased defence spending and commitment to supporting Ukraine.

‘We are united by a joint view of Europe’s future’, Orpo said. ‘We need leadership and a joint will so that we can strengthen European competitiveness and defence.’

The decision by Mr. Merz to go to Turku, Finland, was likely informed by revelations (sic) by Swedish state broadcaster SVT (Wikipedia) that was published on 10 May 2025 and told of what happened after Finland joined NATO:

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Base by base: Russia is Building-Up forces near Finland

Immediately after Sweden and Finland joined NATO, Russian representatives made a veiled threat of ‘military-technical response measures’.

Via SVT, 10 May 2025 (updated 12 May 2025) [source; archived]

But these measures were not forthcoming—instead, Russia has been busy with its war of invasion in Ukraine [so, Russia said they dislike Finland joining NATO and didn’t do a thing—at-first, but that was then, and this is now].

‘Increasing Activity’

Now, however, the first signs of some build-up have started to appear along the Finnish border. This is shown by previously unpublished satellite images obtained by SVT from Planet Labs PBC [Wikipedia; here’s there ‘Q4 2025 Fiscal Update’: 48% of its ‘revenue’ (their words) in 2025 are from ‘Defense & Intellligence’, another 29% from ‘Civil Government’, and the remainder (23%) is ‘Commercial’); here’s Planet Labs PBC’s SEC filings, and it’s perhaps of interest to mention that the key person—venture capitalist Timothy C. Draper (Wikipedia)—set up a massive chain of co-holders of this or that of his companies, incl. his partner John H.F. Fisher (Wikipedia), Andreas Stavrolpoulos (LinkedIn), and the like (via this amended ownership filing with the SEC); see Planet Lab PBC’s 2024 Annual Report with the SEC (from which the below quote was taken from p. 3):

Defense & Intelligence: Governments are strategically engaging with commercial space and remote sensing companies to leverage sharable, unclassified subscription products to complement more traditional defense and security industrial solutions.

So this is where SVT got the information from: a US defence & intelligence contractor, which ‘laundered’ their ‘unclassified subscription products’ via the Swedish state broadcaster, which now informs NATO policy. I though you should know that before reading on.]

- ‘These are signs of increasing activity,’ says Finnish military analyst Emil Kastehelmi, who has been following developments.

Storage for Armoured Vehicles

The images from isolated Russia show that some construction is now taking place in several places [that’s about as vague as can be]. In Petrozavodsk, 175 kilometres east of the Finnish border, the Russian army has built three warehouses that can each accommodate up to 50 armoured vehicles.

Another hall is under construction, according to the latest satellite image from 27 April 2025.

According to Emil Kastehelmi, one reason for the construction may be to hide the amount of vehicles stored here [here’s another reason, courtesy of my snark-infested mind: Petrozavodsk is at about the same latitude as my neck of the woods (61 or so degrees north); it’s often wet and cold, and perhaps these warehouses are there to simply park the vehicles and protect them from rain; personally, while I don’t doubt the existence of Russian military planning efforts to move through NATO territory (this was the Soviet plan all along), the Russians know that with satellites, it’s impossible to hide these transports…]

Other military bases being expanded include Kamenka, where the Russian army has set up a tent camp that can accommodate a couple of thousand soldiers [a tent camp? Remember, in winter it’s very cold—so, either this is a temporary installation or the Russians are coming this summer (which I personally doubt], and the formerly disused Severomorsk-2 air base, which the Russian army has begun to renovate [i.e., it’s not yet ready for action]. The pictures published by SVT show several helicopters parked—180 kilometres from the Finnish border, and 110 from the Norwegian [hardly a forward positioning for the time being].

At the same time, the Olenja airbase in the far north is in full swing. From here, strategic bombers are operating bombing flights against targets in Ukraine, according to Ukrainian reports [remember: the Ukrainians would never-ever lie to anyone about anything, right? Right!]

The Swedish Armed Forces’ Response

The Swedish Armed Forces say they are closely monitoring developments in the Russian neighbourhood [I’d be concerned if they didn’t…]. And already after the summer, personnel from the Swedish Armed Forces are expected to be placed in a new forward NATO headquarters in Finnish Lapland.

The Swedish Defence Minister sees the build-up on the other side of the Russian border as Russia completing what it had previously said it was planning:

When we applied for NATO membership, the Russians said that they would take military-technical measures in connection with this, and I see a direct connection here, that is what they are doing. They are increasing their military presence and thus their freedom of action in our neighbourhood [remember that the Swedish defence minister is talking about Russia doing things in Russia].

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Bottom Lines

We’re now able to piece together these issues, and my views are as follows:

• Nordic cooperation is so deeply entrenched that NATO accession (by Finland and Sweden) did not change these things—for ‘Western’ countries. Read this again: NATO accession by Finland and Sweden merely formalised a reality that was totally obvious to everybody with functioning brain-cells.

• Accession to NATO by Finland and Sweden did change the strategic outlook for Russia whose gov’t said they’d have to, and will, respond—and now they are doing something that’s both totally in line with established practices and was similarly expected by literally everybody.

• If he wasn’t a war-mongering, hare-brained bankster, Mr. Merz would have never bothered to travel to Turku to meet the heads of the Nordic gov’ts; now, with the prospects of war with Russia! Russia! Russia! increasing, however, it was worth his time.

The most troubling implications I see here, though, are two-fold, and I fear we must talk about them now:

On the one hand, there is a growing recognition, in so many words, that NATO accession, however irrelevant in practice it may have been, actually jeopardised the security of both Finland and Sweden in ways that were entirely foreseeable. In fact, it’s fair to say that joining NATO was a foreign policy blunder of gigantic proportions, although I’m equally convinced that—provided their neutrality would serve Moscow’s interests (at least for the time being)—if push came to shove, Finnish and Swedish neutrality would be worthless. That’s the fate of small countries in great-power competition since time immemorial (both Thucydides and Paul Kennedy talk about this, for instance), and while I personally find such prospects both unpalatable and disgusting, I can understand why great powers do what they do.

As regards the practical implications—I note a comparable anti-neutrality stance of the Austrian gov’t (see my long-ish piece here for background)—the EU has a mutual assistance clause since the adoption of the Treaty of Lisbon:

The Treaty of Lisbon strengthens the solidarity between European Union (EU) Member States in dealing with external threats by introducing a mutual defence clause (Article 42(7) of the Treaty on European Union). This clause provides that if a Member State is the victim of armed aggression on its territory, the other Member States have an obligation to aid and assist it by all the means in their power, in accordance with Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations [that would be the oft-abused right to self-defence].

This obligation of mutual defence is binding on all Member States. However, it does not affect the neutrality of certain Member States and is consistent with the commitments of countries that are NATO members.

We note, in passing, that Article 42 TEU also includes a section (3), which reads as follows:

Member States shall make civilian and military capabilities available to the Union for the implementation of the common security and defence policy, to contribute to the objectives defined by the Council.

And a section (5), which reads as follows:

The Council may entrust the execution of a task, within the Union framework, to a group of Member States in order to protect the Union’s values and serve its interests.

Basically, what Article 42 does is laying a dual set of trip-wires for the escalation of any conflict, for section (7) as a second paragraph, which reads as follows:

Commitments and cooperation in this area shall be consistent with commitments under the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, which, for those States which are members of it, remains the foundation of their collective defence and the forum for its implementation.

Note that, apart from Austria, only Ireland is an EU member-state but not a NATO member. Yet both Dublin and Vienna are bound by the EU Treaties to ‘cooperation…consistent with the commitments under NATO’.

If your answer is ‘what can go wrong?’, let’s talk about the second major implication here, which relates to the argumentation provided:

On the other hand, then, we observe the standard playbook of Western warmongering: Much like with the shameful and disgusting episodes concerning Iraq—remember the Kuwaiti ambassador’s daughter crying at the ‘false testimony’ (that’s a quote from this Wikipedia piece) in Congress in 1990 in which 15-year-old Nayirah al-Ṣabaḥ (‘the daughter of Kuwaiti ambassador Saud Nasser al-Saud al-Sabah’) alleged having

witnessed Iraqi soldiers taking premature babies out of incubators in a maternity ward before looting the incubators and leaving the babies to die on the floor. Nayirah's statements were widely publicized and cited numerous times in the United States Senate and by American president George H. W. Bush to contribute to the rationale for pursuing military action against Iraq.

Virtually the same playbook was used in 2003 by the US gov’t to justify the Iraq invasion (see Colin Powell’s UN speech on 5 Feb. 2003).

We may also note the fakery in regards to virtually all other such conflicts since at least the 1990s (of course, that applies also to post-WW2 conflicts), which begs the obvious question:

How TF is it possible that, knowing all the above, that the Swedish state broadcaster laundering ‘intelligence obtained from Planet Labs’—a known US gov’t defence contractor—and doesn’t raise a single doubt it its reporting™?

How TF is it possible that, knowing about these implications, the heads of the gov’ts of five Nordic countries plus Germany’s new chancellor and bankster Friedrich Merz, are gaslighting their audiences with this kind of BS?

It’s so transparent what’s going on: the Western intel services/deep state is apparently at their main purpose—manufacturing war—once more.

Hence, the question is: why war?

And here are my two cents: the Western Empire is bankrupt, economically-financially (as well as morally, but that’s irrelevant for foreign affairs), and we’re observing Keynes’ infamous dictum (‘in the long run, we’re all dead’) coming to fruition: with debt levels being unsustainably high and there being no means (let alone the will) of ever paying down these gargantuan mountains of debt, there’s literally but one solution™ left:

Impose rationing and centralised command and control over everything, whether done ‘because climate change™’ or ‘because Putin’, regiment Western societies to a degree unimaginable at this moment, and hope to stay in power.

That’s literally it. There’s probably layers upon layers of conspiracies (such as the one within NATO/EU circles about the prolongation of enmity vs. Russia! Russia! Russia!) and tons of think tankers fearing for their comfy incomes and plush jobs™ pushing papers and peddling nonsense, as well as those who work™ in the bloated permanent bureaucracies in NYC, London, Washington, Brussels, and elsewhere. It’s their livelihoods that is at stake, and these psychopaths are perfectly willing to sacrifice the likes of you and me to keep up the game a tad longer.

There’s nothing else. No grandiose vision, no altruistic ideas, no ideological convictions.

Seldom, if ever, historically speaking, have a self-select few proposed to kill the many for so little.

The criminality and perversion of these people knows neither bounds nor shame.

Hence, the one thing anyone can do: don’t comply.