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The Only Medical Specialty That Survives on Lies

By Peter C. Gøtzsche | Brownstone Institute | September 8, 2025

I am a specialist in internal medicine and have a keen interest in statistics and research methodology.1 My general approach to science has led to publications in many different areas because people came to me when they suspected something fishy in their specialty.1

In 2007, midwife Margrethe Nielsen from the Danish Consumer Council wanted to find out if history was repeating itself. I offered her a PhD student scholarship and we found out that the withdrawal symptoms are very similar for depression drugs and benzodiazepines, but they were described as dependence only for the latter.2

This started my interest in psychiatry and I quickly realised that a lot else was also misrepresented in this specialty. The lies psychiatrists convey to the public are so common and so harmful for their patients that I published my own textbook of psychiatry where I document what is wrong in the official textbooks used by medical students and psychiatrists in training.3 Much of what is claimed in the textbooks is scientifically dishonest, and frequently cited research is often totally unreliable because the data were tortured till they confessed.4

Psychiatry is the only specialty I know of that causes more harm than good; in fact, vastly more harm than good.5 This disaster can only survive because psychiatrists constantly lie to the public about what they can achieve with their drugs. Psychiatrists also routinely violate elementary human rights about informed consent and use forced treatment even though it is harmful.5,6

The title of my most recent psychiatry book summarises the issues: “Is psychiatry a crime against humanity?”5 As you shall see, I am not exaggerating.

In January 2014, I published the article, “Psychiatry gone astray,” in a major Danish newspaper, which also came out in English.7 I described ten myths in psychiatry that are harmful for the patients:

Myth 1: Your disease is caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain.

Myth 2: It’s no problem to stop treatment with antidepressants.

Myth 3: Psychotropic drugs for mental illness are like insulin for diabetes.

Myth 4: Psychotropic drugs reduce the number of chronically ill patients.

Myth 5: Happy pills do not cause suicide in children and adolescents.

Myth 6: Happy pills have no side effects.

Myth 7: Happy pills are not addictive.

Myth 8: The prevalence of depression has increased a lot.

Myth 9: The main problem is not overtreatment, but undertreatment.

Myth 10: Antipsychotics prevent brain damage.

I explained why “Our citizens would be far better off if we removed all the psychotropic drugs from the market, as doctors are unable to handle them. It is inescapable that their availability creates more harm than good. Psychiatrists should therefore do everything they can to treat as little as possible, in as short a time as possible, or not at all, with psychotropic drugs.”

I hit some sore toes. There was an outcry, spearheaded by the drug industry and their paid allies among doctors and the media, but also the biggest debate in Denmark ever about psychiatric drugs.1,6 For more than a month, there wasn’t a single day without discussion of these issues on radio, TV, in newspapers, and at psychiatric departments. But sadly, the harmful business continued as usual.

The Facts

Psychiatric drugs do not have any specific effects, directed against a specific disease.8 Psychiatric disorders are merely a constellation of symptoms and psychiatric drugs have mainly two effects: They either sedate and numb people, or they stimulate them.

Brain-active drugs have such effects, e.g., also alcohol, opioids, cannabis, other psychedelics, and cocaine, but we don’t call such drugs antidepressants or antipsychotics. And the effect of antidepressants and antipsychotics is far below the minimally relevant effect, as established by the psychiatrists themselves in their research.3,6 It is therefore reasonable to say that they don’t work.

The most important effects of psychiatric drugs are not what you hear about. Because of the colossal overuse of the drugs, they are the major reason that our prescription drugs are the leading cause of death, ahead of heart disease and cancer.9 One in five citizens is on an antidepressant, which can cause falls, and when elderly people break their hip, one-fifth will die within the next year.

Many of those who don’t die will fare badly anyhow. In all countries where the relationship has been examined, the rates of disability pensions go up in tandem with increased usage of psychiatric drugs.10

You don’t hear much about sexual disturbances either. The so-called happy pills harm the sex life in half the patients, and in half of those patients, the harm is unacceptable.11 In some patients, the harms are irreversible and continue after the patients come off their drugs, which has led to suicide.12

The Lies

Psychiatrists, particularly those in high positions, routinely lie to the public with the intent to protect their guild interests and their financial interests, which are huge. In the US, there are more psychiatrists collecting payments from the pharma industry than any other type of specialist.13

The American Psychiatric Association (AMA) is corrupt. Many of the psychiatrists who invented the most foolish diagnoses in its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) for psychiatric disorders, which expanded hugely the market for psychiatric drugs, were on industry payroll. But they are not open about it. The DSM-5-TR panel members received $14 million in undisclosed industry funding.14 To a European, this is an obscene level of corruption.

The worst lie is this one: Psychiatrists routinely tell their patients that they are ill because they have a chemical imbalance in the brain and that they will receive a drug that fixes this.

An associated lie is that withdrawal effects, when the patients try to come off their drugs, are trivial, and not withdrawal effects at all, but signs that their disease has relapsed and that they still need the drugs.15

In 2018, leaders in the UK Royal College of Psychiatrists wrote in the Times that, “in the vast majority of patients, any unpleasant symptoms experienced on discontinuing antidepressants have resolved within two weeks of stopping treatment.”5 A group of clinicians and academics, including me, wrote to the authors that their statement was incorrect and that the College’s own survey of over 800 patients had found that withdrawal symptoms were experienced by 63% of the patients and that a quarter reported anxiety lasting more than 12 weeks.

The College immediately removed its survey from its website and when they refused to correct the error, we made our complaint public, which was covered by the BBC. Later, psychiatrist Sir Simon Wessely, previous president of the College, rejected any link between the pills and suicide and stated categorically in a podcast that they are “not addictive.”

We then published a most damning letter in the BMJ.16 Since guidelines from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) stated that withdrawal symptoms were “usually mild and self-limiting over about 1 week,” we asked for the evidence. NICE provided two short review articles, neither of which supported the one-week claim, and both articles cited numerous sources that contradicted it!

The embarrassment was now so big that the College needed to change its stance and NICE updated its guidelines.

This is one of the very rare instances where protests about psychiatry’s lies have led to any change. But the organised denial just continued. In 2025, a highly flawed systematic review in JAMA Psychiatry claimed that antidepressant withdrawal is not a problem.17,18 As usual, the authors postulated that depression after discontinuation is indicative of depression relapse.

To spread a little candlelight in the psychiatric darkness, I invented the term abstinence depression, which is not a true depression.3,18 The fact is that about half of the patients experience withdrawal effects; in half of the cases they are severe; and when patients try to stop, they often become worse than they were before they started on the drug.19 Moreover, the longer one is on the drugs, the higher the risk of withdrawal.19,20

The lies about a chemical imbalance and that abstinence symptoms are signs of relapse keep patients on their drugs for many years. Why would they ever stop when it is so clear that they need the drugs? But we don’t argue this way in relation to abuse of alcohol or narcotics. The patients never had a chemical imbalance causing their problems; but the drugs created one21,22 and caused harm.

Another big selling point is that you only need to treat a couple of patients to benefit one of them. This is also a huge lie. Psychiatric drugs cannot cure anyone. And the illusion of huge benefits is obtained by statistical manipulation.23 The trick is to dichotomise disappointing outcome data on a ranking scale and talk about response rates instead.24

This statistical hocus-pocus can convert a non-existing benefit into an almost doubling of the response rate,24 which looks very impressive. But as psychiatrist Joanna Moncrieff wrote, it is spinning straw into gold transforming ineffectiveness into the much-trumpeted idea that antidepressants work.25

The number needed to treat to benefit one patient (NNT) doesn’t exist because more patients are harmed than those who benefit. There can therefore only be a number needed to harm (NNH), which is two for sexual harms caused by antidepressants.11

Harms and benefits are rarely measured on the same scale, but when patients in a placebo-controlled trial decide whether it is worthwhile to continue in the trial, they make a judgment about if the benefits they perceive exceed the harms. My research group found that 12% more patients dropped out on a depression pill than on placebo (P < 0.00001).26 Thus, the patients will benefit by NOT being treated with antidepressants. They prefer a placebo.

More Examples of Institutional Betrayal

The US National Institute for Mental Health (NIMH) is the most prestigious psychiatric institution in the world. In 2022, Thomas Insel, its director from 2002 to 2015, called “America’s psychiatrist,” published the book, “Healing: Our Path From Mental Illness to Mental Health.”

Insel takes on the role of a drug rep, selling the wonders of psychiatric drugs to the public, but his book is misleading and dishonest.5 It starts already with the title. Psychiatric drugs cannot heal mental disorders, and the path the psychiatrists have taken is not from mental illness to mental health, but from bad to worse. Clearly, Insel makes an unintended case for abolishing psychiatry even though he tries to support it.27

The book reflects the thinking of psychiatric leaders everywhere and encapsulates how psychiatry has consistently betrayed public trust and misinformed the public, and that it will never tell the public the truth about psychiatric drugs.

Being a former NIMH director, Insel had an ethical obligation to tell his readers about the negative long-term outcomes of treatment with psychiatric drugs, as documented in expensive and prestigious research funded by the NIMH, e.g. the STAR*D trial in depression – a $35 million fraud – the MTA trial in ADHD, and the CATIE trial in schizophrenia.5 He didn’t, even though the NIMH is the only institution in the world that funds the big, long-term drug trials. As psychiatric leaders always do, Insel sacrificed the patients and protected the psychiatric guild by keeping the long-term studies financed by his own institute hidden.

In January 2025, I notified the UK drug regulator, the Medicines & Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), that the package inserts for antidepressants — called patient information leaflets (PIL) — contain false statements about depression being caused by a chemical imbalance, and I called for the misleading messages to be removed.28

The MHRA refused and when I sent a letter about this to four major UK newspapers and the Royal College of Psychiatrists with Joanna Moncrieff and others, they didn’t even have the courtesy to respond.

To paraphrase Lenin, editors of leading medical journals also behave like useful idiots for psychiatry and the drug industry. On 10 May 2025, an anonymous editorial in the Lancet, “50 years of SSRIs: weighing benefits and harms,” did little of what its title promised. It praised the drugs based on flawed research and glossed over the harms. When I pointed out how misleading the editorial was in a letter to the editor, it was rejected.28

Many Cochrane reviews of psychiatric drugs also contain misleading praises of the drugs and are garbage in, garbage out exercises that uncritically reproduce the flawed data the drug industry has published.1,5,29-31

The Lie That Drugs Can Prevent Suicide

Despite their pompous designation, “State of the Art” articles in leading medical journals are usually misleading and they are particularly dishonest in relation to suicides.1 A 19-page review in the BMJ claimed that depression drugs, lithium, antiepileptics, clozapine, ketamine, and electroshock can decrease the risk of suicide.32 None of the 159 references were convincing;33 the package inserts for depression drugs warn against the risk of suicide; and the package inserts for antiepileptics state that they double the risk of suicide!

In a 14-page Lancet suicide seminar from 2022, the authors tried to resurrect the lie about the chemical imbalance but the two articles they cited were gobbledygook.34,35 Among risk factors for suicide, they mentioned substance use but not depression pills, antiepileptics, or the psychiatric profession itself.35,36 A Danish register study of 2,429 suicides showed a very marked dose-response relationship:36 The closer the contact with psychiatric staff, the greater the risk of suicide.

Compared to people who had not received any psychiatric treatment in the preceding year, the adjusted rate ratio for suicide was 44 for people who had been admitted to a psychiatric hospital.36 Such patients would of course be expected to be at greatest risk of suicide because they were more ill than the others (confounding by indication), but the findings were robust and most of the potential biases in the study were actually conservative, i.e. favoured the null hypothesis of there being no relationship. An accompanying editorial noted that there is little doubt that suicide is related to both stigma and trauma and that it is entirely plausible that the stigma and trauma inherent in psychiatric treatment—particularly if involuntary— might cause suicide.37

The Lancet authors wrote that there is a possibility of exacerbating suicidal thoughts. Wrong. It is not a possibility; it is a fact. None of the 142 references were to any of the many meta-analyses showing that depression pills increase the suicide risk compared to placebo. The authors even claimed, with no references, that drug treatment can reduce the suicide risk. Which miraculous drugs can do this?

They also noted that some research has found an association with increased risk of suicide-related outcomes in young people. This is also dishonest. When the FDA looked at all the randomised trials, they found a causal relation and not just an association.

In 2023, the “experts” failed us badly again. A 16-page article in BMJ about suicide in young people, with 169 references, mentioned some risk factors, e.g. living in a home with firearms, but not depression drugs, which they recommended with “increased monitoring by the prescribing physician.”38 This is a fake fix, as people may kill themselves suddenly and unexpectedly.39

The authors considered a risk difference of 0.7% for suicidal ideation or suicide attempt between drug and placebo small and even dismissed it: “Data from more recent pediatric antidepressant trials have not shown differences between drug and placebo.” The review they quoted cannot be used to such effect and for rare events, it is unacceptable to lose statistical power by including only “recent” trials. Moreover, the review only included published trial reports, which we know have omitted many suicide attempts and suicides, even in children.6,39 It is irresponsible of the BMJ to publish such dangerous nonsense.

In 2023, I called for retraction of three fraudulent trial reports that had omitted suicidal events in children.40 Even though my letter was co-signed by 10 people who each lost a child or spouse to suicide as a direct consequence of being prescribed an antidepressant drug for a non-psychiatric condition, my request was turned down by both involved journals.41

Annette Flanagin, Executive Managing Editor, Vice President, Editorial Operations JAMA and JAMA Network, replied: “We shared your letter with the author of the study published in Archives of General Psychiatry and he does not identify any new concerns. Similarly, we do not find new evidence in support of your request to retract this article.”

So, JAMA and Graham Emslie, who omitted two suicide attempts on fluoxetine, do not think this is something to bother about. When I contacted the journal’s owner, Elsevier, they did not engage with our concerns but directed me back to the journal.

Douglas K. Novins, Editor-in-Chief, Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry (JCAAP), wrote to me that, “Following guidelines developed by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE),” they had thoroughly reviewed my “critique, as well as the responses provided by the papers’ authors. We are satisfied that the critiques of the papers as outlined do not merit retraction.”

It is hard to see how Novins could have followed the COPE guidelines, as the two trial reports, by Emslie and Martin Keller, are clearly fraudulent.

In 2023, I did a Google search on suicide and antidepressants, which confirmed that the public is being massively and systematically misinformed.42,43 One of the top 10 posts was from the Danish Centre for Suicide Research that reported that depression drugs increase the risk of repeated suicide attempts by 50%.44 The research was supported by Lundbeck, and after the researchers had adjusted their analyses for many factors including psychiatric contact and use of various psychiatric drugs, they concluded that the pills do not increase the risk of suicide. It is plain wrong to adjust for something that is part of the causal chain, as it may remove a true association, but the authors surely pleased their funder.

Another post was a comment I made on the Danish Board of Health’s website.45 Poul Videbech, a national icon in depression, had claimed in the Board’s journal, Rational Pharmacotherapy, that undertreatment with depression drugs is dangerous because of the suicide risk. This cannot be correct because the drugs increase the risk of suicide.

When I searched the Internet to find out what the “experts” opine currently, I found a systematic review in the psychiatrists’ flagship journal, American Journal of Psychiatry.46 It was about “evidence-based strategies,” but already the abstract was blatantly false. It claimed that “Meta-analyses find that antidepressants prevent suicide attempts.”

I don’t know of any other medical specialty whose practitioners lie systematically to the public in matters of life and death and claim the opposite of what is true.

In June 2025, I gave a talk in Capitol about suicides caused by antidepressants, invited by US war veterans who are routinely given these drugs for their war traumas.47 As expected, the effect of the veterans’ suicide prevention programme has been a notable increase in suicides corresponding to a similar increase in antidepressant usage.48,49

In the surreal upside-down world of psychiatry, all suicide prevention initiatives I have come across have included drugs that increase suicides!50

There was a press conference outside the Capitol,47 but the media are not keen to write stories about antidepressants killing people. I only saw an article in the Wall Street Journal, which I tweeted about:

Combat cocktails: US war veterans are destroyed and kill themselves because of psychiatric polypharmacy. Wall Street Journal https://bit.ly/4fjkz5P.

Antidepressants Harm the Unborn Child

New winds are blowing in the US, which could profoundly change healthcare for the better.51 On 21 July 2025, the FDA held a two-hour seminar about the possible harms to the foetus of treating pregnant women with antidepressants.52 For the first time, this crucial issue was honestly debated at the FDA, by good scientists, but this could not be tolerated by the professional liars.

There was a howl of outrage from psychiatric organisations and mainstream media that accused the FDA’s panel of being alarmingly unbalanced and of spreading misinformation,53-55 which was not at all the case.

The American Psychiatric Association (AMA) wrote to the FDA four days after the meeting that it was “alarmed and concerned by the misinterpretations and unbalanced viewpoints shared by several of the panelists… This propagation of biased interpretations at a time when suicide is a leading cause of maternal death within the first postpartum year could seriously hinder maternal mental health care. The inaccurate interpretation of data, and the use of opinion, rather than the years of research on antidepressant medications, will exacerbate stigma and deter pregnant individuals from seeking necessary care.”

The AMA could hardly have been more dishonest. Antidepressants double not only the risk of suicide but even actual suicides.49,56

Without mentioning the pregnancy issue, the AMA circled the wagons again, in a tweet on 28 August:57

“IMPORTANT: Decades of rigorous research, randomized clinical trials, peer-reviewed studies, meta-analyses, national registry studies, and FDA oversight show that psychiatric medications are safe and effective. Medications like SSRIs can be lifesaving if they are taken as directed under the care of an appropriately licensed healthcare professional. Learn more: https://ow.ly/RWEQ50WNJeI.“

In just two sentences, the AMA propagated three lies. No psychiatric drug is safe. They all kill people, to a substantial degree.1,3,5,6,9 And it has never been documented that SSRIs can be life-saving while it has been documented that they take many lives. They cause suicides and homicides6 and lead to falls in the elderly,9 and when they break their hip, one-fifth will die within the next year. Psychiatric medications are not effective either, e.g. the effect of antidepressants and antipsychotics is far below the minimally relevant effect, as established by the psychiatrists themselves in their research.5,6

Not even when there is clear evidence, both from studies in animals and humans,52-55 that our children are being harmed by psychiatric drugs before they are even born, do we see any admission from the AMA that it is wrong to treat pregnant women with antidepressants. They prefer to continue lying.

Antidepressants should be banned for use in pregnant women. Psychotherapy is more effective, as it has enduring effects,5,6 and it won’t harm the unborn child.

Reactions to AMA’s Tweet

Increasingly, the public is waking up to psychiatry’s deceptions. People are not so dumb as the AMA thinks they are, which the retweets to AMA’s tweet57 demonstrate:

“The FDA issues a black box warning for all SSRI’s indicating increased risk of suicidal thoughts and behaviors, particularly in children, adolescents, and adults under 25. How could the American Psychiatric Association make such a claim? (sic) Isn’t doing so extremely unethical?!”

“The APA is lying to you. SSRIs are neither safe nor effective. NOT EVEN CLOSE. And they do not magically perform better under the care of a licensed professional. Them’s the facts.”

“Anytime I hear experts so-called say something is safe and effective. I immediately know that that is not the case. Thank you for confirming my suspicion.”

“Merriam-Webster defines ‘safe’ as ‘free from danger, harm, or risk.’ All classes of psych meds include black box warnings about serious or life-threatening adverse effects risks.”

“How safe is sudden death? Some of those meds can cause that.”

“Life-taking. My adult son didn’t make it past 6 weeks after his #PillPusher prescribed SSRIs within 15min of meeting him.”

“What percentage of patients who take SSRIs are cured and can stop taking them?”

“I don’t know a single person who has been cured by psychiatric drugs.”

“The good ‘ol APA, brought to you by Pfizer. Maybe they will make a med for cognitive dissonance soon?”

“Psychiatry is quackery. Read the book Anatomy of an Epidemic by Robert Whitaker!”

“Psychiatry is one of the dumbest religions.”

A retweeter showed this picture of Mr. Bean, which sort of explains it all:

Conclusions

Psychiatry is a totally corrupt specialty, ethically, scientifically, and financially, with devastating consequences for the patients, their relatives and friends, and for our national economies.

Psychiatry is a crime against humanity that must be stopped.5 It should not be a medical specialty, and patients with mental health issues should not be treated by medically trained doctors because the existing approaches, which focus on drugs, are not working.

In the UK, mental health disability has almost tripled in recent decades, and the gap in life expectancy between people with severe mental health issues and the general population has doubled.58 The World Health Organisation (WHO) and the United Nations have therefore recently called for systematic mental health reform emphasising psychosocial interventions.58

My advice to patients is: If you have a mental health issue, don’t see a psychiatrist. It is too dangerous and might turn out to be the biggest error you made in your entire life.12,59 Don’t look up a family doctor either, as they are also programmed to make psychiatric diagnoses and hand out psychiatric pills.

References

1 Gøtzsche PC. Whistleblower in healthcare (autobiography). Copenhagen: Institute for Scientific Freedom 2025; April 8 (freely available).

2 Nielsen M, Hansen EH, Gøtzsche PC. What is the difference between dependence and withdrawal reactions? A comparison of benzodiazepines and selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors. Addiction 2012;107:900–8.

3 Gøtzsche PC. Critical Psychiatry Textbook: a new psychiatry is needed. Copenhagen: Institute for Scientific Freedom 2023; May 17.

4 Mills JL. Data torturing. N Engl J Med 1993;329:1196-9.

5 Gøtzsche PC. Is psychiatry a crime against humanity? Copenhagen: Institute for Scientific Freedom; 2024 (freely available).

6 Gøtzsche PC. Deadly pPsychiatry and Organised Denial. Copenhagen: People’s Press; 2015.

7 Gøtzsche PC. Psychiatry gone astray. Mad in America 2014; Jan 28.

8 Moncrieff J. The Myth of the Chemical Cure: A Critique of Psychiatric Drug Treatment. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan; 2007.

9 Gøtzsche PC. Prescription Drugs Are the Leading Cause of Death. Brownstone Journal 2024; April 16.

10 Whitaker R. Anatomy of an Epidemic, 2nd edition. New York: Broadway Paperbacks; 2015.

11 Montejo A, Llorca G, Izquierdo J, et al. Incidence of sexual dysfunction associated with antidepressant agents: a prospective multicenter study of 1022 outpatients. Spanish Working Group for the study of psychotropic-related sexual dysfunction. J Clin Psychiatry 2001;62 (suppl 3):10–21.

12 Gøtzsche PC. Mental Health Survival Kit and Withdrawal from Psychiatric Drugs. Ann Arbor: L H Press; 2022.

13 Staton T. Psychiatrists dominate doc-payment database. Fierce Pharma 2010; Oct 25.

14 Burton KW. DSM-5-TR Panel Members Received $14M in Undisclosed Industry Funding. Medscape 2024; Jan 10.

15 Gøtzsche PC, Demasi M. Interventions to help patients withdraw from depression drugs: A systematic review. Int J Risk Saf Med 2024;35:103-16.

16 Davies J, Read J, Hengartner MP, et al. Clinical guidelines on antidepressant withdrawal urgently need updating. BMJ 2019;365:l2238.

17 Kalfas M, Tsapekos D, Butler M, et al. Incidence and nature of antidepressant discontinuation symptoms: a systematic review and meta-analysis. JAMA Psychiatry 2025;Jul 9:e251362.

18 Gøtzsche PC. Exposing the Lie That Antidepressant Withdrawal Symptoms are Mild and Short-Lived. Brownstone Journal 2025; July 25.

19 Davies J, Read J. A systematic review into the incidence, severity and duration of antidepressant withdrawal effects: Are guidelines evidence-based? Addict Behav 2019;97:111-21.

20 Horowitz MA, Buckman JEJ, Saunders R, et al. Antidepressants withdrawal effects and duration of use: a survey of patients enrolled in primary care psychotherapy services. Psychiatry Res 2025;350:116497.

21 Moncrieff J, Cohen D. Do antidepressants cure or create abnormal brain states? PLoS Med 2006;3:e240.

22 Moncrieff J, Cooper RE, Stockmann T, et al. The serotonin theory of depression: a systematic umbrella review of the evidence. Mol Psychiatry 2023;28:3243-56.

23 Gøtzsche PC. Number needed to treat with a psychiatric drug to benefit one patient is an illusion. Mad in America 2022; Dec 13.

24 Gøtzsche PC. Response Rates in Psychiatric Drug trials are Statistical Nonsense. Brownstone Journal 2025; July 11.

25 Moncrieff J. Chemically Imbalanced: The Making and Unmaking of the Serotonin Myth. Padstow: Flint; 2025.

26 Sharma T, Guski LS, Freund N, et al. Drop-out rates in placebo-controlled trials of antidepressant drugs: A systematic review and meta-analysis based on clinical study reports. Int J Risk Saf Med 2019;30:217-32.

27 Whitaker R. Thomas Insel makes a case for abolishing psychiatry. Mad in America 2022; Apr 30.

28 Gøtzsche PC. Protecting the false narrative about antidepressants. Mad in America 2025; July 7.

29 Gøtzsche PC. Cochrane recommends antidepressants for anxiety in a garbage in, garbage out review. Mad in America 2025; July 29.

30 Gøtzsche PC. Garbage in, garbage out: the newest Cochrane meta-analysis of depression pills in children. Mad in America 2021; Aug 19.

31 Gøtzsche PC. Cochrane reviews of psychiatric drugs are untrustworthy. Mad in America 2023; Sept 14.

32 Bolton JM, Gunnell D, Turecki G. Suicide risk assessment and intervention in people with mental illness. BMJ 2015;351:h4978.

33 Gøtzsche PC. No psychiatric drugs have been convincingly shown to decrease suicides. BMJ 2015; Dec 10.

34 Knipe D, Padmanathan P, Newton-Howes G, et al. Suicide and self-harm. Lancet 2022;399:1903-16.

35 Gøtzsche PC. A hopelessly flawed seminar in “The Lancet” about suicide. Mad in America 2022; June 1.

36 Hjorthøj CR, Madsen T, Agerbo E, et al. Risk of suicide according to level of psychiatric treatment: a nationwide nested case-control study. Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol 2014;49:1357–65.

37 Large MM, Ryan CJ. Disturbing findings about the risk of suicide and psychiatric hospitals. Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol 2014;49:1353–5.

38 Hughes JL, Horowitz LM, Ackerman JP, et al. Suicide in young people: screening, risk assessment, and intervention. BMJ 2023;381:e070630.

39 Gøtzsche PC. Depression drugs have been shown to double the risk of suicide in young people and should not be used. BMJ 2023; April 26.

40 Gøtzsche PC. Call for retraction of three fraudulent trial reports of antidepressants in children and adolescents. Institute for Scientific Freedom 2023; Aug 3.

41 Gøtzsche PC. Medical journals refuse to retract fraudulent trial reports that omitted suicidal events in children. Mad in America 2024; Mar 18.

42 Gøtzsche PC. The lie that antidepressants protect against suicide is deadly. Mad in America 2023; Nov 28.

43 Gøtzsche PC. So-called suicide experts recommend antidepressants, which increase suicides. Mad in America 2024; Oct 24.

44 Jakobsen SG, Christiansen E. Selvmordsforsøg og antidepressiva. Center for Selvmordsforskning 2019; Dec.

45 Gøtzsche PC. Misinformation om antidepressiva og selvmord. http://www.irf.dk 2015; March 5.

46 Mann JJ, Michel CA, Auerbach RP. Improving suicide prevention through evidence-based strategies: a systematic review. Am J Psychiatry 2021;178:611-24.

47 Harris L. Veterans Take Their “War Cry For Change” to Capitol Hill. Mad in America 2025; June 14.

48 Gøtzsche PC. Suicides increase after national suicide prevention introduced. Mad in America 2025; Feb 20.

49 Gøtzsche PC. Observational studies confirm trial results that antidepressants double suicides. Mad in America 2025; Feb 8.

50 Gøtzsche PC. So-called suicide experts recommend antidepressants, which increase suicides. Mad in America 2024; Oct 24.

51 Kennedy: A new time for America? Filmed interview with Peter C. Gøtzsche. Broken Medical Science 2025; Jan 12.

52 FDA Expert Panel on Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) and Pregnancy. YouTube 2025; July 21.

53 Whitaker R. Not even the unborn are safe from psychiatric harm. Mad in America 2025; Aug 23.

54 Moncrieff J, Urato A. Antidepressants in Pregnancy -Turning a Blind Eye, Again. Mad in America 2025; Aug 25.

55 Gøtzsche PC. Psychiatrists Deny the Harm of Antidepressants for the Fetus. Brownstone Journal 2025; Aug 30.

56 Hengartner MP, Plöderl M. Reply to the Letter to the Editor: “Newer-Generation Antidepressants and Suicide Risk: Thoughts on Hengartner and Plöderl’s ReAnalysis.” Psychother Psychosom 2019;88:373-4.

57 American Psychiatric Association tweet. X 2025; Aug 28.

58 Shifting the balance towards social interventions: a call for an overhaul of the mental health system. Beyond Pills All-Party Parliamentary Group 2024; May.

59 Breggin P. The most dangerous thing you will ever do. Mad in America 2020; March 2.

Dr. Peter Gøtzsche co-founded the Cochrane Collaboration, once considered the world’s preeminent independent medical research organization. In 2010 Gøtzsche was named Professor of Clinical Research Design and Analysis at the University of Copenhagen. Gøtzsche has published more than 97 over 100 papers in the “big five” medical journals (JAMA, Lancet, New England Journal of Medicine, British Medical Journal, and Annals of Internal Medicine). Gøtzsche has also authored books on medical issues including Deadly Medicines and Organized Crime.

September 11, 2025 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Science and Pseudo-Science | , | Leave a comment

Scottish lawmaker demands European sporting bodies ban Israel

MEMO | September 11, 2025

A Scottish lawmaker tabled a motion at parliament Thursday condemning Israel’s membership in European sporting associations, urging organizations to revoke its participation, Anadolu reports.

The motion, lodged at Holyrood by James Dornan, said Israel should not be permitted to compete under European banners as it is geographically situated in the Asian continent, not Europe.

It cited reported views that Israeli state policy is one of genocide against the people of Gaza. The motion views “the relentless and barbaric implementation of this policy are grounds for the rescinding of Israel’s membership from European sporting associations.”

Dornan’s motion urged European bodies such as the European football governing body (UEFA), the Federation of International Basketball Association Europe, the European Handball Association and the European Athletic Association to dispel Israel’s membership forthwith.

Last month, Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur for human rights in the Palestinian territories, demanded UEFA expel Israel from competitions for war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip.

It was after UEFA’s farewell to former Palestinian footballer Suleiman al-Obeid, whom it called the “Palestinian Pele.”

The Israeli army has continued a brutal offensive on Gaza, killing at least 64,700 Palestinians since October 2023. The military campaign has devastated the enclave, which is facing famine.

Last November, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.

September 11, 2025 Posted by | Solidarity and Activism, War Crimes | , , | Leave a comment

Hezbollah denies any links to arrestees in Damascus countryside

Al Mayadeen | September 11, 2025

Hezbollah has denied the Syrian Interior Ministry’s claim that several individuals arrested in the western Damascus countryside are members of the group.

In a statement issued by its Media Relations Office on Thursday, Hezbollah reiterated that it does not have any presence or any activity within Syrian territory, asserting that it is “deeply committed to Syria’s stability and the security of its people.”

This follows remarks by the head of internal security for the Damascus countryside governorate, Brigadier General Ahmad al-Dalati, who alleged that security forces arrested a cell operating in the western Damascus countryside towns of Sa’sa’ and Kanakir, which he claimed was affiliated with Hezbollah.

Al-Dalati further claimed that security forces had seized rocket launch platforms, 19 Grad-type rockets, anti-tank missiles, a number of individual weapons, and large quantities of various types of ammunition.

Not so new accusations

Syria has previously leveled similar accusations against Hezbollah, which consistently denies having any involvement or presence on Syrian soil.

On July 13, Hezbollah categorically denied similar allegations made by Syria’s Interior Ministry that one of the individuals arrested in Homs at the time was affiliated with the Lebanese Resistance group.

In a statement issued Sunday by its Media Relations Office, Hezbollah said it has “no presence or activity in Syria” and rejected any connection to local events or conflicts.

No involvement in Syria events

On March 8, Hezbollah issued a firm denial of media reports that claimed it was involved in the ongoing conflict in Syria, as a war monitor reported that recent violence had killed more than 500 people from the country’s Alawite minority community.

In its statement, Hezbollah’s Media Relations Office urged media outlets to refrain from falling for disinformation campaigns that serve questionable foreign agendas, asserting that “some parties are keen to drag Hezbollah’s name into the events taking place in Syria and accuse it of being a party to the conflict.”

The Lebanese Resistance group further called on media outlets to uphold accuracy in their reporting and to avoid being drawn into politically motivated disinformation campaigns that serve foreign interests.

September 11, 2025 Posted by | Deception, Wars for Israel | , | Leave a comment

Qatar: an ambiguous agent in the Zionist architecture for the Middle East

By Lucas Leiroz | Strategic Culture Foundation | September 11, 2025

The recent Israeli attacks on Qatar have brought to public debate an issue long overlooked by analysts during the current Middle East conflict: Qatar’s ambiguous role in the regional security architecture.

In the geopolitical theater of the Middle East, Qatar has played a profoundly ambiguous role—at times portrayed as a regional mediator, at others as a strategic collaborator with the Washington-Tel Aviv axis. This ambivalence is neither accidental nor merely tactical. It is rooted in the very foundations of Gulf monarchies’ foreign policy, notoriously driven by a commercial mentality that prioritizes stability, survival, and diplomatic gains over any consistent ideological alignment. However, in light of the current stage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, this self-interested neutrality has increasingly morphed into active complicity with the Zionist occupation regime.

Despite hosting the political leadership of Hamas in Doha, Qatar does not finance its military wing—which, in fact, is supported by Iran. The hospitality extended to the political branch of the Palestinian movement serves, in reality, as a diplomatic tool to increase Qatari influence over the resistance and steer it toward behavior less hostile to Israeli and American interests. This strategy has been employed for years under the pretense of “mediation,” but in practice, it functions as a containment mechanism for the Palestinian national movement.

For years, the Al Jazeera network, controlled by Doha, had authorized access to the Gaza Strip, even under the strict control of Israeli security forces. This privilege was not granted out of goodwill by Tel Aviv but was the result of a strategic arrangement: Al Jazeera promoted anti-Iran rhetoric within the occupied territories, reinforcing the sectarian divide between Sunnis and Shiites and distracting Palestinians from their real source of military support. In return, Israel allowed the ideological diffusion of Wahhabism in Gaza, calculating that this doctrine would weaken Palestinian nationalism and inter-Muslim solidarity, replacing them with religious divisions and fractured loyalties.

This pact began to decline as Al Jazeera became a major outlet for exposing the brutal reality of the genocide in Gaza. Once Qatar’s media presence in occupied Palestine started to generate more costs than benefits for Israel, the Zionist regime enacted a censorship law banning Al Jazeera and assassinated several of its journalists during the criminal airstrikes on Gaza.

Qatar is also home to the largest U.S. military base in the Middle East—Al Udeid Air Base. This facility not only houses American equipment and troops but also serves as an operational platform for Israeli assets in joint missions against Gaza, Hezbollah, and potentially Iran. The Israeli presence on Qatari soil is an open secret and illustrates just how much Qatar has functioned as a logistical hub for the regional security architecture coordinated by Washington and Tel Aviv.

In June, Iran launched precision strikes against this base during its brief direct war with Israel. The message was unequivocal: by allowing its territory to be used by powers hostile to the Axis of Resistance, Qatar had crossed the limits of neutrality. Doha’s response, however, was to remain in a position of complicit silence, ignoring internal protests and maintaining its alignment with Western allies.

This posture exposes the fundamental paradox of Gulf foreign policy: even with populations broadly sympathetic to the Palestinian cause, the Wahhabi bloc has repeatedly chosen to accommodate Israeli and American projects, as long as doing so ensures dynastic survival and economic stability. This reflects a deeply rooted rationality in the political culture of desert nations—one shaped by centuries of pragmatic adaptation to scarcity and existential threats. In an environment where taking sides can mean ruin, ambiguity becomes a way of life.

However, in the current context of conflict radicalization, this ambiguity is no longer perceived as strategy but as betrayal. By refusing to break with the occupying powers, Qatar risks being dragged into an escalation it helped to ignite. The Israeli bombs falling on Gaza today do so, directly or indirectly, with American logistical support originating from Qatari territory. This undeniable fact—under any serious analysis—undermines Doha’s attempt to present itself as both bridge and wall, as arbiter and accomplice.

The recent Israeli strikes on Doha have made one thing painfully clear: befriending the Zionists is a deadly mistake.

September 11, 2025 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | , , , , , | Leave a comment

US House votes to repeal president’s Middle East war powers

Al Mayadeen | September 11, 2025

In a significant move to reclaim Congressional authority over military engagement, the US House of Representatives voted on Tuesday to repeal decades-old laws that authorized war in the Middle East.

The 261-167 vote represents a bipartisan push to rescind the 1991 and 2002 Authorizations for Use of Military Force (AUMFs), originally enacted ahead of the Gulf War and the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

The repeal was adopted as an amendment to the annual National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) and is being hailed as a victory for war powers reform advocates, who argue that outdated authorizations enable unchecked presidential use of military force.

Long-awaited win for war powers reform advocates

The amendment was co-sponsored by Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) and Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY) and garnered support from 49 Republicans and 212 Democrats. Advocates argue that keeping these authorizations in place enables future administrations to bypass Congress in deploying US military power.

“We don’t need to have Congress effectively modern-day declaring war and leaving it in place for a quarter of a freaking century, or in this case, 34 years,” said Roy.

Meeks added that he was “prepared to fight” in upcoming Senate negotiations to ensure the repeal becomes law.

Pushback from opponents

The proposal had an uncertain path to passage. Initially excluded from the package of amendments allowed for floor debate, the measure was added only after an unusual procedural win in the House Rules Committee. Republicans Ralph Norman (SC), Morgan Griffith (VA), and Chip Roy broke with their party to help Democrats force a debate on the amendment.

Not all lawmakers welcomed the repeal. Rep. Joe Wilson (R-FL) warned that revoking the war powers laws would “tie the president’s hands” in responding to regional threats, including resistance movements in Iraq.

Despite these concerns, the amendment passed with bipartisan backing, though deeper divisions remain over broader defense policies.

Wider debate over executive military power continues

While the vote represents a symbolic step toward limiting presidential war authority, critics note that the repeal will not affect recent military actions, including President Donald Trump’s alleged strike last week on a vessel in the Caribbean he claimed was for smuggling drugs.

The war powers repeal is expected to become a central issue in House-Senate negotiations over the final defense policy package. Although both chambers have voted in recent years to repeal the 2002 Iraq AUMF, no repeal legislation has yet been enacted into law.

Background on AUMFs

  • 1991 AUMF: Authorized military force during the Gulf War under President George H. W. Bush;
  • 2002 AUMF: Enabled the 2003 invasion of Iraq under President George W. Bush;
  • 2014: Former President Barack Obama used the authorization to justify airstrikes in Iraq and Syria;
  • 2020: US President Donald Trump used it in his first term to greenlight the airstrike that killed the IRGC’s Quds Force commander General Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad.

While former President Joe Biden never formally used the authorization, his administration argued it was important to keep it intact to respond to any future threats.

September 11, 2025 Posted by | Militarism, Wars for Israel | , | 1 Comment

Germans’ Nord Stream story is pure comedy, Moscow points finger at Brits

By Martin Jay | Strategic Culture Foundation | September 11, 2025

The Germans are sticking to their preposterous claims that the Nord Stream pipeline attacks, which effectively forced Germany to ditch its cheap gas in preference for overpriced American gas, were carried out by Ukrainians. In late August, a cohort of unlikely suspects, who some might call ‘patsies’ were rounded up and bundled into vans to face charges, according to a number of big media outlets whose reports did not make it into the international domain.

However, the story itself is comical as the Germans are going to extraordinary servile lengths to please their American masters who have no doubt asked them to cook up a story and go out and arrest ‘the usual suspects’.

German media went to extraordinary lengths to not only get details right but also to present it to a gullible public with a united front – one story, one narrative with no possibilities of it being spun differently when the smaller media outlets rewrite it. They went so far, they even made it a ‘joint report’ between Die Zeit, ARD, and Süddeutsche Zeitung, with investigators reported to have said they have identified all suspects involved in the sabotage. The reports claim the warrants cover four divers, an explosives expert, a ship captain, and the ‘leader’ of the operation.

Officials allege the suspects travelled under false names using genuine passports, a detail they say indicates support from high-level Ukrainian officials although no such journalists writing up the hilarious piece appear to want to point out the absurdity of the whole operation being carried out by a diving instructor.

One has to wonder why at this precise moment these unfortunate souls have been framed for crimes they didn’t commit. Is it because western intelligence picked up reports that more information is coming to light about the operation and which partners the Americans might have had?

As far as making calculated assumptions about who the real culprits were, the Russians themselves appear to be the most realistic with their assessment with some of their experts fingering the British naval special forces.

The sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines could not have been pulled off without Western commandos, a top aide to Russian President Vladimir Putin has claimed, singling out Britain as the likely culprit to have done it. The idea that Ukrainians themselves carried out the technical work lacks credibility on a number of levels. In an article published recently in Kommersant, the former head of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), Nikolay Patrushev, argued that Ukrainians simply don’t have the required expertise to carry out this complex operation under their own steam. The sabotage was likely ‘planned, overseen, and executed with the involvement of highly trained NATO special forces,’ Patrushev wrote, adding that the perpetrators were experienced in deep-sea operations and familiar with working in the Baltic. ‘Few armies or intelligence services have divers capable of executing such an operation correctly and, above all, covertly. One unit with the necessary skills is the British Special Boat Service,’ he said.

Founded during World War II, the SBS is the Royal Navy’s elite squad specializing in amphibious warfare which carried out a number of daring raids during WWII which changed the course of the war – perhaps salt in the wound of politicians in Germany who prefer not to remember this period of their history.

For those in Germany who kept a straight face for the last three years like the then chancellor Olaf Scholz or his foreign minister, the clueless Annalena Baerbock, there are rewards though from the Americans who are grateful that they sold out their own country. Baerbock has just landed the top job at the UN as the assembly’s president. Nice work if you can get it but in reality, a brown envelope pay off for her graft.

September 11, 2025 Posted by | Economics, False Flag Terrorism | , | 1 Comment

Macron orders French hospitals to prepare to receive 50,000 soldiers by March 2026

By Ahmed Adel | September 11, 2025

The announcement that hospitals in France are preparing to receive 50,000 soldiers by March 2026 did not elicit a noticeable reaction in the French media, and, in fact, it should not be given any undue importance. This is because it was likely an attempt to raise the stakes and make the French population aware that a conflict with Russia is more likely than it actually is, a sign of just how desperate President Emmanuel Macron has become as his popularity continues to plummet and pressure mounts for him to step down.

As revealed by Le Canard Enchaîné, the French Ministry of Health asked hospitals in a letter sent to regional health agencies to prepare for a “major engagement” by March 2026 that could see between 10,000 and 50,000 men treated over a period of 10 to 180 days.

“In the current international context, it is necessary to anticipate the modalities of health support in situations of high-intensity conflict,” the Ministry of Health reportedly wrote in the document.

Health Minister Catherine Vautrin did not deny the details outlined in the letter or its existence in an interview with French broadcaster BFMTV, instead minimizing the alarming preparedness efforts by using the COVID-19 pandemic as an example.

“It’s part of preparation, like strategic stockpiles, like epidemics. I wasn’t in office at the time of COVID-19, remember. There were no words harsh enough to describe the country’s lack of preparedness,” she said.

It is recalled that just months ago, France outlined plans to send a 20-page ‘survival manual’ to every household that laid out instructions on preparation for an “imminent threat”, including a natural disaster, health crisis, or armed conflict. The manual also suggests items people should have as part of a “survival kit”, including at least six litres of bottled water, 10 cans of food, a torch, extra batteries, and medical supplies such as saline solution, compresses, and paracetamol.

Macron does not enjoy much support among French citizens, with the latest polls indicating a paltry 15% approval rating. Such an announcement should therefore not be taken too seriously. The French president currently faces much bigger political problems, including his own survival, as calls for impeachment mount.

At the same time, March 2026 is only half a year away, and it is questionable whether hospitals can realistically prepare for such a large capacity within such a short period. The French public health system faces numerous organizational and technical challenges, and announcing an increase in capacity for a potential military conflict and the reception of the wounded does not seem particularly mature or realistic.

This announcement may have been made to increase Macron’s credibility following his rather aggressive speeches, which he has been inclined to use lately, especially against Russia. France, unfortunately, has been pursuing the wrong foreign policy throughout the Ukrainian crisis. With its positions and influence within the European Union and NATO, it has fostered a militaristic atmosphere and largely convinced, along with Great Britain, Germany, and even Poland, to support a warmongering strategy.

Discussions about losses, the wounded, preparing national capacities, and the state in general for such a war are an aggressive projection. Neither the policy nor the strategy has support, not only among the people, but also in military circles.

Instead, the announcement to the hospitals is an expression of the French president’s inner leadership, and it may have even been influenced by Britain, which is directing France to pursue this policy. Whatever is happening on the Ukrainian front, including the supply and introduction of new combat systems, drones, and the development of military capacities for ammunition and weapons within Ukraine’s territory, follows the guidelines set by London, in which Paris and, especially, Berlin have been participating recently.

Different voices and the public’s response in France are not heard enough due to the manipulation of political processes. Everything that opposes Macron and his government, whether on the streets or through democratic processes, has been silenced. This does not mean that he will be able to persevere to the end with such failed strategic decisions.

France has had a hung parliament since Macron surprised his country by calling snap national elections last year, after a poor performance in the June 2024 European vote. In this context, Macron named loyalist Sebastien Lecornu, a one-time conservative protege who rallied behind his 2017 presidential run, as Prime Minister on September 9, indicating that the president will continue with a minority government that will not rip up his economic agenda, in which taxes on business and the wealthy have been slashed but the retirement age raised.

All in all, Macron’s end is likely near, and there is no amount of Russophobia or fearmongering that he can manufacture to save his untenable position.

Ahmed Adel is a Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher.

September 11, 2025 Posted by | Militarism, Russophobia | , | Leave a comment

In ASEAN Nations, Coal Is a Physical Manifestation of Progress

By Vijay Jayaraj | Real Clear Markets | September 9, 2025

When most people think of ASEAN – a diverse association of Southeast Asian nations that include Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam – they picture Thailand’s beaches, Singapore’s gleaming skyline or Indonesia’s temples.

What they don’t see is an economic juggernaut that will drive some of the planet’s largest growth in energy demand. Vietnam has emerged as a global manufacturing hub. Indonesia processes the world’s nickel for electric vehicle batteries. Thailand manufactures automobiles for export across Asia. Each of these economic engines demands reliable, affordable electricity that operates 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

In fact, 2023 witnessed a demand increase of nearly 45 terawatt-hours (TWh), an amount of energy that must be generated, transmitted regionally, and delivered locally on a continual basis. Where did this new power come from? Coal. An astonishing 96% of that new demand was met by coal-fired power plants.

Let that sink in. Coal, the energy source routinely demonized in Western capitals and at global climate summits, met nearly all the region’s new electricity needs. This reality stands in direct contradiction to rosy predictions of a transition to “renewables” manufactured by highly compensated executives at elite consulting firms who have spent the better part of a decade selling energy fairy tales to governments and investors.

Indonesia alone added 11 TWh of coal-generated electricity in 2023, while its electricity demand rose by 17 TWh, with coal meeting two-thirds of this increase. The Philippines generates more than 60% of its electricity from coal, and Malaysia and Vietnam each around 50%.

Ultra-supercritical coal technology – using extraordinarily high temperatures and pressures and pioneered at Malaysia’s Manjung plant and Indonesia’s Batang facility, delivers higher efficiency than older coal plants. These advanced facilities demonstrate that coal technology continues to improve while wind and solar remain dependent on weather conditions and the time of day.

The wind and solar share across ASEAN remained a pitiful 4.5% in 2023. This minuscule contribution exposes the bankruptcy of consultants’ promises of “renewables” dominating the regional power mix by mid-2020s.

Coal’s dominance in recent years is not an accident; it is a necessity. Indonesia, the region’s economic giant, leans on coal to power its export-driven industries, including nickel for EV batteries. Vietnam’s manufacturing boom, lifting millions into the middle class, runs on coal’s steady output. Malaysia and the Philippines, too, rely on coal to sustain their growing economies. Even Singapore, a global hub of innovation, depends on coal to maintain its energy security.

Yet, to focus solely on the power grid is to miss the forest for the trees, as electricity is just one component of total energy consumption. Electricity represents only a fraction of total consumption across ASEAN. The larger picture is primary energy consumption, which includes fuel for transport, industry and heating.

Oil, natural gas and coal collectively hold the major share of ASEAN’s primary energy mix, with oil leading consumption patterns across transportation and industrial sectors. Factories, petrochemicals, shipping, aviation, and agriculture all consume fossil fuels in large quantities.

ASEAN countries are committing hundreds of billions of dollars to fossil fuel infrastructure that will operate for decades. Coal plants have an average lifespan of 40 years. These capital investments create long-term commitments to hydrocarbon use that extend far beyond current political cycles.

Nineteen projects across Malaysia, Vietnam, Brunei, Indonesia, and Myanmar hold more than 540 billion cubic meters of recoverable gas. Countries don’t spend billions developing gas fields if they plan to abandon fossil fuels within the next decade.

ASEAN’s embrace of coal is about more than just keeping the lights on. These nations aren’t chasing arbitrary climate targets; they’re building the infrastructure of their future and prosperity for people.

Every new airport, every new highway and every new factory is a testament to the power of coal. To argue against coal is to oppose the physical manifestations of progress. The “green” agenda, by seeking to eliminate coal, demands that the developing world stop building – an ultimatum that ASEAN is rightly and wisely ignoring.

September 11, 2025 Posted by | Economics, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity | , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Tucker Carlson claims Israeli spies knew about 9/11 attacks

RT | September 10, 2025

Israeli intelligence knew beforehand of the 9/11, American journalist Tucker Carlson has claimed. The topic, as well as other long-buried facts, will be explored in his upcoming documentary series on the attacks.

Carlson made the remarks on Tuesday when he appeared on Piers Morgan’s Uncensored News. The journalist pointed out the Israeli leadership never actually hid its attitude to the attack and believed they had a positive impact on the US-Israel ties.

“Of course I didn’t allege that the Jews did it. I don’t even know what that means. I think, in fact, saying things like that is a way to discredit real questions,” Carlson said.

“Benjamin Netanyahu on camera, right after [the attacks] he said it was a good thing because it brings the United States into a conflict that we’ve been involved in on an existential level for decades,” he added.

Carlson apparently referred to the remarks Netanyahu made back in 2002 during the US House hearings, when he said that the democracies “sometimes have to be bombed into going to war” and likened the 9/11 events to the Pearl Harbor attack.

Israel had ‘total control’ over Congress – TrumpREAD MORE: Israel had ‘total control’ over Congress – Trump
The journalist also invoked the “Israeli art students” affair, stating that the public knowledge about it has been very limited, with reports on it ultimately vanishing.

“We know that a group of ‘Israeli art students’ – who clearly were not art students, clearly some of them were aligned with the Israeli intelligence – were arrested and held for quite some time in the US before being released without charges. And we know that a group of them – I’m quoting an FBI document, not the Internet – filmed the attacks on 9/11, and… ‘seemed to have foreknowledge’ of those attacks,” Carlson stated.

The first sightings of “Israeli art students” date back to late 2000, when they began to show up at US federal law enforcement and military agencies’ buildings, trying to peddle artworks and socialize with agents. The “students” repeatedly appeared at unmarked locations and hidden side entrances and even visited some agents at their homes.

According to media reports of the time, at least 140 Israeli nationals engaged in such activities were arrested between early 2001 and the 9/11 attacks, while a further 60 were detained shortly after. Moreover, some groups of the “students” reportedly rented properties in close vicinity to residencies of the 9/11 attacks perpetrators.

September 11, 2025 Posted by | False Flag Terrorism, Timeless or most popular, Video | , | Leave a comment