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Why did Sweden have more covid deaths than its neighbors?

By Sebastian Rushworth, M.D. | December 6, 2020

One of the arguments that has been used in support of strict lockdown is that Sweden has had significantly more covid deaths than its nordic neighbours. On the 19th of November, Sweden had registered 637 covid deaths per million people. For comparison, Denmark had registered 140, Norway had registered 57, and Finland had registered 69.

But, as I wrote about recently, the studies that have been done have not been able to find any correlation between severity of lockdown and the number of covid deaths. Which must logically mean that Sweden’s higher death rate was not due to the fact that it didn’t institute a severe lockdown. So, if that is the case, why did Sweden have more covid deaths than its closest neighbors?

A paper written by three economists at the end of August sought to answer that question. The research didn’t receive any specific funding, and the authors reported no conflicts of interest. The authors provided 15 different factors that could potentially explain the difference. I’m going to focus on the few that I think are likely the most important.

The first hypothesis is that Sweden, and in particular Stockholm, imported many more cases of covid-19 from abroad before measures were put in place to stop the spread between countries. The main reason for this is that Stockholm has a half-term holiday (“sportlovet”) in late February, when many people go skiing in the alps. The other nordic countries have similar holidays, but they have them earlier. So any Norwegians, Danes, or Finns who went skiing in the alps, would have gone there before the pandemic exploded in that region, while the people from Stockholm were there when infections were spreading at their worst.

The two other large-ish cities in Sweden, Malmö and Gothenburg, provide a useful control for this hypothesis. Both cities have their half-term holiday a week or two before Stockholm, and both were hit far less severely than Stockholm in the first wave. Stockholm experienced 40% of Swedish covid deaths, despite having only 24% of Sweden’s population.

Apart from this, Swedes travel internationally far more than their nordic neighbors (80% more per million people), which would have resulted in significantly more cases of covid being brought in to the country at the beginning of the pandemic.

The second hypothesis concerns the fact that Sweden has a much bigger population of immigrants than its nordic neighbors. 19% of Sweden’s population is foreign born, as opposed to 14% for Denmark and Norway, and only 8% for Finland. What this means in practice is that Sweden has a bigger population of people with darker skin, and it has been clear since early in the pandemic that darker skinned people in western countries are much more likely to develop severe covid than lighter skinned people.

As an aside, Much of the media debate around this phenomenon has centred around the idea that darker skinned people generally have lower status, higher rates of poverty, worse access to health care and so on – basically, that the difference is due to institutional racism.

But there is one big problem with that idea. It doesn’t fit all the facts. An article in the Washington Post on May 20th reported that 27 of 29 doctors who had died of covid in the UK up to that point belonged to ethnic minorities. In other words, 93% of doctors who had died at that point came from ethnic minorities, even though they only constitute 44% of all doctors in the country. Why is this important? Because doctors with darker skin are still doctors, which means that they are members of a high status, well paid, well-off segment of society.

Note, I’m not saying that institutional racism doesn’t exist. I’m just saying that it can’t explain why darker skinned people in western countries are hit much harder by covid than lighter skinned people.

Vitamin D deficiency could though. Darker skinned people in northern Europe are more likely to be vitamin D deficient for the simple reason that their skin isn’t as good at producing vitamin D from the feeble sunlight we get in this part of the world. A number of observational studies have shown that people with low vitamin D levels do worse when infected with covid, and there is even a randomized trial in which patients treated with high dose vitamin D did much better than the control group, which I’ve written about in a separate article (funnily enough, that study gained pretty much zero media attention, while remdesivir, a highly expensive drug that is almost completely useless against covid, has been talked about endlessly).

Anyway, what the authors are saying is that Sweden has a larger ethnic minority population than its nordic neighbours, and people from ethnic minorities do worse when they get covid.

The third hypothesis, and from my perspective the most important, concerns the fact that Sweden had a much larger vulnerable population at the beginning of 2020 than its nordic neighbours. This can be seen in multiple different ways in the statistics.

The first is that Sweden has a large nursing home population. Relative to population size, Sweden’s nursing home population is 50% larger than Denmark’s. And as I’ve mentioned previously, in Sweden, people don’t go to nursing homes until they are near the end of life.

The second way this can be seen in the statistics is by looking at overall mortality for the immediately preceding year, 2019. If unusually few people die in one year, then unusually many will die in the following year, since there is a carry forward effect (due to the fact that humans are not immortal). 2019 was an unusually un-deadly year in Sweden, and the early part of 2020 (pre-covid), was also unusually un-deadly, which means that there was an unusually large number of very frail old people in the country when covid struck. This same effect was not seen in Sweden’s nordic neighbours – for them 2019 was normal in terms of overall mortality.

To clarify exactly how big this difference is, let’s look at the numbers. In Sweden, overall mortality in 2019 was 2,5% lower than the average for the preceding five years. In Norway, mortality was exactly in line with the average. Denmark and Finland both had mortality rates that were 1% above the average. Denmark, Finland, and Norway were in a much better position in relation to covid from the start. Sweden was always going to have more deaths, regardless of the actions it took.

As I think this article shows, there were a number of big differences between Sweden and its nordic neighbors at the beginning of the pandemic, which are altogether certainly sufficient to explain the big difference in covid mortality.

Correlation is not causation. Many people have chosen to see a causative relationship between Sweden’s lack of severe lockdown and relatively high number of deaths, because it supports their prior beliefs about the effectiveness of lockdowns. Those beliefs are, however, not supported by the evidence.

You might also be interested in my article about how deadly covid really is, or my article about how effective lockdowns are.

December 6, 2020 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science | , | 2 Comments

Swedish Opposition Demands Answers About Alleged US Espionage Against Country

By Igor Kuznetsov – Sputnik – 26.11.2020

According to a whistleblower report, the US intelligence service NSA, with the help of its Danish counterpart, spied on targets in several countries, including Norway, Finland, and Sweden.

In an unexpected alliance, the Left and the Sweden Democrats, representing the opposite ends of the Swedish political spectrum, have teamed up in demanding an answer from the government about alleged US espionage.

Danish Radio earlier published a whistleblower report from the country’s Defence Intelligence Service (FE) about the US National Security Agency (NSA) spying against the Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish defence industries via access to the data centre on the island of Amager off Copenhagen. From there, the NSA reportedly targeted traffic from ministries and defence companies such as Denmark’s Terma and Sweden’s Saab.

According to Danish sources, the espionage took place at the same time as the Danish state moved to the final round of fighter aircraft procurement, in which Saab’s Gripen was a contender. The Danish state eventually bought 27 US-made F-35 fighter jets.

Left MP Håkan Svenneling asked Social Democrat Foreign Minister Ann Linde what measures the minister and the government in general have taken in connection with the reported espionage, while Sweden Democrat MP Björn Söder demanded an answer from Defence Minister Peter Hultqvist.

“This may have affected the Swedish defence industry in a very negative way and it must be clarified”, Söder explained to national broadcaster SVT, emphasising that the government has been “very slow to act.”

In response, Social Democrat Interior Minister Mikael Damberg stressed that the government is waiting for Denmark’s investigation and that he cannot comment on the “accuracy” of the information that has appeared in the media.

“On the other hand, of course, I and the relevant Swedish authorities follow the Danish investigation with great interest”, Damberg said, assuring that the government “takes very seriously all forms of espionage against Sweden”.

Norway previously launched talks with Denmark about the espionage allegations at defence minister level, involving Norway’s Frank Bakke-Jensen and Denmark’s Trine Bramsen.

According to Danish Radio, the NSA used the Amager data centre with its XKeyscore system, which was revealed in 2013 by whistleblower Edward Snowden and which is a key feature of the NSA’s entire interception apparatus. The programme allows for a large amount of data in fibre cables to sifted through with the help of “selectors”, which are keywords such as the names of people in top positions in target organisations.

Founded in 1937, Saab AB is one of Sweden’s leading defence companies. Between 1947 and 1990 it served as the parent company of renowned car manufacturer Saab Automobile. Its main focus, however, is and has been fighter aircraft, combat weapons, missile systems, torpedoes, sensor systems, and unmanned underwater vehicles, as well as airborne surveillance solutions, radars, and means of electronic warfare. With some 17,000 employees, Saab is seen as the backbone of Sweden’s military-industrial complex.

November 26, 2020 Posted by | Deception | , , | 1 Comment

How deadly is covid-19?

By Sebastian Rushworth | October 24, 2020

September 2020 was the least deadly month in Swedish history, in terms of number of deaths per 100,000 population. Ever. And I don’t mean the least deadly September, I mean the least deadly month. Ever. To me, this is pretty clear evidence of two things. First, that covid is not a very deadly disease. And second, that Sweden has herd immunity.

When I posted this information on my twitter feed, the response from proponents of further lockdown was that the reason September was such an un-deadly month, was because everyone has already died earlier in the pandemic. To me, that seems like a pretty self-defeating argument. Why?

Because 6,000 people have died of covid in Sweden, a country with a population of 10,000,000 people. 6,000 people is 0,06% of the population. If it is enough for that tiny a fraction of a population to die of a pandemic for the pandemic to peter out so completely that a country can have its least deadly month ever, then the pandemic was never that deadly to begin with.

In August, I wrote an article where I proposed that the mortality for covid is only 0,12%, roughly the same as influenza. That number was based on a back-of-the-envelope calculation. I figured that, since the death rate had dropped continuously for months and was at very low levels, Sweden must have reached a point where it had herd immunity. And I figured that at least 50% of the population must have been infected for herd immunity to have been reached. 50% of Sweden’s population is five million people. 6,000 / 5,000,000 = 0,12%

At the beginning of October, one of the World Health Organisation’s executive directors, Mike Ryan, said that the WHO estimated that 750 million people had so far been infected with covid. At that point, one million people had died of the disease. That gives a death rate for covid of 0,13% . So the WHO said that the death rate is 0,13% . Not too far off my earlier back-of-envelope estimation. This of course begs the question why there are continued lockdowns for a disease that is no worse than the flu.

A short while later, the WHO released an analysis by professor John Ioannidis, with his estimate of the covid death rate. This analysis was based on seroprevalance data, i.e. data on how many people were shown to have antibodies to covid in their bloodstream at different times in different countries, which was correlated with the number of deaths in those countries. Through this analysis, professor Ioannidis reached the conclusion that covid has an overall mortality rate of around 0,23% (in other words, one in 434 infected people die of the disease). For people under the age of seventy, the mortality rate was estimated at 0,05% (in other words, one in 2,000 infected people under the age of 70 die of the disease).

As I’ve discussed before, I don’t think antibody data gives a very complete picture, since there are studies showing that a lot of people don’t produce measurable antibodies in their bloodstreams, but still have immunity, either thanks to a T-cell response, or thanks to local antibody production in the respiratory tract. So I think that the fatality rate is significantly lower than what the analysis by professor Ioannidis found, and more in line with what the WHO stated earlier in October.

But even if the antibody based number is the correct number, then covid still is not a very deadly disease. For comparison, the 1918 flu pandemic is thought to have had an infection fatality rate of 2,5%, i.e. one in forty infected people died. So the 1918 flu was 11 times more deadly than covid if you go by professor Ioannidis’ antibody based numbers, and 19 times more deadly than covid if you go by the fatality rate provided 12 days earlier by the WHO’s Mike Ryan.

And this is missing one big point about covid. The average person who dies from covid is over 80 years old and has multiple underlying health conditions. In other words, their life expectancy is very short. The average person who died in the 1918 pandemic was in their late 20’s. So each death in the 1918 pandemic actually meant around 50 years more of life lost per person than each death in the covid pandemic. Multiply that by the fact that it had a 19 times higher death rate, and the 1918 flu was in fact 950 times more deadly than covid, in terms its capacity to shorten people’s lives.

OK, I’ve discussed the fatality rate of the 1918 flu pandemic, and compared that to covid. But what about the fatality rate of the common cold viruses that are constantly circulating in society? How does covid compare to them?

Many people think that the common cold viruses are harmless. But in fact, among elderly people with underlying health conditions, they are frequently deadly. A study carried out in 2017 found that, among frail elderly people, rhinovirus is actually more deadly than regular influenza. In that study, the 30 day mortality for frail elderly people admitted to hospital due to a rhinovirus infection was 10%. For frail elderly people admitted to hospital due to influenza, 30 day mortality was 7% .

What is my point? If you are old and frail, and have underlying health conditions, then even that most harmless of all infections, the so called “common cold,” can be deadly. In fact, it often is. Covid-19 is not a unique disease, and does not appear to have a noticeably higher mortality rate than the so called “common cold.”

There is one final aspect to all this that needs to be discussed. And that is the effect of covid on overall mortality. If it turns out that covid has no effect on overall mortality, then that really brings in to question why we are locking down, since we’re not actually preventing any deaths. So, what is the effect of covid on overall mortality?

Let’s look at Sweden, since that is perhaps the country that has taken the most relaxed approach of any to preventing spread, and which should therefore also be reasonably be expected to have had the highest impact on its overall death rate. From January to September 2020, Sweden experienced 675 deaths per 100,000 population. That is less than both 2017 and 2018. In fact, 2020 is so far the third least deadly year in Swedish history.

What does this mean? It means that covid, a supposedly deadly viral pandemic, has not killed enough Swedes to have any noticeable impact on overall mortality.

How can this be explained, when we know that 6,000 Swedes have died of covid?

As I see it, there are two possible explanations. The first is that most people who died “of” covid actually died with covid. In other words, they had a positive covid test and were therefore characterized as covid deaths, when the actual cause of death was something else. The second is that most people who died of covid were so old, and so frail, and had so many underlying health conditions, that even without covid, they would have died by now. There are no other reasonable explanations.

I am not saying that covid is nothing, or that it doesn’t exist. I am saying that it is a virus with a marginal effect on longevity. And yet, public policy in most countries has been driven by doomsday scenarios based on completely unrealistic numbers. To put it simply, we’ve acted like we’re dealing with a global ebola outbreak, when covid is much more like the common cold.

You might also enjoy reading my article about why I think Sweden has herd immunity, or enjoy watching my conversation with Ivor Cummins of Fat Emperor about covid-19.

October 24, 2020 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science | , | 1 Comment

Crew Behind New Film About Estonia Tragedy Charged With Violating Sanctity of Underwater Grave

By Igor Kuznetsov – Sputnik – 01.10.2020

Recent underwater footage of the Estonia ferry resting on the bottom of the Baltic Sea has uncovered extensive damage on the starboard side, including a previously unknown 4-metre hole, fuelling renewed interest in the case and demands for a new investigation.

Two Swedes that were part of a crew that worked on a new documentary about the 1994 death of the Estonia ferry have been charged for violating the Estonia Act, which specifically prohibits citizens from the signatory counties to even approach the wreck.

The film team included Swedish, Norwegian, and German citizens, while the boat’s crew included German and Polish citizens as well. The purpose of the documentary was to try and find out the truth about the tragedy, which is the largest peacetime maritime catastrophe in the Baltic Sea.

“The grave peace at the Estonia has been violated by the incident”, chamber prosecutor Helene Gestrin at the National Unit against International and Organised Crime, said in a press release. “The Estonia is located in international waters, but to protect the wreck, there is special legislation in place based on an agreement between several Baltic Sea states that Sweden has signed”, she reminded. The law of the the sanctity of the sea grave has been signed by Estonia and Finland as well.

The filming took place in September 2019, when a German-flagged boat sent an underwater drone to the wreck of the Estonia in a bid to uncover new details about its sudden and tragic death. Significantly, Germany is not among the signatories of the Estonia Act. The penalty for the crime is a fine and imprisonment for up to two years.

“The law has never been tried by a court before. The question is whether Swedish law outweighs the fact that the underwater activities took place in international waters and by a German-flagged boat”, Helene Gestrin said.

37-year-old shipwreck expert Linus Andersson from Gothenburg is one of the accused. He maintains that he hasn’t done anything wrong.

“Sweden cannot assert its own legislation in international waters”, he told national broadcaster SVT. “I understand that the law is meant to protect the Estonia wreck. The ethical and moral aspects were also important to me. But when I heard that the relatives’ association almost encouraged us [to perform a new survey], I felt safe”, Linus Andersson said.

He criticised the previous surveys as “deficient” for not being methodical enough and not following the same pattern and expressed hope that his finds, which include a previously unknown 4-metre hole in the starboard side, will pave the way for a new, thorough investigation.

​The find also rekindled the old criticism of the previous investigation, which placed the blame on a faulty bow visor that allowed thousands of tonnes of water to flood in, as hasty and insufficient. It also rejuvenated popular alternative theories, such as the massive ferry, which, as former Estonian public prosecutor Margus Kurm speculated, could have carried a “sensitive consignment” of sorts, sinking after a collision with a submarine. These theories were also fuelled by the Swedish government deciding to drop thousands of tonnes of pebbles on the site while the previous inquiry was still underway.

In the aftermath of the film, Estonia survivors also penned an open letter demanding the Swedish government hold a new investigation.

While Prime Minister Stefan Löfven finally broke the silence and responded to the criticism by saying that he didn’t rule out new dives at the Estonia site, prosecutor Gestrin stressed this is virtually impossible with current legislation. She emphasised that it is “completely forbidden” – even for the Swedish Accident Investigation Board – to carry out dives at the wreck site.

The Estonia sank in the Baltic Sea on 28 September 1994, on its way from Tallinn to Stockholm, killing 852 people.

October 1, 2020 Posted by | Deception, Timeless or most popular | , | 1 Comment

Was the Estonia Downed by Submarine? Huge Hole in Hull Kindles New Theories About 1994 Tragedy

MS Estonia model

By Igor Kuznetsov – Sputnik – 29.09.2020

The Estonia catastrophe 26 years ago that claimed 852 lives is the worst peacetime tragedy in the Baltic Sea and the second-deadliest peacetime sinking of a European ship, second only to the Titanic.

The foreign ministers of Finland, Estonia, and Sweden have agreed to jointly assess new evidence regarding the Estonia ferry that sank in 1994.

New underwater footage of the shipwreck from a Swedish documentary about the disaster shows extensive damage on the starboard side, including a previously unknown 4-metre hole.

The find has since fuelled renewed speculations and theories about the massive cruise ship’s tragic fate.

Margus Kurm, former public prosecutor and former chairman of the Estonian government’s investigation into the disaster, suggested that the Estonia probably collided with a submarine, a Swedish one at that.

Based on the new information, Kurm speculated that there could have been a “sensitive consignment” on board the ship that needed to be monitored. The botched surveillance operation was likely performed by a Swedish submarine, he mused in an interview with the Estonian newspaper Postimees, suggesting that Sweden “lied straight to our face”. Kurm stressed that 400,000 cubic metres of sand and stone had been transported there and a decision to declare the sanctity of the site was made very quickly in 1995 when the inquiry was still underway.

​Former Estonian Defence Minister Enn Tupp, active when the disaster occurred, also argued that the ship sank after a collision with a submarine, but didn’t point out Sweden specifically.

Lars Ångström, a former member of the parliamentary defence committee for the Green Party who has been involved in the issue for several years, believes that the hole was probably caused by another ship, most likely a military one.

However, ex-Swedish Defence Minister Anders Björck has dismissed the claims as “rather incredible”. “Had it been so, we would have immediately received a report about it, and it would have been noticed”, he told Swedish national broadcaster SVT. He also stressed that it would have taken a huge blackout operation to perform anything like that and then try to hide it.

None of Sweden’s other top ministers who in the 1990s were responsible for the Estonia investigation, including Prime Ministers Carl Bildt and Göran Persson, have commented on the matter.

The hole discovered in the hull of the Estonia can be explained in several ways, suggested Jørgen Amdahl, a professor at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, who ran a computer simulation of the disaster. He dismissed the results of the official 1997 investigation that the sinking was caused by a broken bow visor.

Two other explanations are more likely, Amdahl mused to SVT. One is that the ship was damaged when it hit the bottom. Another possibility is that an object hit the ship from the side with a force of up to 600 tonnes.

Survivors Demand Justice

Meanwhile, an open letter by Estonia survivors has been published by the daily Aftonbladet, demanding a new investigation.

“It is the Swedish government’s responsibility to immediately take the initiative for such a diving operation with full and open presentation of the results to the public and the media in all countries affected by the disaster”, they wrote.

Kent Härstedt, survivor and former MP for the Social Democrats, supported the demand for a new investigation as the current one doesn’t feel “complete and credible”, he said.

“I am not conspiratorial, but with what has emerged today, there will be further questions – why is the hole not included in the official investigation”, Härstedt told SVT.

Estonian Prime Minister Jüri Ratas has called for a new Estonian investigation since the findings were presented in a new documentary. He suggested that the new information raises questions that must be answered in a “clear, dignified, and transparent way”.

Second Only to the Titanic

The sinking of the Estonia in the Baltic Sea between Sweden, Åland, Finland, and Estonia is seen as one of the worst maritime disasters of the 20th century, second to only the Titantic in peacetime. Some 852 people died in the disaster and only 137 survivors were rescued. The official version has so far been that the bow visor separated and the ship’s bow door opened, whereupon it immediately took on a heavy starboard tilt, as water flooded into the vehicle deck.

Based on a suggestion by the Swedish government, thousands of tonnes of pebbles were dropped on the site to bury the whole ship in situ. The subsequent 1995 Estonia Agreement prohibits citizens from the signatory counties to even approach the wreck, which has long fuelled various speculations. The wreck is monitored by radar by the Finnish Navy.

September 29, 2020 Posted by | Deception, Militarism, Timeless or most popular | , | 1 Comment

Germany claims French & Swedish labs ‘confirmed’ Navalny’s Novichok poisoning, as Macron labels incident ‘attempted murder’

RT | September 14, 2020

The German government claimed on Monday that the presence of a substance from the Novichok family of poisons in the system of Russian opposition figure Alexey Navalny has now been confirmed by three different laboratories.

Two of them are its European Union partners France and Sweden, according to Berlin, which says it has brought in the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) to analyze the samples. Officials renewed their demand that Russia explain the incident.

“The federal government involved the OPCW in the analysis of evidence from the Navalny case. The OPCW took samples from Navalny and took the necessary steps to study them in its laboratories,” a German government statement read. “The federal government has also asked its European partners France and Sweden to conduct an independent study. The results of these tests are now available and confirm the German evidence. Independent of the ongoing OPCW investigations, three laboratories have now independently demonstrated the presence of a nerve agent from the Novichok group as the cause of Mr. Navalny’s poisoning.”

The head of German intelligence, Bruno Kahl, said last week that the poison used was stronger than previously known. This raised eyebrows in Russia, given that previous variants of Novichok were supposed to have been devastatingly lethal, and Navalny has survived his alleged poisoning.

“We again call on Russia to explain what happened. We are in close contact with our European partners regarding further steps,” the statement continued.

Meanwhile, after the French tests, French state-run news wire AFP reported that President Emmanuel Macron urged his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, to urgently shed light on what he called the “attempted murder” of Navalny.

On September 9, the German Ministry of Defense announced that samples taken from Navalny had been transferred to the OPCW. Moscow has complained about a lack of cooperation from Berlin.

On August 20, a plane carrying Navalny made an emergency landing in Omsk after he suddenly became unwell on a flight from Siberia to Moscow. The anti-corruption activist was taken to hospital, placed in an induced coma, and put on a ventilator. On August 22, he was flown to Germany for treatment.

German doctors said on August 24 that they had found signs of Navalny having been poisoned with substances from the cholinesterase inhibitors group. They added that there was no threat to his life, but there was a possibility there would be long-term effects on his nervous system.

September 14, 2020 Posted by | False Flag Terrorism, Russophobia | , , | Leave a comment

An IPCC History Lesson

By Donna Laframboise | Big Picture News | February 15, 2011

The late Bert Bolin, a Swedish meteorologist, was the first chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). His tenure began in 1988 and ended in 1997 – well after the IPCC’s second assessment report had been completed. (There have been four so far, published in 1990, 1995, 2001, and 2007.)

Cynical individuals are quick to declare that the fix was in from the beginning. According to these people, there’s no way the IPCC could have declared that humans aren’t responsible for an alarming degree of climate change. It’s easy to make these sorts of declarations, of course. Finding compelling, reliable evidence to support them is a different matter.

I’m currently examining Bolin’s memoir, titled: A History of the Science and Politics of Climate Change. Although it was published back in 2007, I’m not certain many people have actually read it. On page 33 these lines appear:

I was asked by the Swedish government in 1975 to summarise available knowledge, and later that same year it was concluded in a government bill concerning future Swedish energy policy that ‘…It is likely that climatic concerns will limit the burning of fossil fuels rather than the size of the natural resources.’

As an adviser to the Swedish Prime Minister, therefore, Bolin was asked for his professional opinion. He doesn’t tell us what that opinion was. (In a footnote, though, he refers us to a document that is by no means easy to track down: Swedish Government proposition 1975/76: No. 30 to the Swedish Parliament.)

Back in the 1970s lots of people felt the depletion of the Earth’s natural resources was imminent, especially since the world’s population was increasing. But Sweden, after consulting Bolin, officially expressed a different view. If it had misunderstood Bolin’s position – or had egregiously exaggerated its import – one would think he’d have said so in his book.

Instead, we’re left with the uneasy feeling that a full 13 years before the IPCC was even born its first chairman had already decided that fossil fuels didn’t merely affect the climate, but that the affect was so adverse their use would need to be curtailed.

June 14, 2020 Posted by | Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | | Leave a comment

NATO’s colonization of Ukraine under guise of partnership

By Scott Ritter | RT | June 13, 2020

NATO has extended yet another in a long line of “incentives” designed to tease Ukraine with the prospects of joining the transatlantic alliance, while stopping short of actual membership.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has designated Ukraine as an “Enhanced Opportunity Partner,” making it one of six nations (the others being Georgia, Sweden, Finland, Australia and Jordan) rewarded for their significant contributions to NATO operations and alliance objectives by having the opportunity for increased dialogue and cooperation with the alliance.

A main objective of this enhanced interaction is for NATO and Ukraine to develop operational capabilities and interoperability through military exercises which will enable Ukrainian military personnel to gain practical hands-on experience in operating with NATO partners.

Seen in this light, the “Enhanced Opportunity Partner” status is an extension of the “Partnership Interoperability Initiative” designed to maintain the military interoperability between NATO and Ukraine, developed after more than a decade of involvement by Ukraine in the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan. Thus Kiev keeps open the door for the possibility of military cooperation in any future NATO operational commitment, ensuring that Ukrainian military forces would be able to fight side by side with NATO if called upon to do so.
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The designation of “Enhanced Opportunity Partner” is the latest example of NATO outreach to Ukraine, which fosters the possibility of full membership, something that the Ukrainian Parliament called its strategic foreign and security policy objective back in 2017. The current president, Volodymyr Zelensky, has likewise expressed his desire to put engagement with NATO at the top of his policy priorities.

The dream of Ukraine becoming a member of NATO dates back three decades. Dialogue and cooperation between NATO and Ukraine began in October 1991, on the eve of the collapse of the Soviet Union, when a newly independent Ukraine joined the North Atlantic Cooperation Council (NACC). NACC was envisioned as a forum for dialogue and cooperation between NATO and the non-Russian members of the former Warsaw Pact. Then came the “Partnership for Peace” program in 1994, giving Ukraine the opportunity to develop closer ties with the alliance.

In July 1997 Ukraine and NATO signed the “Charter on a Distinctive Partnership,” which established a NATO-Ukraine Commission intended to further political dialogue and cooperation “at all appropriate levels.” In November 2002 Ukraine signed an “Individual Partnership Plan” with NATO outlining a program of assistance and practical support designed to facilitate Ukraine’s membership in the alliance, and followed that up in 2005 with the so-called “Intensive Dialogue” related to Ukraine’s NATO aspirations.
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In 2008 NATO declared that Ukraine could become a full member when it was ready to join and could meet the criteria for membership, but refused Ukraine’s request to enter into a formal Membership Action Plan. The lack of popular support within Ukraine for NATO membership, combined with a change in government that saw Viktor Yanukovych take the helm as President, prompted Ukraine to back away from its previous plans to join NATO.

This all changed in 2014 when, in the aftermath of the Euromaidan unrest Yanakovych was driven out of office, eventually replaced by Petro Poroshenko, who found himself facing off against a militant minority in the Donbas and the Russian government in the Crimea. The outbreak of fighting in eastern Ukraine since 2014 prompted Poroshenko to renew Ukraine’s call to be brought in as a full-fledged NATO member, something the transatlantic alliance has to date failed to act on.

There is a saying that if something looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it must be a duck. Given its lengthy history of political and military interaction with NATO, including a decade-long military deployment in Afghanistan, Ukraine has achieved a level of interoperability with NATO that exceeds that of some actual members. US and NATO military personnel are on the ground in Ukraine conducting training, while Ukrainian forces are deployed in support of several ongoing NATO military commitments, including Iraq and Kosovo. Ukraine looks like NATO, talks like NATO, acts like NATO – but it is not NATO. Nor will it ever be.
Also on rt.com NATO’s call on ‘like-minded nations’ to stand up to rise of China is just a desperate bid for global relevance

The critical question to be asked is precisely what kind of relationship NATO envisions having with Ukraine. While the status of “enhanced opportunity partner” implies a way toward eventual NATO membership, the reality is that there is no discernable path that would bring Ukraine to this objective. The rampant political corruption in the country today is disqualifying under any circumstances, and the dispute with Hungary over Ukraine curbing minority rights represents a death knell in a consensus-driven organization like NATO.

But the real dealbreaker is the ongoing standoff between Kiev and Moscow over Crimea. There is virtually no scenario that has Russia leaving it voluntarily or by force. The prospects of enabling Ukraine to resolve the conflict by force of arms simply by invoking Article 5 of the UN Charter is not something NATO either seeks or desires.

Which leaves one wondering at NATO’s true objective in continuing to string Ukraine along. The answer lies in the composition of the six nations that have been granted “enhanced opportunity partner” status. Four of them – Ukraine, Georgia, Sweden and Finland – directly face off against Russia on a broad front stretching from the Arctic to the Black Sea. Jordan’s interests intersect with Moscow’s in Syria. Australia provides NATO with an opening for expanding its reach into the Pacific, an objective recently outlined by NATO Secretary General, Jens Stoltenberg.

NATO aspires to be a political organization, but in reality it is nothing more than a military alliance with geopolitical ambition. Its effectiveness rests in its ability to project military power, and in order to do this effectively, the military organizations involved must possess a high level of interoperability across a wide spectrum of areas, including command and control, logistics and equipment.
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By extending the status of “enhanced opportunity partner” to Ukraine and the other five nations, NATO is expanding its military capabilities without taking on the risks associated with expanding its membership; Ukrainian troops can be sacrificed in some far-off land void of any real national security interest to the Ukrainian people, and yet NATO will never mobilize under Article 5 to come to Kiev’s aid on its own soil. In many ways, the relationship mirrors that of a colonial master to its subjects, demanding much while delivering little. At the end of the day, the status of “enhanced opportunity partner” is little more than that of a glorified minion who trades its own flesh and blood for the false promise of opportunity that will never materialize.

Scott Ritter is a former US Marine Corps intelligence officer. He served in the Soviet Union as an inspector implementing the INF Treaty, in General Schwarzkopf’s staff during the Gulf War, and from 1991-1998 as a UN weapons inspector. Follow him on Twitter @RealScottRitter

June 13, 2020 Posted by | Militarism, Timeless or most popular | , , , , | 1 Comment

Deception – Submarines against Olof Palme

thersites | April 22, 2020

Background:

In the early 1980s, Sweden was haunted by several hundred sightings of mysterious submarines, causing much panic in public opinion and greatly embarrassing the non-aligned Social Democrat government led by Olof Palme and its efforts to create detente in Europe.

In 1981, a Soviet submarine had run aground in Swedish territorial waters, and the Soviets consequently got blamed for every subsequent sighting over the nest half decade,

10 years later, high ranking US and British officials causally revealed in interviews that NATO had sent submarines into Swedish waters – with the Swedish Navy High Command being informed of the matter, but with neither the Swedish militar brass nor US/UK/NATO informing the elected Swedish government.

After the assassination of Olof Palme in 1986 and the end of the Cold War in the late 1980s, the sightings disappeared – only for the submarines turn up again in 2014, during the New Cold War.

(Director; Dirk Pohlmann)

April 25, 2020 Posted by | Deception, Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Russophobia, Timeless or most popular, Video | , , , | Leave a comment

“Business as Usual” Isn’t Even a Choice

By Anatoly Karlin • Unz Review • April 1, 2020

A few days ago, I joked on Twitter:

The choice isn’t between boomer genocide and an economic collapse.

The choice is between boomer genocide and economic collapse, or producing millions of 5 cent masks and making people wear them.

Reality is, it is only boomer genocide that isn’t a choice.

74% of Americans support a national quarantine, and that even includes 72% of Republicans. In France, there is a near consensus on lockdown at 96%. In Italy it is 94%.

In Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro – the only President of a major democratic polity who continues to insist on treating coronavirus as a nothingburger – has been made into a lame duck, his commands ignored by 24 out of Brazil’s 27 governors and even by his own Health Minister.

Meanwhile, as predicted by Ron Unz, Trump has performed a volte face, extending federal social distancing guidelines past Easter up to April 30 and now touts 100,000 deaths as a “good scenario.”

Which is just as well, because as we know see, modern democracies are simply incapable of “powering through” even through what is a fairly low-mortality pandemic in historical terms.

Consequently, the only choices are:

  • Nip it in the bud early on through mass testing-tracing-treatment, border controls, and limited lockdowns, resulting in limited economic damage. [for example]
  • Wait until later, necessitating progressively more massive, longer, and economically ruinous lockdowns. [for example]

So the only correct move is to clamp down close to the start, and to clamp down hard. This is what was done in all the East Asian polities, be they chaotic democracies, city-state technocracies, or Communist single-party states.

Because in the latter scenario, there will eventually come a time when you are simply sidelined by your own underlings and by regional authorities, adding a political crisis on top of a healthcare and economic one.

In my post on Trump’s initial decision, I speculated:

Far out scenario: Blue states may outright defy Trump on abandoning containment measures, in which case they too would be doing starkly better than Red states (unless it also sparks a Constitutional crisis into the bargain).

Well, on that note, here’s a Tweet from California governor Gavin Newsom today. That’s some interesting wording there:

So again, good on Donald Trump to have come to terms with Corona reality and averting what could have become a very dangerous experiment.

This brings us to another interesting question: Will we get a “clean” experiment anywhere?

As per above, I don’t think it’s going to happen in any democracy. Britain backed away from its “herd immunity” idea two weeks ago, on realizing that their models didn’t include a term for ventilator shortages. The Dutch followed soon afterwards. With Sweden’s coronavirus mortality trajectory beginning to radically diverge from those of its Nordic cousins, I believe it is only a matter of time before they go into lockdown as well.

My guess is that our best “hope” – inappropriate as that expression may be – lies in Belarus, which is run by a decidedly non-coronapilled dictator.

April 2, 2020 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Economics | , , | 2 Comments

Swedish Minister Pushes for ‘Psychological Defence Authority’ to Counter Disinformation

Sputnik – November 18, 2019

The Swedish psychological defence was established in 1954 during the Cold War and later merged with other agencies. Now it may see a revival amid a broader interest in Cold War-era tactics and sentiments.

Swedish Defence Minister Peter Hultqvist would by his own admission like to see a “psychological defence authority” in place to protect the citizens from foreign disinformation.

This backdrop to the move is the “tremendous activity” taking place in social media, Hultqvist explained to Swedish Radio.

According to him, the internet activity may have the malicious goal of splitting society. And that’s just a taste of what level it can reach in a real crisis situation, he pointed out.

“I think it is important that we get a psychological defence authority in Sweden where you can have a direct channel where you give information from the state power that this is the case in different situations and that people can feel that they can trust,” Peter Hultqvist told Swedish Radio.

Swedish media need to prepare for how they would act if there was a real crisis, for example, if Sweden were to be attacked, Hultqvist stressed.

According to Hultqvist, traditional media must also become better at avoiding situations where their news is being exploited by “hostile forces” tasked with painting a negative picture of Sweden.

The Swedish psychological defence was established in connection with the beginning of the Cold War in 1954. Sweden is currently investigating the possibilities of re-establishing a psychological defence authority after calls from Prime Minister Stefan Löfven. The inquiry is being led by former Security Police Chief Anders Danielsson. The conclusions are to be presented next May, and the new authority is scheduled to commence work in 2022.

In rekindling Cold War-era sentiments, a record 4.8 million copies of the brochure “If Crisis or War Comes” were issued last year. The last time a pamphlet on handling crisis situations and wars was issued was in 1961 at the height of the Cold War, which spurred many questions about the timing of its re-edition.

While concepts such as “troll factory”, “fact resistance” and “online hate” have become fixtures in the Swedish media narrative, a larger emphasis is being put on so-called “source criticism”, with countless fact-checking sites in place to stop both domestic and imported “fake news”. Since 2017, Source Criticism Day has been celebrated on 13 March.

November 18, 2019 Posted by | Deception, Full Spectrum Dominance | | 1 Comment

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