Recessions, debt, energy crisis, inflation and wars… somehow it is all related, and it is related at a global level, impacting nearly all economies and markets. It all seems to be going rather badly for the “rules based global order,” or as some prefer to call it, “the empire of lies.”

Shock, after shock, after shock…

Last week, on Oct. 6, Kristalina Georgieva, IMF’s Managing Director gave a speech at the Georgetown University in Washington where she explained that the global economy, which was expected to recover strongly after the Covid 19 pandemic, experienced a “shock, after shock, after shock” instead, that it is now experiencing a “fundamental shift,” and that this shift could create a “dangerous new normal.” Georgieva thinks this can only be mitigated by “countries working together.”

We’re winning in Ukraine! Or maybe we’re not.

Part of the problem is the “senseless war” in Ukraine. For weeks now, as the groupthink went, the war has turned in the west’s favor and Ukraine has been winning. Nobody even bothers pretending any more that this war is between Russia and Ukraine: it is now overtly discussed as the war between Russia and the collective west. NATO’s Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg made this plain in yesterday’s press conference: “If Putin wins, that is not only a big defeat for the Ukrainians, but it will be the defeat, and dangerous, for all of us.” But not to worry, said Stoltenberg, “Ukraine has the momentum,” and “President Putin is failing in Ukraine.”

Last week, US 4-star General Jack Keane went on Fox Business to boast about Bidden administration’s awesome “investment” in Ukraine: “We have a $6 trillion budget… we’ve invested, and I mean, invested, $66 billion in Ukraine this year and that is like, 1.1% [of the budget] … So for $66 billion what we’re getting is Ukraine doing the fighting, they are literally destroying the Russian Army on the battlefield.” 

So apparently we’re winning and we can all relax – everything is awesome. Or maybe it isn’t. Last week, former US National Security Advisor, John Bolton published a revealing article that gives away a different mindset near the top of western command-and-control hierarchy. Bolton says that “the West still lacks a shared definition of ‘victory’ in Ukraine,” and that “everyone worries about the durability of Europe’s resolve…” But it was John Bolton’s Tweet promoting the article that was the most revealing: 

My new article's headline is clear– "Putin must go: Now is the time for regime change in Russia." There is no long-term prospect for achieving America’s critical, long-standing goal of peace and security in Europe without regime change in Russia. https://t.co/yHmZTW0W7b

— John Bolton (@AmbJohnBolton) October 5, 2022

There it is: “There is no long-term prospect for achieving America’s critical, long-standing goal of peace and security in Europe without regime change in Russia.” What Bolton seems to be saying is that Putin has defeated the rules-based global order and that they can only reverse this defeat if they could remove Putin from power and replace him with some Juan Guaido who would hand them back their toys and their victory. Bolton then went on CBS to advocate for the assassination of Vladimir Putin.

“Putin has left us no real alternative,” says former national security advisor @AmbJohnBolton on why now is the time for regime change in Russia and that Putin must go. “This has been the 800 pound Gorilla in the room ever since Russia invaded Ukraine.” pic.twitter.com/pLK4cHiKJS

— Catherine Herridge (@CBS_Herridge) October 8, 2022

I could be wrong but, between Ambassador Bolton, General Keane, Jens Stoltenberg, Kristalina Georgieva, as well as many others, it doesn’t seem that the empire’s leading minds are very confident about the way things are going. In fact, they all seem a bit incoherent in their statements and even panicked perhaps, as though they are sensing defeat.

It’s the banks, not Vladimir Putin

So then, what would be the “fundamental shift,” and the “dangerous new normal” that IMF’s Georgieva is worried about? I believe that the worry is that the rules-based global order is falling into a profound economic, social and political crisis that could be long and very severe. And even while we are all encouraged to come together and hate on Russia and Vladimir Putin, that’s not where this crisis emanated from. Rather, it emanated from the fraudulent monetary system that’s largely shaped our rules-based global order and which has had an impressive track record of incentivizing forever wars and generating chronic crises. 

Chronic crises, forever wars

We can trace the evolution of today’s monetary system back to the Bank of England. It was established in 1694 and over the following century (from 1701 to 1815), England waged fully 18 officially declared wars against her then rival power, France. Back then, the French were hated almost as much as the Russians are today. In 1833 the Parliament passed the Bank of England Act, granting the BOE monopoly on issuing the empire’s “legal tender” currency. Out of the remaining 67 years of the 19th century, Britain spent 32 years in recessions, depressions, bankruptcy or financial collapse including the 22-year long depression lasting from 1873 to 1896. This was while the British Empire was at the zenith of its power yet, like today it was “shock, after shock, after shock…”

Rather than waging never-ending wars, blowing up bridges and pipelines or assassinating Vladimir Putin, western powers would do better to focus on reforming our monetary system and embrace honest money. Even a miraculous military victory over Russia would do no more than delay the day of reckoning. In the meantime, the system would need to find a new enemy to fight more wars. That is a certainty. As Lord Acton said over a century ago, “The issue that has swept down the centuries and which will have to be fought sooner or later is the people versus the Banks.” The banks – not Russia nor Vladimir Putin!

P.S. By “the Banks,” I do not mean local banks and savings institutions but the international banking cartel and their Global Systemically Important Banks.

Alex Krainer – @NakedHedgie is the creator of I-System Trend Following and publisher of daily TrendCompass reports covering over 200 key financial and commodity markets for investors and traders – probably the best CTA daily newsletter on the market today.