author: Tyler Durden
Written by Colin Todhunter via Off-Guardian.org,
The global disturbances we have seen in fresh years are frequently presented as a chaotic series of events: "pandemic", inflation, energy shortages and war.
No wonder most people are confused. However, structural analysis reveals a more informed, controlled demolition of the social contract of the 20th century.
We are witnessing a transition from a productive capitalism model that required a healthy mass labour force to what Yanis Varoufakis calls a techno-feudal order.
The engine of this transformation was a desperate financial stabilisation strategy implemented through a public wellness event. As prof. Fabio Vighi pointed out, the global financial strategy reached a point of terminal instability in late 2019, as evidenced by the collapse of the American repo marketplace (where banks lend to each other).
By freezing the real economy through lockdown, central banks carried out massive liquidity injections to save the banking and finance sector. If this money went into a functioning economy, it would trigger hyperinflation. Keeping the population in the country, the elite conducted a secret rescue that retained financial class dominance by sacrificing the productive mediate class.
However, there must besides have been a geopolitical reset. For decades, Germany's economy has been based on 3 pillars: inexpensive Russian gas, high-tech exports to China and an American safety umbrella. By the end of 2025, all 3 were broken. prof. Michael Hudson notes that Nord Stream's "sabotage" pipelines were a structural necessity for the western financial elite.
If Germany continued to integrate with Russia and China, it would make a pillar of power independent of the US dollar. The conflict in Ukraine met a certain objective: it led to Germany replacing Russian gas and forcing the massive expansion of liquefied natural gas infrastructure (LNG) and reliance on LNG from the US. In contrast to pipeline gas, LNG must be supercooled, transported and re-heated, which is naturally 3–4 times more expensive.
As a result, in 2025 industrial production in Germany has been at the lowest level since the 1990s. The dense industry, specified as BASF (chemistry) and ThyssenKrupp (steel), moves to the US or China. Meanwhile, Germany is moving from an industrial giant to creating jobs in the green energy sector (including the "hydrogen centre"), semiconductors and microelectronics, robotics and biotechnology, and redirecting capital to yearly defence spending of EUR 150 billion.
At the same time, while Germany is breaking down, the City of London lives thanks to global volatility. Among another things, City is simply a global centre of war hazard insurance and energy brokerage. erstwhile a pipeline is destroyed or a strategically crucial shipping way is threatened, the price of insurance against the hazard of war triples. The London insurance marketplace (Lloyd's) draws these "risk contributions" from the planet economy.
City brokers treat geopolitical instability as a variable asset class. Even erstwhile British households are crushed with bills for energy, the financial center remains profitable, extracting wealth from the chaos that abroad policy helps produce.
Moreover, City of London has strengthened its position as a essential intermediary in the transatlantic energy transition. Although physical gas comes from the US and is consumed in Europe, the financial and legal structure of this trade is almost entirely managed in London.
Brokers and stock exchanges, specified as the ICE (Intercontinental Exchange) in London, reported evidence volumes of forward and derivative contracts on LNG. These are financial establishments for the future price of gasoline. As the volatility of fees and commissions collected by London's traders and clearing houses increases rapidly.
Over 90% of the world's maritime insurance, including specialized, high-component insurance required for LNG tankers, is insured by Lloyd's. By enforcing the strict war hazard premiums on all ship entering European waters, London in practice imposes a private taxation on all gas molecule that replaces lost Russian gases.
This ensures that while European manufacture is facing advanced energy costs, City financial companies are charging immense logistical costs for replacement supplies.
Of course, the structural adjustment of economies leads to large social tensions.
And here comes the "Russian threat". It was elevated to the rank of omnipotent interior narrative, utilized to manage national opposition and to mobilise society to unite around the flag. The Scarecrow performs an crucial intellectual function, transforming the increasing anger of the mediocre into a patriotic work to endure difficulties.
Under this "permanent state of emergency" regime, any industrial action, protest or systemic criticism can be considered a sinister abroad influence or a challenge, allowing the state to usage fresh extended police powers to suppress interior tensions.
To justify redirecting billions of taxes from the site of failing public services to the military-industrial complex to make an "growth" in a failing economy (a desperate effort to revive a failing neoliberalism — see chapter 2 Here.), the state must keep a advanced level of existential fear. In the UK, the Defence Industrial strategy 2025 clearly presents militarisation as a growth engine, utilizing the spectra of the Russian invasion to legitimize state wealth transfer to high-tech defence contractors.
By creating a permanent martial law, the elite ensures that the main pillar of the economy is the 1 that straight serves the safety of the state, while the public is told that their dwindling wellness care and pensions are a essential victim to the endurance of the nation.
In this context, we besides see the changing position of man. In the industrial age, the state "subscribed" the working class by investing in NHS and education due to the fact that it needed a suitable population to drive production. Artificial intelligence, robotics and economical collapse increasingly make a large part of this workforce unnecessary.
Since capital may no longer consider reproduction of work desirable or profitable, the State withdraws its subscription. The visible deterioration of the NHS is the consequence of an intentional withdrawal of the investment. (The private wellness insurance marketplace in the UK has risen to evidence £8.64 billion, which means nearly 14% increase year-on-year.)
If the individual is no longer needed for production, the State considers wellness care to be a "non-compliant cost" for decommissioning.
When the population is no longer an asset but a financial burden, the state moves from care to exit management. It is no coincidence that we see calls for fast legalization of assisted suicide throughout the West. It can besides aid explain the prescribing of midazolam and the ban on resuscitation in nursing homes during the COVID event. Data show that the UK government purchased immense amounts of midazolam (stocks for 2 years in just 2 months) in early 2020.
In 2025, authoritative impact assessments indicated that legalization of assisted death would bring "significant savings" for NHS and the state pension strategy — estimated at up to £18.3 million over a decade for pensions themselves. An assessment of the impact of the bill on terminally sick adults (end of life) (May 2025) officially estimated the impact on "benefits and pensions". By 10, the state is estimated to save around £27.7 million per year on unpaid pensions and benefits due to assisted deaths.
By speeding up the "offboarding" of non-productive older people (what happened to the marketing slogan from COVID times "saving Grandma?"), the strategy removes billions of future pension liabilities from the state balance sheet.
What can we anticipate in the future? We will see how elites will proceed to advance a communicative of a permanent state of emergency under the pretext of a climate crisis and a Russian threat in order to supply the ideological discipline essential to justify the tightened-up austerity measures.
Meanwhile, digital recognition and currency of central banks will make a strategy of full surveillance. In this developing system, a citizen is replaced by a "managed entity" whose access to the economy depends on the result of the social credit.
The views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of ZeroHedge.
Translated by Google Translator
source:https://www.zerohedge.com/
