The new NATO Secretary General, Mark Rutte, has thundered once again. He wants funds for rearmament and to counter threats that exist only in his head. After decades of disasters, the desk-bound warmongers are still pushing us toward the risk of an all-out nuclear world war. Founded to defend us, NATO has become our main danger. For decades, they have fueled useless conflicts and learned nothing. Instead of demanding money, Rutte should explain to us what happened in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya. He should tell us what the billions of public funds spent were for and how he plans not to repeat such global embarrassments.
Let Rutte explain how the export of democracy and human rights through bombs ended, and how the fight against Islamic terrorism has gone, especially in light of recent developments in Syria. And let’s talk about Ukraine. We have bled financially only to see piles of rubble and corpses. Now NATO wants more money to arm itself against Putin, who until yesterday was our friend but whom they’ve now turned into public enemy number one.
First, NATO opens branches like a fast-food chain, and if others don’t like it, they don’t care and pick fights, even pretending to be the victims. Enough is enough. NATO has made the world more insecure and unstable, yet it continues down this path, showing that the real enemy of us Westerners is our own selfish inability to learn from our mistakes and choose peace once and for all.
After decades of failures, Rutte goes around European capitals with his hat in hand, as if nothing has happened. As if he doesn’t see what is around him. We are under constant blackmail from the global financial casino, living in a perpetual crisis. The working poor are struggling for a decent life, while governments are left with only scraps. There isn’t enough money even for essential services, and yet Rutte wants it spent on missiles and cannons. It’s truly absurd.
Money taken from the poor and given to the wealthy war lobby to kill other poor people — all because some desk-bound warmonger decided so. It’s truly shameful. NATO’s interpretation of the international scenario is entirely wrong. The ones who have always unleashed wars around the world are us, the Westerners. We are the planet’s main threat, not others.
We spent centuries massacring each other and bleeding the Global South through colonization. After two world wars, we specialized in “couch wars,” causing all sorts of destruction. We invaded countries, toppled governments at will, razed cities, and sowed chaos indiscriminately. And we still have the audacity to point fingers. If others are rearming, it’s to defend themselves from us.
If we want to avoid escalation, we must stop and return to treaties instead of proliferation. The Secretary General of an organization like NATO, dedicated to our defense, should interpret history with a shred of intellectual honesty and acknowledge the disasters of recent years. He should also explain that no one will win a nuclear war; it would be the last war ever fought, and everything must be done to prevent it.
He should respect the path of peace pursued by our grandparents, who lived through war, a path reflected in our constitutions and forming the foundation of Europe. The more a civilization evolves, the more it avoids the self-destructive madness of war. Yet Rutte is making the rounds with his hat in hand, preaching warmongering delusions straight out of the last century. He wants money for rearmament to counter a supposed Russian invasion, as if Ukraine is just an excuse to drag us back decades.
It’s an excuse to create false enemies and false fears, siphoning off vast public resources to fund the arms industry. It’s collective suicide, culturally as well, orchestrated by desk-bound warmongers and not by European citizens. But, as far as we know, we still live in a democracy, and the will of the people should prevail.
At this rate, European citizens will take to the streets to protest against a NATO that was founded to protect them but has become their greatest threat.
