Reidar Kaarboe
Hva Mener Partiene

This is not a conversation with a journalist or a politician - because such a conversation would never take place in Norway. This is a conversation with Gemini, an AI, which I began when I thought of writing a short op-ed for Klassekampen in which I wanted to call for objective arguments for the view that the war in Ukraine was provoked by the US and NATO. So I wanted to test the AI ​​- and it became a conversation that now is published here in its entirety.

My questions and comments are in bold italic large font like this, AI's answers are in normal text, and AI's headlines are in bold normal text.

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Are there any arguments that suggest that Russia's war in Ukraine was provoked by the US and NATO? This question has never been posed in Norway, but I think it really is an important one to ask: do such arguments exist or not? Perhaps you have some that you can list briefly?

It is true that this perspective rarely dominates in Norwegian mainstream media, but it is a central part of the international security policy debate – especially within the realist tradition in political science.

Here is a brief summary of the most common arguments making the case for the US and NATO having helped provoke the conflict:

1. NATO expansion eastwards

This is the most important point. From the Russian perspective (and from academics such as John Mearsheimer), it is argued that NATO has broken informal promises made in 1990 not to expand "one inch" eastwards. When countries such as Poland, the Baltic countries [joined NATO], and later the desire to include Ukraine and Georgia followed, this was seen as an existential threat in Moscow.

The argument: No great power would accept a hostile military alliance moving right up to their most important border (often compared to how the US reacted during the Cuban Missile Crisis).

Steven Crozier
steigan.no

Where is the peace movement when we need it? And why have all the parties in Parliament become puppets of the arms industry?

In a prison cell in Nuremberg in 1946, while awaiting his death sentence, former Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring delivered a ruthless lesson in political psychology to American intelligence officer Gustave Gilbert. Göring dismissed the notion that free democracies are immune to warmongering. "Naturally, the common people don't want war," he remarked dryly, "but it is always the leaders who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along."

The method required neither political genius nor persuasive argument: "All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for a lack of patriotism and for exposing the country to danger." Göring paused to emphasize the universal truth of his own cynicism: "It works the same way in any country."

Eight decades later, Göring’s precise diagnosis echoes across a Europe now arming itself for a new major war. Germany, the architect of the previous century’s catastrophe, is spearheading this new militarization. Defense Minister Boris Pistorius and Chief of Defense Carsten Breuer have set a stark deadline: by 2029, Russia could be capable of attacking a NATO country. Germany must become kriegstüchtig—combat-ready. The population is being systematically prepared for the end of peacetime.

Here in Norway, this psychological mechanism takes on a distinctive and dangerous twist. Our society is built on a foundation of trust—a deep, institutionalized belief that the state, the authorities, and the dominant media wish us nothing but well. This trust, the very engine of the Norwegian welfare state, also serves as the perfect lubricant for political and military mobilization.

Glenn Diesen
Glenn's Substack

Prof. Glenn Diesen at the Valdai Discussion Club

[25 February 2026] The US has had a longstanding interest in acquiring Greenland. After the purchase of Alaska in 1867, US Secretary of State William Seward proposed purchasing Greenland from Denmark. In 1910, the US yet again suggested acquiring Greenland through a land swap with Denmark, in return for offering the Philippine islands of Mindanao and Palawan. The appeal was Greenland’s strategic position in the North Atlantic and its resource potential. During the Second World War, the US took temporary control over Greenland as Denmark was under German occupation, and the 1941 Denmark-US agreement was framed by Washington as a defence of the Western hemisphere and thus in the spirit of the Monroe Doctrine. After returning control of Greenland to Denmark, the US offered to buy Greenland again in 1946 in the context of the Cold War. The Arctic became a key strategic region due to the Soviet adversary, yet the US eventually accepted the base agreement in 1951 instead of pursuing annexation.

Greenland in the Multipolar World | Trump’s brazen efforts to annex Greenland make sense under the multipolar distribution of power that ended the unipolar moment. Under the bipolar era of balancing the Soviet Union and the unipolar era of establishing collective hegemony through NATO expansionism, the US and European interests were closely aligned. In a multipolar distribution of power, the US will pivot away from Europe and their interests will become increasingly divergent.

Glenn Diesen
Glenn's Substack

[Speech slightly edited for clarity by this editor.]

The following is my speech at a conference organised by General Michael Flynn at the Gold Institute in Banja Luka, Republika Srpska.

My talk will focus to a large extent on Russia, as it has played a central role in shaping the purpose of transatlantic security over the past 80 years. Furthermore, Russia is a key actor in the multipolar world, an independent pole of power, and China's most important strategic partner. The China-Russia strategic partnership is referred to as Kissinger’s worst nightmare, as his key achievement was to keep these two Eurasian giants apart.

Trump recently met with Xi in Beijing, and shortly thereafter, Putin arrived there as well. The two Eurasian leaders agreed upon a common statement on commitment to a multipolar world. Three years earlier, in March 2023, Xi had told Putin that the world is now undergoing changes not seen for 100 years.

In the 1990s and 2000s, Russia prioritised integration with the West to construct an inclusive Europe – a Greater Europe. With this overarching objective, relations with China and Iran were often ignored and even used as a bargaining chip for Russia to negotiate a place in the West. This is no longer the case; Russia now looks to the East, and countries such as China, Iran, and India are key strategic partners in an effort to reduce dependence on the West and construct a multipolar world order.

Finian Cunningham
strategic-culture.su

Russia’s hand is being forced to hit the new front to restore deterrence and avoid a total escalation.

The shooting down of a Ukrainian drone by a NATO warplane over Estonia this week shows how close the proxy war with Russia is to a European-wide escalation.

NATO and the EU leadership are pushing the Baltic states to escalate the war with Russia. Maybe it’s time for Moscow to preempt as the best way to avoid all-out war.

It was the first reported case of a NATO fighter jet intercepting a Ukrainian unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). Estonia’s Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur announced: “We decided that we needed to take it down… it was meant to hit Russian targets.”

His remarks betray a nervousness among the Baltic states about where their support for Ukraine is leading them after Russia warned that it is ready to deliver on threats of retaliation for allowing Ukraine to use their airspace to launch strikes. Effectively, they are forming a new front against Russia, with echoes of Operation Barbarossa when the Nazi Third Reich attacked Russia in a pincer through these same states in 1941. However, in the current situation, they are not sure about the consequences. Russia might have to relieve them of their doubts anyway before it’s too late.

Glenn Diesen
Glenn's Substack

The trajectory now appears increasingly clear: NATO will continue to disintegrate, and the Europeans will compensate by further escalating the war against Russia.

NATO was always destined to be a temporary military alliance, united by a common enemy and threat during the Cold War. Once that threat disappeared with the end of the Cold War and, thereafter, the collapse of the Soviet Union, the main question in the 1990s was: What would be NATO’s new raison d'être? The answer to this question was to pursue unipolarity / collective hegemony in the post-Cold War era through NATO expansionism and military interventionism (“out of area or out of business”).

Russia was implicitly given the ultimatum: be a compliant civilizational student or a counter-civilizational force. Russia could accept NATO's hegemonic role as a “force for good,” or it could resist, in which case NATO would return to its former role of confronting Russia. The NATO-backed regime change in Ukraine—aimed at transforming the country from a Russian partner into a frontline state aligned against Russia— triggered the war in 2014. NATO thus began reverting to its former role of confronting Russia, even as the hegemonic era had come to an end.

Now that the former collective hegemony has given way to a multipolar world, NATO has once again lost its purpose and will disintegrate. European leaders want to restore NATO’s original purpose: containing Russia. This will fail because it is based on the fraudulent narrative that Russia wants to restore the Soviet Union, rather than balancing NATO expansionism and military interventionism.

Glenn Diesen
Glenn's Substack

Why are Norwegian political elites so overrepresented in the Epstein files? Several news outlets around the world have reported on the shock to the small Scandinavian country, which consistently demonstrates high public trust in the government. How could this have happened?

The source of the problem is a de-nationalised political elite decoupling itself from the public. The Norwegian government has an explicit ambition to become an international humanitarian superpower by spending billions on aid. The small country’s obsession with punching above its weight in international humanitarianism could be applauded. However, if one scratches the surface, it is not as benign as one would hope.

A small but wealthy country can easily give rise to an elite class with ambitions beyond national borders, and even fuel delusions that they can save the world. With enough resources, these elites form a permanent bureaucracy, develop international elite networks, and in the process earn some money for themselves. Whereas monarchs of the past had a mandate from God, the new nobility claims a mandate from humanitarianism and globalism. Immunity develops because when policies are defined by virtue, opposition is deemed heretical and illegitimate. Herein lies the problem of international humanitarianism: the assumed virtue limits criticism, transparency, and accountability.

Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin
President of Russia (en.kremlin.ru)

Vladimir Putin took part in the plenary session of the 22nd annual meeting of the Valdai International Discussion Club.

Research Director of the Foundation for Development and Support of the Valdai International Discussion Club Fyodor Lukyanov: Ladies and gentlemen, guests of the Valdai Club!

We are beginning the plenary session of the 22nd annual forum of the Valdai International Discussion Club. It is a great honour for me to invite President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin to this stage.

Mr President, thank you very much for once again finding time to join us. The Valdai Club enjoys this great privilege of meeting with you for 23 consecutive years to discuss the most topical issues. I believe that no one else is that lucky.

The 22nd meeting of the Valdai Club, which took place over the past three days, was titled “The Polycentric World: Instructions for Use.” We are attempting to move from merely understanding and describing this new world to practical matters: that is, comprehending how to live in it, since it is not yet entirely clear.

We may consider ourselves advanced users, but we are still only users of this world. You, however, are at least a mechanic and perhaps even an engineer of this very polycentric world order, so we eagerly await some guidelines for use from you.

Glenn Diesen
Glenn's Substack

This international system based on international anarchy originated with the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, which laid the foundation for the modern world order. The hegemonic system had broken down, and after 30 years of war, it became evident that there would be no peace through victory by a new hegemon. The Thirty-Year War thus ended with the Peace of Westphalia, which was based on the recognition that peace would depend on a balance of power between sovereign states. Security in the Westphalian system therefore entails mitigating security competition by attempting to establish formats for indivisible security. The Westphalian peace is often blamed for the international anarchy, yet this is not the crisis of our time.

What is often left out is that the Westphalian system relied on recognition of mutual security concerns as a condition for reducing mutual threats as a way to advance indivisible security. The Peace of Westphalia therefore also introduced the foundations for modern diplomacy, which entails dialogue for mutual understanding as the condition for reducing the security competition.

Our politicians and media no longer do this. They do not recognise the security concerns of our opponents, which means that they can no longer reduce the security competition and pursue indivisible security. Those who attempt to understand the opposing side, to place themselves in the shoes of the opponent and have some empathy, are labelled as Putinists, Panda-huggers and apologists for the Ayatollahs. Recognising the security concerns of the opponent has become tantamount to “legitimising” or “supporting” the policies of the opponents, which is seen as an act of treason. The result is that it becomes impossible to pursue indivisible security and peace.

Prof. Glenn Diesen
Glenn's Substack

The deeper the belief in the righteousness of the cause, the easier it becomes to love the war that serves it.

Norway identifies itself as a model of a liberal and tolerant peace-oriented nation. Yet, a collective mindset has developed with intense distrust and loathing of anyone who deviates from the government’s official truth and war narratives.

Here is a social experiment to test the claim above. I am a professor of political science, but I am also a politician running for Parliament. My recently established political party is primarily an anti-war party, and we started a poster campaign on public transportation in Oslo. The core message was that we are for negotiations and against weapons for the war in Ukraine. This seemed like a reasonable position as Norway previously had (until 2022) a policy of not sending weapons to countries at war (as it escalates and can make us a participant), and our country used to advocate for diplomacy and negotiations as the path to peace.

Norway has abandoned these policies and unified under the new mantra that “weapons are the path to peace”, and we have boycotted basic diplomacy with Russia for more than three years at a time when hundreds of thousands of young men died in the trenches. Was our peace-oriented nation ready to at least consider the argument that we should return to our former policies of negotiating instead of fueling the war with more weapons to fight the world’s largest nuclear power?