Greenland or Bust: The Compelling Case for Acquisition

Townhall 

One year ago, just before he re-assumed the presidency, Donald Trump was pilloried by the feckless Secretary of State Antony Blinken as well as the usual gang of late-night talk show propagandists. What for, on this occasion? Trump expressed a desire to acquire Greenland.

A sizeable throng of Trump supporters, including GOP officials, also were bewildered about the quest. Many felt that this notion in no way was a top concern and that the historic mess left by Biden/Harris presented more than enough challenges. On top of that, Biden’s puppet masters spent their last days in power sabotaging and undermining the incoming Trump Administration in every way that they could muster.

The Adults are Now in Charge

Upon re-entering office, Trump had his hands full: inflation, energy production, illegals by the multi-millions, drug cartels, China, Russia, Ukraine, activist judges... the list was and remains endless. Unlike his first Administration, however, this time, Trump knew all about Washington DC.

More pointedly, the President knew who to pick for his staff, advisors, agency heads, ambassadors, and cabinet. In particular, the foursome of Donald Trump, JD Vance, Marco Rubio, and Pete Hegseth is perhaps as fine a line-up as we’ve witnessed in the last 40 years, if not the last 200 years. All of which brings us to Greenland.

Much More than Ice and Snow

I’ve had the pleasure of visiting three towns in Greenland (there are no cities), whereas, for most Americans, Greenland is merely a big place on the map to the right of Canada, and that’s it.

Today, the world's largest island is of enormous significance to us and to our allies. If the Arctic recedes over the next two decades, then the Arctic Ocean will automatically become an even more advantageous shipping route. It would more efficiently connect East Asia and Europe. As such, the area is sought by our global rivals/adversaries, China and Russia.

The massive waters north of Canada are nearly equal in size to the Mediterranean Sea. Approximately 30 percent of our Earth’s natural gas deposits and 13 percent of its oil reserves are located in the Arctic region. Greenland itself contains untold treasures including minerals and crucial energy sources.  

Both Russia and China are highly covetous of this territory. They are well aware that any country can establish operations in the Arctic: International law maintains that beyond 200 nautical miles, waterways and bodies of water are not within the domain of any country. Thus, both nations seek to drill, mine, and fish in this resource-rich environment. Menacingly, they wish to exploit the area for military advantage.

With America’s destruction of Iran’s nuclear capabilities and the way in which we extracted Nicolás Maduro from Venezuela, both Russia and China are on high alert regarding our military superiority. Both nations would dread our newly invigorated global reach in obtaining Greenland.

The Scramble is On

Chinese leader Xi Jinping has been keen to establish China as a great “polar power.” He seeks to chart the Arctic Ocean floor, construct massive icebreakers, extract valuable minerals, and mine emerging energy sources. Russia, despite dwindling finances accruing to the multi-year war in Ukraine, has already placed aircraft, naval vessels, missiles, and armaments throughout several Arctic bases.

As for the U.S.? In Alaska, we have about 26,700 active military personnel with some 30,000 dependents. Seeking to hide their utter weakness, a bit more than three years ago, the Biden manipulators prepared an Arctic strategy, claiming that the U.S. will bolster both our “military and civilian capabilities," "as required to deter threats.” Beyond that, their progress was close to zilch.

What about Canada, the nation with territory closest to the Arctic? They are lax. Their Arctic patrols operate in the summer month only, with limited ice-breaking capabilities. What’s more, the Canadians have no political will to succeed. They are virtually defenseless. If somehow they mustered the will, they’d still be years away from a strong defensive posture.

The Only Game in Town

We must take the lead, for our benefit, Canada’s, and NATO’s. As with Thomas Jefferson’s 1803 Louisiana Purchase at an astonishing three cents per acre (even by the monetary values of that age), and as with U.S. Secretary of State William Seward's 1867 purchase of Alaska from Russia – nearly 600,000 square miles – at only two cents per acre, acquiring Greenland today is both prudent and vital. Let the scoffers be damned.

Fortunately, President Trump, with top talent like JD Vance, Marco Rubio, and Pete Hegseth, has a strategy to safeguard our interests and those of our Allies. The key component is acquiring Greenland.

Podcast thread for Jan 10

 

'sighs'.

Greenland: Land of Possibilities or Impossibilities?

American Thinker 

In this current situation where a superpower has its eyes on acquiring a micro-society of people living on a strategically-placed massive block of ice that is capping valuable resources under its permafrost, it may be wise to step back from saber-rattling, bombasticating, and threatening behavior for awhile and consider the realistic options of adopting soft power.

The U.S., or more specifically, President Trump, wants Greenland, has to haveGreenland, is gonna get Greenland. We get it. We've heard it and so has the rest of the world since his first term in office. That he doesn't "package" his wishes to take charge or control of another country in niceties all delivered with a hand-written gift card, we get that, too.

It's unsettling to the Greenlanders who have been Denmark's wards for nearly all of their existence if you exclude their time as a Norwegian possession and the five years in the 1940s when Denmark was occupied by the Nazis. It's also worrying their protector, Denmark. They worry that if Greenland were to accept the Americans' offer of "marriage," they would stand to lose about 93% of their entire kingdom (when measured in land mass), not to mention prestige.

Those of us who know where Greenland is also know why whoever is in control of it is determinative to world security. On that point, Donald Trump is correct. The Arctic may be cold and desolate, but it is also geographically strategic for securing that part of the world. And it's critical for shipping (nearly 90% of all the shipping traversing Greenland occurs on its western coast).

The country is a veritable buffet of valuable minerals and metals that lie buried beneath its vast region of permafrost (which can be as deep as 600 meters, making any mining extremely expensive). They include rare earth elements (REEs), iron ore, gold, zinc and lead, nickel, copper, cobalt, graphite, and the platinum group metals (PGMs).

Greenland is not the Klondike.

Any country that controls Greenland also controls the rights to mine for those items – within certain limits which are strongly affected by political decisionsand environmental restrictions, of course. But any attempt to recklessly "mine, baby, mine" would be met with major international disapproval, and in that regard it is not the Klondike of 1896 which ended up raping the countryside.

Then there is the tourism sector to be considered. From the Greenlanders' point of view, their current equation is simple; maximize the tourist spending while minimizing the tourism footprint. There is always going to be a question of how much is too much for any city or locality, and just because there's plenty of ice to go around, Greenlanders will still want to preserve their privacy and peace of mind so that the capital, Nuuk, doesn't become an ice palace Martha's Vineyard or the Hamptons of Long Island with thousands of tourists running around.

Greenlanders don't want their daily lives to mirror those of the Danes in Copenhagen in the summer. Copenhagen has actually reached its saturation point with about 5 million to 8 million tourist overnight stays in the summer months taking the shine off the "coziness" factor of the city that is literally flooded with people. 

Nothing like that can happen in the short term in Greenland, however, because the country has an undercapacity of hotel rooms. The last hotel built there was a Best Western with 78 rooms in 2021.

Why is Denmark so intent on holding on to Greenland?

I suspect there are many reasons. One is pride. Another is history and tradition, and a third may be a centuries' old bad taste left in the Danes' mouths from when the Danes sold their Danish West Indies Islands of the three "Saints": St. Thomas, St. John and St. Croix to the Americans in 1917 for $25 million in gold. A terrific real estate deal when seen in the economies of those three islands today.

The Danish Kingdom is a long-standing monarchy and the Danes are proud of their monarchs and their two step-children that enjoy self-governance: the Faroe Islands and Greenland. They would hate for even one of them to "leave home." That is understandable, but nearly all children leave home at some point, cutting the apron strings to achieve their independence and brave the new world on their own.

In Greenland, the self-rule movement that advocates for separation from Denmark has been around for decades, but ever since Donald Trump started rattling his presidential saber about taking over Greenland, that movement has been growing. A 2025 polling average suggests a majority of Greenlanders would vote for independence if a referendum were held today (e.g., about 56% support independence, with 28% opposed -- source: veriangroup.com).

Another source finds that support for full independence has increased over time — rising to around 84% in 2025 compared with about 67.8% in 2019 — though attitudes vary depending on economic concerns and living standards. It's important to stress that the Greenlanders wanting independence realize that the process is a long one and that their answers were given in the context of getting independence "eventually." We must remember that the Greenlanders' clock ticks at a very different speed than that of the Americans.

What then to do? Enter "soft power."

While the EU "coalition of the willing" (to support Denmark and oppose Trump on the Greenland issue) is growing, the EU is worried about a possible U.S. military operation to "free" Greenland and place it under a kind of benevolent American "political receivership" similar to post-war Japan or maybe like Grenada after the 1983 American invasion. Then, the American government exerted temporary, externally supervised control during a political transition, not a permanent U.S. administration. There is no question that the recent events in Venezuela are creating a lot of worry on the part of the Danes, the Greenlanders and the EU members, not to mention the leaders of Venezuela's neighboring countries.

The Danes, Greenlanders and Americans are due to meet in Washington next week to discuss the "Greenland situation," but instead of pulling a Khrushchev at the U.N. by hammering their shoes on the table and expressing outrage or anger, I would suggest that the Danes and Greenlanders huddle up and adopt a totally different strategy of "soft power" – one that is designed to slow Donald Trump's momentum and offer a third way to solve the crisis, at least temporarily.

That third way would include something Trump loves … building, developing, project management. Greenland needs investment in its tourism sector and it needs tourists and the U.S. private sector could give it to them. The U.S. "Greenland team" needs to brush up its Shakespeare and take a page or two from "The Tempest." The character Prospero ultimately forgives his enemies who betrayed him; conflicts are resolved through mercy rather than revenge; broken relationships (political, familial, romantic) are restored and the play ends not with punishment, but with release, harmony, and return. The Tempest is often viewed as Shakespeare’s final statement on forgiveness and reconciliation, and it ends a whole lot better than Hamlet.

Therefore, the Danes should help the Greenlanders create a package of business-related projects or ideas that essentially bring American businesspeople together to form a crack unit of pro-Greenland "troops" who might be willing to invest in the country and who would be given some very attractive economic incentives for being the first wave of investors there. A few key universities could offer some scholarships to outstanding Greenland students and perhaps establish some exchange programs.

The U.S. government could encourage the U.S. EXIM Bank to sponsor a fact-finding mission to Greenland and then bring interested local Greenlanders and Danes (government and private sector) back to the U.S. for follow-up visits. It's time to think creatively and ratchet down the rhetoric and put our sabers back up on the wall where they belong. No one needs to apologize for using soft power, especially when it leads to ending conflicts.

In Minnesota, the Manufacture of Unwitting Marxist Martyrs

Normals know that you leave the cops alone when they're making an arrest. 

Leftists, though, have created a new normal ...

American  Thinker 

On Jan. 7, 2026, an extremist protester attempted to ram ICE agents in Minneapolis with her SUV, and subsequently died from gunshot wounds when agents appropriately responded to the threat.

She and her girlfriend had been on the scene for some time, objecting to the ongoing ICE action, harassing the agents as they were doing their job.

Leftists watch one video, from one perspective, and claim she was murdered; reasonable people watch an array of videos of the incident from several directions, and recognize it as self-defense on the part of the agents.

Many in the Left are understandably horrified, thinking, “that could have been me.” Some on the Left didn’t waste time mourning, knowing they can fundraise off this incident while the iron is hot.

Like all officer-involved deaths, there will be an internal investigation; the videos will be studied, witnesses will be interviewed, official determinations will be made. For now, at least, under the American system, the agent who fired at the charging vehicle is innocent until proven guilty.

But there are some things we can recognize from the incident right away, which should enlighten us about a nationwide problem.

These activists are not behaving rationally.

Normal people, when they see a police bust taking place, either leave the area or step back to watch from a safe distance. Whether it’s a mass arrest of a flash mob at a retail store, or police breaking up a late night brawl at a bar, even people who simply “can’t tear their eyes away from the train wreck,” at least manage to find the presence of mind to stay out of the policemen’s way.

But these activists, for nearly a year now, have often been getting close to the operations, as close as they can. We see them blowing whistles to warn criminals of the police presence. We see them jeering the agents, even throwing rocks or other projectiles at them, or just getting in their faces, trying to provoke a response. 

In normal times, this would be recognized as insanity.

No matter whether you’re from a good law-abiding family or a mafia neighborhood, you are taught from childhood to always be deferential to law enforcement officers. Always.

You give them room, you stay out of their way, you don’t provoke them. If you’re stopped for a traffic ticket, you keep your hands where the police can see them so they don’t consider you a threat. If you see an arrest in progress, you cross the street so you don’t impede their work.

Everybody knows this.

From childhood.

But something has changed in recent years. As the BLM riots and the 1% riots -- and the Antifa riots and the George Floyd riots -- all spread and normalized violent demonstrations, the Left started giving their activist members a new kind of marching order:

The Left is now ordering its members to act up, to push the envelope with ICE and other forms of law enforcement. These foot soldiers of the radical Left aren’t thinking of blowing whistles and throwing hands, and blocking the street with their cars, all by themselves; they are following the precise instructions of their activist leadership.

Perhaps they aren’t bright enough to realize that when you interfere with law enforcement doing their job, it’s a crime.

Maybe they don’t have the sense to realize that visibly warning criminals that the police are after them can make them accomplices to those criminals, guilty of aiding and abetting an escape.

Or maybe they are bright enough to realize that what they’re doing is criminal – it's not all that hard a concept to grasp – but they have been told they have nothing to fear, because the officials never prosecute these things.

Well, what these people are forgetting is that the American legal system is designed, as they say, not just for government and society, but also “for your own good.”

That is, we don’t just have laws against obstructing officers in the performance of their duty in order to help catch the criminals; we also have these laws because if you obstruct them in the pursuit of their job, you are also putting yourself in danger, and you’ll put other innocent bystanders in danger as well.

These protesters are the ones making these situations more dangerous, for all concerned. These protesters can claim all they want that federal law enforcement is “bringing chaos,” but they know it’s a lie. Leave them alone to do their job, and there would be no chaos.

It’s the protesters, getting in the way, blocking agents with their bodies or with their cars, alerting criminals that the police are after them, who make these situations volatile, increasing the odds of unnecessary injury or death, as just occurred in Minneapolis.

Watch the response by the Left in the days and weeks to come.

Clearly, the obvious reaction to today’s death should be for the Left to call on their members to stand down, to stop the harassment and provocation of ICE immediately. To cool both the rhetoric and the action right away, to prevent further bloodshed.

But what are the odds of that?

Watch the Left. You will see them fundraise off this unnecessary loss of one of their own. You will see them double down, and continue telling their members to blow their whistles, and position their vehicles, and do everything they can think of to be human obstacles.

Because the Left doesn’t really care about the safety of their own members (if they did, they wouldn’t have spent the past sixty years doing everything possible to stop the incarceration of street criminals). What they care about is disruption. Destruction. Lawlessness.

That’s what they campaign on. That’s what they fundraise on.

And when their members are injured or killed as a result of their own horrible advice, they can use these manufactured martyrdoms for PR.

Don’t believe me? Look at every other Marxist movement in history, from Lenin to Mao, from Castro to Pol Pot. The Left always devours its own. They have no more respect for the lives of their own members than they do for anyone else.

It’s just how Marxism works.

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U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright Discusses Consequences of Imaginary Problem Solving

Conservative Treehouse 

U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright gives an outline of energy production in three-minutes.  I especially liked this part: “Germany invested half a trillion (in renewables) and now produce 20% less electricity at 3x the price,” Wright noted.

$10 trillion has been invested/deposited within the Climate Change Bureau of Imaginary Problems; Secretary Wright discusses the outcome. Now, I know it is easy for us to laugh and enjoy this type of fact-based mic drop, however, as we watch this short video think seriously about the position of Canada as it relates to what Wright is mentioning.

Yes, the examples of the United Kingdom and Germany are excellent in their representative value to drive home the point; however, ¹Canada is more predestined toward failure in their energy policy than Germany.  WATCH:

The U.S. Energy Secretary just obliterated Net Zero ideology in 60 seconds.

Oil, gas, and coal power EVERYTHING including green energy.

This is what adults sound like.

Liberals are not ready for this conversation.pic.twitter.com/c6J4x7k7Nk

— Marc Nixon (@MarcNixon24) January 7, 2026

¹Canada’s climate change energy policy is orders of magnitude worse than the EU.  Canadian carbon trade platforms and the government’s insufferable economic stupidity is a major part of the reason why the USMCA must be dissolved.  The North American continent cannot have comingled economic dependency where Mexico and the USA are expanding through low-cost energy outputs, while Canada generates high-cost energy outputs.

In the long term, the slowly unfolding Canadian economic collapse will be devastating.  Big Panda has previously prepositioned their interests and is awaiting final purchase of the Snow Mexicans for pennies on the dollar.

Former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was accurate in his outline to president-elect Trump that began the point of the USA just taking ownership of Canada (2024).  If something similarly radical doesn’t happen soon, a Chinese protectorate will be our northern neighbor.

Secretary Bessent Announces Regional Action to Block Remittances From any Entity Receiving Public Assistance

Conservative Treehouse 

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is leading the charge to focus on Minneapolis, Minnesota Somali fraud rings for targeted regional actions.  The IRS Criminal Investigations division has been dispatched to focus on the Minneapolis region to identify fraudulent use of public assistance services, combined with the abuse of federal taxpayer funds.

These fraud cases, ongoing since the early 2020s and intensifying in 2024–2026, involve allegations of misappropriating hundreds of millions (potentially up to several billions) in taxpayer funds intended for child nutrition, autism therapy, housing stabilization, personal care assistance, and other Medicaid programs.

In a remarkable approach, Secretary Bessent announced during a Fox News interview that a regional targeting effort is now underway that will block anyone who receives public assistance from sending money overseas (remittances to foreign countries).  This is not a fee or tax on the remittance, or financial transaction; this is a complete block of their ability to send money overseas.  Anyone receiving public assistance will not be able to send money to foreign lands.

Yes, it seems like this is initially going to be subject to the honest admission of the money sender. However, with the IRS reviewing each transfer and cross referencing to public assistance records anyone who attempts to work around this regulation will be subject to federal laws on financial fraud, wire service fraud and potentially money laundering.  WATCH:

The interagency focus will eventually go nationwide, as with the new USAO position that focuses on public assistance fraud; but for now, that focused effort will target Minnesota.   Minneapolis will be the beta test for a national rollout.

All of the money service businesses in the region will now be reviewed and all financial transactions of $3,000 will be required to have an accompanying Suspicious Activity Report (SAR).  With DHS, FBI and now IRS investigators focused exclusively on the two counties involved in the Somali fraud rings, the fraudsters will be identified and prosecuted.

Democrats Want Anti-ICE Protesters To Die So They Can Protect Their Fraudulent Patronage With Riots

Democrats created the conditions that led to the fatal shooting in Minneapolis, and they are now capitalizing on the chaos.

The Federalist

Leftist agitators and the corporate media wasted no time capitalizing on the death of a woman who was fatally shot by an ICE officer after she appeared to ram an agent who was positioned in front of her vehicle.

While those with common sense rightly point out that the shooting was justified by the circumstances and backed up by legal precedent, the left quickly capitalized on the woman’s death by further demonizing federal law enforcement and repeating their tired accusation that the Trump administration is little more than a fascist tyranny.

The shooting on Wednesday and the Somali fraud scandal that at least partially caused the ICE crackdown in Minneapolis call attention to the fact that the left will fanatically defend those whose crimes they themselves have facilitated.

Rather than try to deescalate the situation or provide support for federal law enforcement, Minnesota Democrats moved swiftly to hamstring ICE operations further. Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said, “The presence of federal immigration enforcement agents is causing chaos in our city. We’re demanding ICE to leave the city immediately.”

At a press conference, Gov. Tim Walz threatened to mobilize the Minnesota National Guard to “protect Minnesotans” from “rogue ICE agents” — an act of blatant insurrection. Walz also promised that “The state will ensure there is a full, fair, and expeditious investigation to ensure accountability and justice.” Additionally, Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., called the shooting “state violence.”

But, in truth, “rogue ICE agents” can’t be blamed for the chaos unfolding in Minnesota. That chaos has been carefully planned and cultivated for years now. The Democrats created the conditions that led to the widespread scamming of the public welfare system, most prominently by Somalian immigrants, and have also fostered the conditions in which a leftist agitator was fatally shot.

Over the last few decades, Democrats created a patronage system that’s designed to gradually dismantle the country. They initiated the mass importation of Third Worlders, created programs to support them that provided lucrative jobs and contracts to their allies, fostered an environment in which those programs are ripe for abuse by the people they are supposed to help, ran cover for the inevitable wave of fraud, and then tried to redirect public anger once the fraud was discovered toward those who noticed and attempted to stop it by calling them racist. In exchange, Democrats got votes and the mandate to create even more programs and NGOs for exploitation.

It’s a very similar situation with the left-wing radicals who inevitably show up to impede attempts to uphold the law. Democrats created the conditions that caused a federal law enforcement response, in this case Minneapolis’ total disregard for federal immigration law and their complacency in rooting out fraud. They then employed the same violent rhetoric they’ve used for years to target conservatives and attract deranged radicals. They laid the groundwork for a violent incident, and once it happened, they fanned the flames even further. As a result, agitators have already confronted more agents.

Democrats’ rhetoric radicalized and organized radicals like the woman who was killed on Wednesday. In their continued efforts to demonize ICE agents in the wake of the shooting, Democrats are setting agents, as well as the protesters they claim to care about, up for further conflict that could easily turn violent. As we’ve seen with other protests against ICE that have descended into riots over the past year, they tend to be highly organized and premeditated. Leftist-backed NGOs and Antifa terror cells organize them on a national scale to assault any attempt by Republicans to curtail lawlessness, while Democrat politicians look the other way.

Democrats regularly condemn law enforcement as a concept, but then in almost the same instant, they practically fall on their knees to call for the swift hand of justice to deliver great vengeance and furious anger upon their enemies. Just look at the unprecedented witch hunt that took place after the Jan. 6, 2021 riot at the U.S. Capitol.

But they only hold this level of contempt for the everyday, hardworking citizenry of this country and the law enforcement officials who are trying to enact the mandate they gave President Trump by electing him in 2024.

As for illegal aliens, scammers, drug dealers, and left-wing terrorists who burn down cities? Prior to federal intervention, what justice was forthcoming from state authorities for the taxpayers who had been defrauded to the tune of billions of dollars? What of the animals who rob, rape, and murder innocent American citizens, despite prior criminal records, convictions, and/or deportation orders? Indifference — as if the urban horrors that flash across TV screens and social media day after day are inconsequential, a mere inconvenience on the road to a true leftist utopia.

Democrats defend no one, except perhaps themselves, as fervently as they do the people whose crimes they’ve helped facilitate. The Somali scammers aren’t alien parasites defrauding the country that took them in, they’re victims of racism, according to the Democrats’ propaganda machine. The leftist terrorists destroying property and violently attacking ICE agents aren’t anarchic barbarians, they’re freedom fighters resisting a fascist regime.

They certainly pretended to care about law and order this past Jan. 6, when they gathered in vigil to remember the fifth anniversary of that debunked “insurrection” with a near-religious ecstasy. And they pretend to care when their patronage system is under threat. In short, Democrats’ current M.O. is favor the criminals; punish the law abiders and the law enforcers.

The system created by the Democrats has resulted in the perverse incentive to sow chaos in order to reap the political benefits. And now replicate that system dozens if not hundreds of times across every facet of the federal government and blue state governments. Radical leftist foot soldiers, the state and federal bureaucracy, the professional NGO activists, and Democrat politicians all work in concert to leech taxpayer dollars toward their clients and their causes. They work tirelessly to slowly but surely weaken America in the name of power and greed. The anarchy that they unleash on American cities during this process is a feature, not a bug.

Completely dismantling the system is the only way to stop it. Ending mass immigration, restricting entitlements, culling government bureaucracy, and throttling NGOs must all take place to put an end to this vicious cycle that threatens to tear our country apart and render the phrase “law and order” truly meaningless.

Guess Who Iran's Supreme Leader Blames for Nationwide Unrest

Townhall 

Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei gave a rare public speech in which he blamed President Donald Trump for the widespread unrest in the country.

Iranian citizens took to the streets starting on December 28 to protest against the devaluation of the nation’s currency and other economic woes. But the protests eventually turned into a movement seeking to oust the regime, which has used brutal force to suppress dissent.

The protesters have fought back, setting fire to government buildings and even attacking government officials.

In the speech, Khamenei noted that in Tehran, “a group of vandals came and damaged buildings belonging to their own country.”

The ayatollah said this was happening because Trump “said some nonsense — that if the Iranian government does such-and-such, I will come and stand with you, I will take your side.”

What Khamenei left out was the fact that Trump actually said he would stand with the Iranian people if the regime continues murdering protesters.

“These rioters and harmful individuals — their hearts are pleased by him,” Khamenei continued. “If he can, let him destroy his own country. In his own country there are all kinds of incidents. His hands are stained with the blood of more than a thousand Iranians.”

The supreme leader accused Trump of admitting to commanding the airstrikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities that occurred last year. “So he confessed: his hands are stained with the blood of Iranians,” Khamenei said.

A bunch of inexperienced, careless people, without thinking, believe him, accept it, and act according to his wishes. They set trash on fire, burn things, just so he’ll be pleased.

Everyone should know: the Islamic Republic came to power on the blood of hundreds of thousands of honorable people, and it will not retreat in the face of those who seek to overthrow it. It does not tolerate being an agent of foreigners.

Khamenei then stated that like “the despots and arrogant tyrants of the world…this one [Donald Trump] will be overthrown as well.”

Iran is in the throes of the biggest wave of unrest in years. Nationwide protests are now in their second week. The regime is struggling to tamp down on the demonstrations.

The streets have been full of tens of thousands of people chanting anti-government slogans and targeting symbols of state power. The government has responded with shootings, tear gas, and mass arrests. So far at least 36 civilians have been killed and over 2,000 detained.

The authorities have also limited internet and phone access to prevent people from sharing them on social media.

Vehicle Shortages? Russian Army Is Now Mounting Starlink Panels on Horses.

RedState 

The Russian Army is apparently running short on vehicles. They have been going hammer and tongs with the Ukrainians for some time now, and both sides have lost men and equipment. But the toll on the Russian Army's road-stock may be worse than expected; as evidence, we see that the Russians are now mounting Starlink receivers on horses.

Yes, really.

Russian forces appear to have begun equipping horse-mounted units with Starlink satellite terminals and cameras, according to new images and videos circulated by multiple OSINT investigators, including Special Kherson Cat on January 8.

The footage shows Russian soldiers riding horses fitted with improvised frames carrying flat-panel satellite terminals and what appear to be camera systems.

While the exact purpose of the equipment has not been officially confirmed, analysts say the setup is consistent with communications or situational-awareness use rather than combat firing platforms.

The images add to a growing body of evidence that Russian frontline units—particularly in contested or infrastructure-poor areas—are increasingly relying on animals as substitutes for destroyed or unavailable military vehicles.

A horse equipped with internet access will certainly stirrup some trouble. It is, after all, an innovation that will surely generate a colt following. 

The Russian forces taking this step are, we have to admit, showing some creativity.

There may be some method to this madness. Horses have a few advantages over traditional vehicles; they are one of the most able and effective forms of off-road transport, they are harder to detect by technology, especially in wooded areas, and they don't require a massive logistical train to bring fuel forward; all they need is grass and the occasional apple or sugar cube. But the Russians seem to be slow in putting them to use; one wonders why they are stalling. This delay may be because of the difficulty of finding accomplished horsemen in the ranks of the Russian Army; after all, to be, or not to be, that is the equestrian. 

Seriously, this does make one wonder just how bad a hit Russia's road-stock has taken. As recently as 1945, armies regularly used horses for transport; German and Soviet units were still using horses to pull artillery and wagons, while the might of American industry was drowning the Wehrmacht in trucks, tanks, trucks, jeeps, trucks, command cars, and more trucks. To see a major military force falling back on horses now, well, that probably doesn't bode well for the readiness of the force, whether or not the horses are equipped with internet access.

It could be a real nightmare for President Putin.

One unanticipated aspect of this comes in the form of a rumor that a Ukrainian couple stole two of these internet-equipped horses and is using them to raise trouble behind the Russian lines. The Russian troops who have encountered them are calling them Bonnie and Clydesdale. These two, it seems, aren't very good neighbors.

Of course, throughout the history of horses, there's only been one who could make full use of this startling innovation.