The ECB's Dystopian Digital Euro Dictatorship Set to Launch in October 2025

The European Central Bank (ECB), under Christine Lagarde, is pushing for a digital euro at full speed: “The deadline for us will be October 2025, and we are preparing for this date,” Lagarde explained. The implementation depends on the approval of the Commission, the Council, and Parliament must complete the legislative process.

 Lagarde giving green light to the digital euro:

Every payment tracked in real time, with the ECB able to block payments, deduct taxes,
prevent withdrawals (no bank run), impose expiration dates on money, and enable censorship.

The digital euro is to come in two versions: a retail version for citizens and a wholesale version for financial institutions. What central bankers praise as innovation could turn out to be a Trojan horse for civil liberties. Despite the ECB’s assurances of “high privacy standards,” the fundamental fact remains: a digital central bank currency creates the technical prerequisites for seamless financial transparency.

Unlike cash, every transaction with the digital euro leaves a data trail. The assurance that the ECB will not track transactions is not convincing, given the increasing trends of state surveillance. Technically, it would be possible at any time to lift this self-imposed restriction – for example, in the name of "counterterrorism" or "tax justice."

Lena Petrova (February 9, 2025) -  EU 'Accelerates' Digital Euro Launch:
Revealed Date of Programmable Digital Currency Roll Out. 

 

Especially concerning is the possibility of freezing or confiscating balances at the push of a button. What is currently dismissed as a theoretical scenario could become bitter reality tomorrow. The experiences with account freezes of politically unpopular individuals and media in Western democracies show that this danger is by no means unfounded. A digital euro would dramatically increase this concentration of power. Imagine: A government critic suddenly finds their digital balance frozen – without a court order, without legal recourse, and without a cash alternative.

The "programmability" of the digital euro, hailed as an advantage by its supporters, reveals its true threat: The state could determine what you are allowed to spend your money on (for example, linked to a CO2 budget). Spending limits for certain products, time restrictions, or intended purposes could be directly programmed into the currency. This control could also be abused to enforce political goals. Climate policy through limiting meat purchases or air travel? Health policy by limiting "unhealthy" foods? The technical possibilities would be nearly unlimited.

 » A digital euro would be a digital form of cash. «
This is a blunt lie and exactly what the digital euro is not.

While the ECB presents the digital euro as a necessary response to China’s digital yuan and US stablecoins, it conceals the true essence of this race: It is about control, not innovation. China's CBDC project already shows how digital currencies can be used for social control. The ECB's Ethereum blockchain tests may be technically impressive but divert attention from the fundamental shift in power that a digital euro would represent: away from the citizen, towards the state and its institutions.

 » The key difference with the CBDC is that central banks will have absolute control on the rules and regulations that will determine the use of that expression of central bank liability. And also we will have the technology to enforce that. Those two issues are extremely important and that makes a huge difference with respect to what cash is. «
Agustín Carstens, General Manager, Bank for International Settlements.

The digital euro is not a neutral means of payment but a tool for undermining civil liberties. The promised benefits – faster transactions, offline functionality, competitiveness – do not outweigh the risks. While Lagarde and the ECB are pushing forward with technical preparations, citizens and parliamentarians should ask the fundamental question: Do we want a society where every financial transaction can potentially be monitored, controlled, and sanctioned? The answer to this question will have consequences far beyond 2025 or 2028.

 

See also:

Martin Armstrong (March 3, 2025) - Europe Will Go to War around May 15, Lose, and Euro Will Become Extinct.
TPR (March 2, 2025) - Quantum Computing: Paving the Way for the Tech Oligarchy's Totalitarianism. 

Marc Friedrich (June 23, 2024) - Der Digitale Euro: Die Versklavung der Gesellschaft! (video)

 

了解你的敌人
Know your Enemies.

Quantum Computing: Paving the Way for the Tech Oligarchy's Totalitarianism

Microsoft has announced a breakthrough in quantum computing, creating Majorana 1 quantum chip, with 8 ‘topological qubits.’ This innovation could lead to more scalable and powerful quantum computers. The concept of qubits is crucial. Unlike traditional binary code, which uses 1s and 0s, qubits exist in a state of uncertainty, allowing for almost infinite computational power. Topological qubits take this a step further, using a new state of matter called topoconductor (Majorana quasiparticles) to maintain particles in a grid and prevent errors.

Microsoft Majorana 1 quantum chip.

 

Microsoft's achievement is credited to its collaboration with DARPA, the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. The implications are significant, as a functional quantum computer could potentially break all encryption keys and passwords, granting control over global information. The possibilities are endless. With a million qubits, a quantum computer could solve complex problems that would take conventional computers billions of years to solve. This raises concerns about the potential risks and consequences of such powerful technology, particularly when combined with artificial intelligence.

 

 Ettore Majorana (1906-1938)

 

Google's Willow microchip, previously considered the most advanced quantum computing technology, has been surpassed by Microsoft's achievement. Experts predict that a functional quantum computer could be developed within the next five years, changing the foundations of human society and transforming us into something else.

On March 3, 2025, Chinese scientists unveiled a quantum computer prototype named "Zuchongzhi 3.0" with 105 

superconducting transmon qubits, marking a breakthrough in China's quantum computing advancements. 

Able to achieve results that would take classical supercomputers over 6.4 billion years, the Zuchongzhi 3.0

Quantum Processor reportedly outpaces Google's Willow by "million times".

The potential risks are terrifying. Increasing intelligence by 10 billion times with quantum computing could be catastrophic. Artificial intelligence could become uncontrollable, and the consequences would be dire. As quantum computing advances, it's essential to consider the potential impact on global security, artificial intelligence, and human society as a whole.

Telegram Founder Pavel Durov Arrested In France | Laura Ruggeri

I see only two possible outcomes after Durov's Arrest: Either Durov cooperates with EU/NATO or the platform will be banned altogether. When you are facing a very lengthy sentence for crimes that any user of your platform could have committed (the list is endless), the possibility that Durov will cave in is almost a certainty. 

 

 France decided to prescribe the Assange treatment to Durov.

Under the Orwellian Digital Services Act adopted by the EU in 2022, key requirements include disclosing to regulators how the platform  algorithms work, removing content deemed illegal or any content that EU-funded "fact-checkers" deem inappropriate. Think of what falls foul of  Facebook "community rules" and you get a pretty good idea of what kind of content will be censored. Of course Durov will have to provide a backdoor and encryption keys to Western intelligence services and the police.

Laura Ruggeri - August 25, 2024

 

oooo0oooo 

Mike Benz joins Tucker Carlson and breaks down everything about the US Deep State’s
involvement in Telegram, and why they arrested Pavel Durov. Watch the full conversation HERE.

 

French authorities accuse Durov, who holds citizenships in Russia, France, Saint Kitts and Nevis, and the U.A.E., of complicity in drug trafficking, crimes against children and fraud due to the lack of moderation on his Telegram messenger platform. He could face up to 20 years in prison on all those charges, said Alain Duflot, a French specialist in international law and lecturer at the University of Lyon. Durov received French citizenship in 2021 and will stand trial as a French citizen, French TF1 TV reports. Analysts believe France may use Durov's trial to impose EU sanctions against Telegram, and doubt the possibility of Durov being released either before his trial on bail or after the trial. As he is a French citizen, his extradition to Russia or participation in a prisoner swap deal is reportedly impossible, despite the fact that he also has Russian citizenship.

 

TikTok. Telegram. X. Rumble.

The Great Replacement - Europe has fallen | Eva Vlaardingerbroek

Their message is clear. Our way of life, our Christian religion, our nations, they have to go without exception. Their vision of the future is the neoliberal, unrecognizable Europe, where every city becomes kind of like Brussels. Ugly, dirty, unsafe, zero social cohesion. And what are we left with? A permanent state of isolation, confusion and disorientation. 

 

» Everyone who has eyes can see it:

The native white Christian European population is being replaced at an ever-accelerating rate. ‌«

 

[...] So what's the antidote? A strong Christian Europe of sovereign nation states. That's why we need to outright reject the lie that nationalism causes war. It's not nationalism or national sovereignty that causes war. It's expansionism. And where in Europe do we find that nowadays? In one place and one place only: Brussels. Isn't it funny how the same people who erode our national sovereignty are now telling us that we need to spend billions and billions of euros on the national sovereignty of Ukraine?

» I am going to draw the forbidden conclusion:

The Great Replacement Theory is no longer a theory. ‌«  

[...] During a recent interview I got asked: "Do you think that you ever go too far? Do you think that you're ever too radical?" I thought about it for a second and said: "No, I don't think I go too far." Truth be told. I think we in Europe do not go far enough. I think that if we really think about the organized structural attack on our civilization, that we don't do enough. Do we do enough to stop the attack on our families, on our continent, on our countries and our religion? When we hear about another murder, another stabbing of a young innocent child, do we do enough? When we know that our national sovereignty has been given up in Brussels, do we do enough? When we hear that Christian kids in Germany are now converting to Islam to fit in, do we do enough? I don't think so. 

 

The totalitarian institution of the European Union needs to come down. Let me be clear: I don't believe in reforms. When the foundation of your institution is rotten, and that is the case in Brussels, you can rebuild the house on top of it all you want, but it's still going to crumble. So the only answer is: The Tower of Babel needs to be destroyed! We are the daughters and sons of the greatest nations on Earth. And we need to ask ourselves, what has happened to us? Where do we come from? And more importantly, where are we going? 

 

Our elites have declared a war on us, and now it is time for us to put on the full armor of God, fight back and win.  

 

Eva Vlaardingerbroek 

 

April 25, 2024

 

"The Islamic New World Order is Here - Europe has fallen."

Speech at the 'Conservative Political Action Conference' in Budapest, Hungary.

Google's woke AI makes Vikings black and the Pope a Woman

The men of today boast of the ever growing extent of the modifications they impose on the world, and the consequence is that everything is thereby made more and more ‘artificial’.

The falsification of everything has been shown to be one of the characteristic features of our period, but falsification is not in itself subversion properly so-called, though contributing directly to the preparation for it. Perhaps the clearest indication of this is what may be called the falsification of language, taking the form of the misuse of certain words that have been diverted from their true meaning; misuse of this kind is to some extent imposed by constant suggestion on the part of everyone who exercises any kind of influence over the mentality of the public.

René Guénon
1927

Sora │ Creating Video from Text

Reality aborted. Prompt:

“Historical footage of California during the gold rush”.

 

The launch of Sora yesterday marked the day that we can no longer tell what's real or fake on the internet anymore. 

This is the worst AI will ever be. Now the Americans really will go to the moon.

 

» There was truth and there was untruth, and if you clung to the truth even against the whole world, you were not mad. « 

Nineteen Eighty-Four
George Orwell

 

Reference:

Open AI (Feb 15, 2024) - Sora - Creating video from text.

 

AI expert Connor Leahy is a hacker, researcher and expert on Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). He is the CEO of Conjecture, 

a company he co-founded to focus on making AGI safe. He shares the view of many leading thinkers in the industry,

including the godfather of AI Geoffrey Hinton, who fear what they have built.  

Criticism of mRNA Vaccines now Punishable in France │ Thomas Oysmüller

On February 14, 2024, a law has been passed in France that criminalizes criticism of medical treatment that is appropriate according to "science". The law was pushed through the National Assembly; critics call the law 'Article Pfizer'. According to the law, anyone in France who advises against mRNA or other "medical treatments" that are "obviously suitable" for treatment according to the current state of medical knowledge can now be punished with up to three years in prison or a fine of up to 45,000 euros.

 

 » All tyrannies rule through fraud and force.

But once the fraud is exposed they must rely exclusively on force. «
Nineteen Eighty-Four
George Orwell

The law creates a new criminal offense that makes "incitement to discontinue or refrain from therapeutic or prophylactic medical treatment" and "incitement to use practices that are presented as therapeutic or prophylactic" punishable. This means that any opposition to mRNA treatment and other methods propagated by the pharmaceutical lobby can also be criminalized and punished.

Reference:

Thomas Oysmüller (Feb 15, 2024) - France: Criticism of mRNA will be punishable in the future.

 

One accused and the other one lauded for milking and culling the goyim:

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen sued in Belgium for €35 billion corruption

due to her shady COVID-19 BioNTech/Pfizer mRNA vaccine contracts with Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla.

 

Klaus Schwab's darling, former New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern had allegedly exempted thousands 

of 'high-ranking officials' or 'elites' from the COVID-19 mRNA vaccination, that she rigidly imposed on the ordinary Kiwi.

Scholz Will Go So Everything Remains The Same │ The Duran

Alex Christoforou & Alexander Mercouris:

Is Olaf Scholz, Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany 

- the governor of the most important US-vassal state in Europe - on his way out? 

 

This is what Springer's Bild, Europe’s biggest daily paper and a major CIA media in Germany, is suddenly peddling with. Bild creates a narrative around Scholz 'retiring' soon. He would be replaced by Boris Pistorius, the current Federal Minister of Defence, another seasoned senior Atlanticist, Anti-German, Warmonger, Russophobe and Zionist apparatchik of the US-occupation regime. Pistorius 'may' ban the AfD, Germany's most popular opposition party, Bild informs. To 'save democracy'. No worries. No elections. Steinmeier, Habeck, Baerbock, Faeser will remain. No regime change. Germany remains course. End of announcement.

"Majority wants Pistorius instead of Scholz" claims Bild,

while farmers block roads and fuel deliveries in largest nationwide protests ever.

Weimar 2.0.

 

Reference:

The Duran (Jan 07, 2024) - Is Olaf Scholz on his way out as German Chancellor? (video)

Legality and Legitimacy | Carl Schmitt

Carl Schmitt ranks among the most original and controversial political thinkers of the twentieth century. His incisive criticisms of Enlightenment political thought and liberal political practice remain as shocking and significant today as when they first appeared in Weimar Germany.

 

Carl Schmitt (1888 — 1985), » among the most original « , e.g.:

 » The emptiness of mere majority calculus deprives legality of all persuasive power. «

 

Legality and Legitimacy was composed in 1932, in the midst of the crisis that would lead to the collapse of the Weimar Republic and only a matter of months before Schmitt’s collaboration with the Nazis. Schmitt questions the political viability of liberal constitutionalism, parliamentary government, and the rule of law. Liberal governments, he argues, cannot respond effectively to challenges by radical groups like the Nazis or Communists. Only a presidential regime subject to few, if any, can ensure domestic security in a highly pluralistic society.

Quoted from the introduction to the 2004 first English translation of

Carl Schmitt (1932) - Legality and Legitimacy.

 

November 24, 2023 - In the People's Republic of China, Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) is linked to citizens' mandatory digital ID. If somebody drives over the speed limit, the speed camera system automatically deducts a fine from their digital wallet.

 

November 24, 2023 - President of the European Central Bank (ECB), Christine Lagarde, announces the launch of the European CBDC — the digital euro — which will enable unelected technocrats at the ECB to program how, when, where, on what and by whom it can be spent, including the imposition of social credit, carbon allowance and vaccine passport systems. And despite the lie that 'cash is here to stay', you can be absolutely certain that megalomaniac technocrats such as Lagarde have every intention of gradually phasing out cash altogether, so eventually people will be forced to use CBDCs. European Union citizens already face imprisonment or fines for engaging in cash transactions above €1000, but the introduction of the digital euro will facilitate financial totalitarianism on a scale that would make even George Orwell wince.

 

November 24, 2023 - Christine Anderson, German Member of the European Parliament, explains how CBDCs, in conjunction with digital ID, will be used to exert absolute control over the population: » If you don't comply, they will just shut down your bank account. And it's not like it hasn't happened before. Look to Canada ... There were people standing up for their freedom, for their right not to get some unknown substance injected into their arms. They shut down their bank accounts. So if there was no cash, what are you going to do? They can just eliminate you with a flip of a switch. It's as simple as that. «

 

 

» This would imply to castrate humankind and to degrade it down to the pitiful level of the Chinese. «

Friedrich Nietzsche (1888) answering to Immanuel Kant's 'eternal peace' ideas in his Ecce Homo. Why I am a destiny.

Schwab’s Idea Will Fail | Martin A. Armstrong

Martin A. Armstrong (Oct 03, 2022) - Now insofar as the sovereign debt default, we are looking at governments collapsing which will take down banks that must retain reserves in government bonds. Klaus Schwab is an academic. He has ZERO real-world experience. His ideas will collapse just like Marx for the one element both ignore is human nature. It cost over 200 million lives for Marx to get his theory in place. Communism collapsed because without curiosity and freedom to explore, talk, and think, all advancement of society comes to an end.

Klaus Schwab

Schwab’s idea will fail because the setup is different this time. Marxism succeeded because in Russia serfdom ended only during the 1860s. Therefore, the common people DID NOT own anything and it made sense to raid the rich. This time, people own houses and cars, and they save with pensions and to help their children. This time the common people would have to surrender all their assets so Schwab’s Marxist theories can be implemented. It is a whole different board game this time around.

Quoted from:
Martin A. Armstrong (Oct 03, 2022) - Answering Questions

Wall Street's Revolutionary Socialism for Mexico | Anthony C. Sutton

Anthony C. Sutton (1974) - Another case of revolution supported by New York financial institutions concerned that of Mexico in 1915-16. Von Rintelen, a German espionage agent in the United States, was accused during his May 1917 trial in New York City of attempting to "embroil" the U.S. with Mexico and Japan in order to divert ammunition then flowing to the Allies in Europe. 

 

Iconic image of revolutionary Pancho Villa in Ojinaga, a publicity still taken
by Mutual Film Corporation photographer John Davidson Wheelan, January 1914

 

Payment for the ammunition that was shipped from the United States to the Mexican revolutionary Pancho Villa, was made through Guaranty Trust Company. Von Rintelen's adviser, Sommerfeld, paid $380,000 via Guaranty Trust and Mississippi Valley Trust Company to the Western Cartridge Company of Alton, Illinois, for ammunition shipped to El Paso, for forwarding to Villa. This was in mid-1915. On January 10, 1916, Villa murdered seventeen American miners at Santa Isabel and on March 9, 1916, Villa raided Columbus, New Mexico, and killed eighteen more Americans. 

 

Columbus, New Mexico, after being raided by Pancho Villa

 

Wall Street involvement in these Mexican border raids was the subject of a letter (October 6, 1916) from Lincoln Steffens, an American Communist, to Colonel House [Edward Mandell House], an aide' to Woodrow Wilson: My dear Colonel House: Just before I left New York last Monday, I was told convincingly that "Wall Street" had completed arrangements for one more raid of Mexican bandits into the United States: to be so timed and so atrocious that it would settle the election [...]

 

Venustiano Carranza, 44th President of Mexico,
First Chief of the Constitutionalist Army, 1920

 

Once in power in Mexico, the Carranza government purchased additional arms in the United States. The American Gun Company contracted to ship 5,000 Mausers and a shipment license was issued by the War Trade Board for 15,000 guns and 15,000,000 rounds of ammunition. The American ambassador to Mexico, Fletcher, "flatly refused to recommend or sanction the shipment of any munitions, rifles, etc., to Carranza." However, intervention by Secretary of State Robert Lansing reduced the barrier to one of a temporary delay, and "in a short while [the American Gun Company] would be permitted to make the shipment and deliver."

The raids upon the U.S. by the Villa and the Carranza forces were reported in the New York Times as the "Texas Revolution" (a kind of dry run for the Bolshevik Revolution) and were undertaken jointly by Germans and Bolsheviks. The testimony of John A. Walls, district attorney of Brownsville, Texas, before the 1919 Fall Committee yielded documentary evidence of the link between Bolshevik interests in the United States, German activity, and the Carranza forces in Mexico.

Consequently, the Carranza government, the first in the world with a Soviet-type constitution (which was written by Trotskyites), was a government with support on Wall Street. The Carranza revolution probably could not have succeeded without American munitions and Carranza would not have remained in power as long as he did without American help.

 

[...] We also identified documentary evidence concerning a Wall Street syndicate's financing of the 1912 Sun Yat-sen revolution in China, a revolution that is today hailed by the Chinese Communists as the precursor of Mao's revolution in China. Charles B. Hill, New York attorney negotiating with Sun Yat-sen in behalf of this syndicate, was a director of three Westinghouse subsidiaries, and we have found that Charles R. Crane of Westinghouse in Russia was involved in the Russian Revolution.

Quoted from:
Antony C. Sutton (1974) - Wallstreet and the Bolshevik Revolution

See also:
The Library of Congress - The Mexican Revolution and the United States

Lenin. Money. Revolution. | Serhii Hrabovsky

The themes linked to Lenin, money, and revolution present an inexhaustible source of inquiry for historians, psychologists, and satirists. Just imagine: we have a man who, after the complete victory of communism, urged that toilet bowls in public restrooms be made of solid gold; a man who never had to earn a living through hard work; a man who was comfortably off even in prison and exile, and barely knew what money was, yet at the same time made a considerable contribution to the theory of commodity-money relations.

How exactly did he manage to do that? Not through brochures and articles, of course, but through his revolutionary activities. It was Lenin who, between 1919 and 1921, introduced non-monetary “natural” barter between towns and the countryside. This led to the total collapse of the economy, a complete standstill in agriculture, mass famines, and, consequently, mass uprisings against the regime of the Russian Communist Party. Only then, just before his death, did Lenin perceive the true meaning of money and introduce the NEP (New Economic Policy), a kind of “manageable capitalism” under the supervision of the Communist Party.

 

 

However, our purpose here is not to explore these fascinating subjects, but to investigate where Vladimir Lenin got the enormous sums necessary to fund party activities before the revolution. Over recent decades, some very interesting materials have been published, but much remains obscure. For example, at the beginning of the 20th century, the underground newspaper 'Iskra' was funded by a mysterious benefactor (individual or collective), disguised in party documents as the “Californian gold mines.” Some researchers believe this was an instance of radical Russian revolutionaries being sponsored by American Jewish bankers, mostly Russian expatriates and their descendants, who hated Tsarism for its official anti-Semitic policies.

During the revolution of 1905-07, the Bolsheviks were funded by American oil corporations aiming to push their rivals out of the world markets (specifically, Nobel’s oil cartel in Baku). At that time, American banker Jacob Schiff also provided money to the Bolsheviks, as he himself confessed. Other donors included Yermasov, a manufacturer from Syzran, and Morozov, a merchant and industrialist near Moscow. Later, the Bolshevik party gained another financial supporter in Schmidt, the owner of a furniture factory in Moscow. It is curious that both Savva Morozov and Nikolai Schmidt eventually committed suicide, allowing the Bolsheviks to inherit a considerable portion of their fortunes. Of course, large sums also came from the so-called “ex’es” (a truncated form of “expropriation”), or, in simpler terms, bank robberies, post office heists, and railway ticket-office hold-ups. These actions were masterminded by two characters with criminal monickers: Kamo and Koba, i.e., Ter-Petrosian and Dzhugashvili.

Nevertheless, hundreds of thousands, and even millions, of rubles invested in revolutionary activities could at best only shake the Russian Empire. Despite its shortcomings, the empire’s institutions were relatively solid—at least in peacetime. With the outbreak of World War I, however, new financial and political opportunities opened up for the Bolsheviks, and they didn’t fail to take advantage of them. On January 15, 1915, the German ambassador in Istanbul sent a report to Berlin regarding his meeting with Russian subject Aleksander Gelfand (aka Parvus), an active participant in the 1905-07 revolution and owner of a large trade company. Parvus revealed his plan for the Russian revolution and was immediately invited to Berlin, where he met with influential members of the German cabinet and advisors to Chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg. Parvus suggested that the Germans provide him with a large sum of money to help promote, first, the national movements in Finland and Ukraine, and second, to support the Bolsheviks, who advocated for the defeat of the Russian Empire in the unjust war in order to overthrow the “regime of landlords and capitalists.” The Germans accepted his proposal and, by Kaiser Wilhelm’s personal order, gave him two million German marks as the first contribution to “the cause of the Russian revolution.” Later, other installments followed, some of them for even larger sums. According to a receipt from Parvus, on January 29, 1915, he received 15 million Russian rubles for the development of the revolutionary movement in Russia. The money was allotted with typical German efficiency.

In Finland and Ukraine, Parvus’ (and the German general staff’s) agents turned out to be of secondary importance. Their influence on the independence movements in these countries was insignificant compared to the broader processes of nation-building in the Russian Empire. However, in regard to Lenin, Parvus hit the bull’s-eye. Parvus claimed that he told Lenin that, at that moment, revolution was only possible in Russia and only as a result of Germany winning the war. In response, Lenin sent his proxy Fuerstenberg (aka Ganetsky) for close cooperation with Parvus, which lasted until 1918. Another installment from Germany, although not as large, came to the Bolsheviks via Swiss parliamentarian Karl Moor—amounting to only $35,000. More investments came from the Nia Bank in Stockholm, which, on the order of the German Imperial Bank, opened personal accounts for Lenin, Trotsky, Zinoviev, and other Bolshevik leaders. Order No. 7433 of March 2, 1917, allocated funds for the “services” of Lenin, Zinoviev, Kollontai, and others in spreading public peace propaganda in Russia after the Tsarist regime had just been overthrown.

The enormous sums were wisely administered. The Bolsheviks published their own newspapers, which were distributed free of charge in every town and village. A network of professional propagandists covered the entire territory of Russia, and “Red Guard” units were formed openly. Of course, this was not done with German money alone. Although the “poor” political émigré Trotsky had $10,000 confiscated by Canadian customs in Halifax in 1917 while en route from America to Russia, it is clear that he still managed to smuggle vast sums from banker Jacob Schiff to his supporters.

Even greater funds were raised during the “expropriation of the expropriators” (in simpler terms, robbing the wealthy), initiated in the spring of 1917. Has it ever occurred to anyone to question the Bolsheviks' occupation of the palace of ballerina Kshesinskaya or the Smolny Institute?

The Russian democratic revolution broke out unexpectedly in early spring 1917 for all its political subjects, both inside and outside the empire. It was a spontaneous, grass-roots movement both in Petrograd and on the empire's outskirts. Lenin, who was in exile in Switzerland, had publicly doubted only a month earlier whether the politicians of his generation (those in their 40s and 50s) would live to see a revolution in Russia. However, it was the radical Russian politicians who were the quickest to change their ways and seize the opportunity, aided by German assistance.

All in all, the Russian revolution was not accidental. It is even strange that it did not break out a year earlier. The social, political, and national problems in the Romanov empire had reached their breaking point. From a formal economic perspective, industry was developing dynamically, and the stockpile of weapons and ammunition had increased considerably. Yet, the utter inefficiency of central power and the corruption of the elite—inevitable in any autocracy—took their toll. The deliberate corruption of the army, the undermining of the rear, the sabotage of any attempts to constructively address urgent problems, and the incurable chauvinistic centralism typical of virtually all Great Russian political forces exacerbated the crisis. During the 1917 campaign, Entente troops were supposed to launch a simultaneous general offensive on all European fronts, but the Russian army was unprepared. Consequently, in April, the Anglo-French forces at Rheims failed, with casualties exceeding 100,000 dead and wounded. In July, Russian troops attempted an offensive towards Lviv, but eventually had to retreat from Galicia and Bukovina, and nearly gave up Riga in the north without resistance. Finally, the Battle of Caporetto in October resulted in the disastrous defeat of the Italian army, with 130,000 Italians dead and another 300,000 taken prisoner. Only the English and French divisions, urgently shipped from France, stabilized the front and prevented Italy from withdrawing from the war. After the November uprising in Petrograd, when the Bolsheviks and Left Social Revolutionaries came to power, an armistice was declared on the Eastern front—first de facto and then de jure, with Russia, Ukraine, and Romania.

These changes on the Eastern front were largely made possible by funds allotted by Germany to demoralize the Russian army from the rear. The military operations on the Eastern front, prepared and executed with large-scale success, were considerably facilitated by undermining activities within Russia, conducted by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. "Our chief goal in this activity was to further strengthen the nationalist and separatist sentiments, and support the revolutionary elements. We are continuing this activity even at present and completing an agreement with the political division of the General Staff in Berlin" (Captain von Huelsen).

"Our joint efforts have yielded considerable results. Without our constant support, the Bolshevist movement could never have reached the scale and influence it has now. Everything testifies to the further growth of this movement." These were the words of German Secretary of State Richard von Kuehlmann, written on September 29, 1917. A month and a half before the Bolshevik revolt in Petrograd, von Kuehlmann knew what he was talking about. He was an active participant in all those events; soon after, he would conduct peace negotiations with Bolshevik Russia and the Ukrainian People's Republic in Brest in early 1918. He controlled huge financial currents, amounting to tens of thousands of German marks, and had contacts with key figures in this historic drama. “I have the honor of asking Your Excellence to allot a sum of 15 million marks at the disposal of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for political propaganda in Russia, referring to paragraph 6, section II of the extraordinary budget. Depending on the development of events, I would like to stipulate in advance the possibility of addressing Your Excellence again for additional funds,” von Kuehlmann wrote on November 9, 1917.

No sooner had news of the Petrograd revolt (soon to be labeled the Great October Revolution) arrived than Kaiser Germany allocated new funds for propaganda in Russia. This money went primarily to support the Bolsheviks, who first demoralized the army and then withdrew the Russian Republic from the war, freeing millions of German soldiers for operations in the West.

Despite all this, the Bolsheviks managed to maintain the image of unselfish revolutionaries and romantic Marxists until today. Even now, not only “official” adepts of the Marxist-Leninist creed but also some non-party left intellectuals remain convinced that Lenin and his followers were sincere internationalists and noble champions of the popular cause.

In 1958, Oxford University published secret documents from the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs (including von Kuehlmann’s telegrams) which proved the massive financial and organizational assistance provided by the German authorities to the Bolsheviks. Germany’s goals were clear: the radical revolutionaries were to undermine the military potential of one of the principal rivals of the Central Powers, i.e., the Russian Empire. Thousands of books have been published providing further convincing evidence. Yet, even today, many communist historians and some liberal researchers deny these self-evident historical facts. As German Secretary of State von Kuehlmann noted on December 3, 1917, “Only when the Bolsheviks began to receive constant investments from us via various channels and under various labels were they able to firmly establish their major printed organ, 'Pravda', develop active propaganda, and significantly enlarge their party base, which was rather narrow at the beginning.” Party membership grew a hundredfold within just a year after the overthrow of Tsarism.

Colonel Walter Nicolai, head of German military intelligence during World War I, described Lenin in his memoirs as follows: “Like anyone else at the time, I knew nothing about Bolshevism; as for Lenin, I only knew that he was living in Switzerland as a political émigré. Under the cryptonym ‘Ulianov,’ he provided my service with valuable information on the situation in Tsarist Russia against which he was fighting.”

In other words, without constant German assistance, the Bolsheviks would hardly have become one of the leading Russian parties in 1917. This would have meant a completely different development of events, probably much more anarchical, which would hardly have led to the establishment of a dictatorship, let alone a totalitarian regime. The most likely scenario would have been a different version of the disintegration of the Russian Empire, as World War I was primarily about the destruction of empires. The independence of Finland and Poland was effectively a fait accompli around 1916.

The Russian Empire, or even the Russian Republic, would likely have followed the same process of collapse triggered by World War I. Consider that Britain was forced to grant independence to Ireland, India was pushing for independence right after the war, and many other colonial territories followed suit. The revolution itself was, to some extent, marked by national-liberation struggles, as it was the Life Guards Volhynia Regiment that first rebelled against autocracy in early 1917. At that time, the Bolsheviks were a tiny party, barely known to anyone (with only about four thousand members, mostly in exile and emigration). They had no significant role in overthrowing Tsarism.

Assistance continued after Lenin’s government came to power. "You are free to operate large sums, as we are extremely interested in the stability of the Bolsheviks. You have Riesler’s funds at your disposal. If necessary, wire us how much more you need." (Berlin, May 18, 1918). Von Kuehlmann addressed the German embassy in Moscow, confirming the continuing German support for the Bolsheviks. The Bolsheviks held fast, and by the fall of 1918, they were channeling huge sums from the Russian imperial treasury into revolutionary propaganda in Germany, hoping to incite world revolution.

In Germany, a revolution did break out in early November 1918. Money, weapons, and qualified professional revolutionaries shipped from Moscow played their role. However, local communists failed to lead this revolution. Subjective and (more importantly) objective factors worked against them. A totalitarian regime was only established in Germany 15 years later, but that is a different story. Meanwhile, in 1921, the democratic Weimar Republic's renowned social democrat Eduard Bernstein published an article in his party's central organ 'Vorwärts' titled “A Shady Story,” in which he revealed that, as early as December 1917, he had received confirmation from “a certain competent person” that Germany had given money to Lenin. According to Bernstein, the Bolsheviks alone were paid more than 50 million German marks in gold. This sum was later officially mentioned in a session of the Reichstag's foreign policy committee. When the communist press accused Bernstein of libel, he invited them to sue him, which led to an immediate cessation of the campaign. Since Germany was in desperate need of friendly relations with Soviet Russia, the discussion of this topic in the press was abruptly shut down.

Aleksander Kerensky, one of the Bolsheviks’ main political opponents, concluded from his own investigation that the total sums received by the Bolsheviks before and after coming to power amounted to 80 million German marks in gold. In fact, Lenin never even tried to conceal this from his party colleagues. At a meeting of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee (a Bolshevik quasi-parliament) in November 1918, Lenin stated: “I am often accused of having carried out our revolution with German money; I do not deny it, but with Russian money, I am going to carry out the same revolution in Germany.” And he tried to do so, throwing away tens of millions of rubles. However, he failed: the German social democrats, unlike their Russian counterparts, quickly recognized the situation and arranged for the timely assassination of Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg. This was followed by the disarmament of the “Red Guards” and the physical elimination of their leaders.

They had no other option. Perhaps, if Kerensky had found the courage to order the shooting of Smolny along with all its "red" inhabitants, even the Kaiser’s millions wouldn’t have helped them. We might round off here, were it not for a report from 'The New York Times' in April 1921, stating that in 1920 alone, 75 million Swiss francs were sent to Lenin’s account in a Swiss bank. According to the newspaper, Trotsky had $11 million and 90 million francs in his accounts; Zinoviev had 80 million francs; the “knight of the revolution,” Dzerzhinsky, had 80 million; and Ganetsky-Fuerstenberg had 60 million francs and 10 million dollars. Lenin, in his secret note to Cheka leaders Unschlicht and Bokiy on April 24, 1921, demanded they find the source of this information leak. However, it was never discovered.

Was this money also intended for the world revolution? Or was it some form of kickback from politicians and financiers in countries where Lenin and Trotsky’s “red horses” were not ordered to go? We can only speculate. Even now, a significant portion of Lenin’s papers remains top secret.

Quoted from: 

Serhii Hrabovsky (2010) - Lenin. Money. Revolution.

See also:

Eustace C. Mullins (1952) - The Study of The Federal Reserve and Its Secrets.

Arsene de Goulevitch (1962) - Czarism and Revolution: From the Past to the Future of Russia.

Carroll Quigley (1966) - Tragedy and Hope: A History of The World In Our Time.

Gary Allen and Larry Abraham (1971) - None Dare Call It Conspiracy.
Gary D. Best (1972) - Financing a Foreign War: Jacob H. Schiff and Japan, 1904–05. 

Antony C. Sutton (1974) - Wallstreet and the Bolshevik Revolution.

Carroll Quigley (1981) - The Anglo-American Establishment.

 Quora (2017) - Who funded the Bolsheviks rise to power in Russia?  

Klaus Schwab & Thierry Malleret (2020) - COVID-19: The Great Reset.