Original title: Who is funding the conflict? Michael Schneider on the power of banks & BlackRock
Interviewer: Patrik Baab¹
Guest: Michael Schneider
Published: July 26, 2026
By: Gegen den Strom @PatrikBaab-Official²
On: YouTube

My comment: see footnote³

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In total this is a discussion about the hidden mechanisms of power, the necessity of civic courage, and the urgent appeal: Recognize the patterns of history before they repeat themselves.

Michael Schneider looks back on decades of work as a critical intellectual and bestselling author. He argues for a return to reason and shows why the loss of historical awareness poses the greatest threat to a peaceful future in Europe.
A discussion about the hidden mechanisms of power, the necessity of civic courage, and the urgent appeal: Recognize the patterns of history before they repeat themselves.

In this interview, writer and professor Michael Schneider analyses the historical and economic driving forces behind the current confrontation with Russia. While the official narrative often emphasizes moral values, Schneider looks behind the scenes of a system driven by financial interests and a deeply rooted historical repression.

The conversation with Michael Schneider covers:
– The Economics of War: Why the Third Reich’s campaign in Russia was also a gigantic amortization plan for the German economy and what role financial capital plays today in fuelling conflicts.
– The Power of Banks: How financial giants like BlackRock and Goldman Sachs extend their influence to the highest levels of government and use wars as a means of securing devalued loans.
– Reversal of Perpetrator and Victim: Why the crimes against Soviet citizens remain a taboo subject in Germany’s collective memory and how this repression is giving rise to a new, dangerous Russophobia.
– The Betrayal of Intellectuals: The failure of the academic elite and the creeping conformity in media and universities, which increasingly marginalizes critical voices.
– Civilizational Regression: How digitalization and AI are leading to a society without history and why the legacy of the Enlightenment is under such massive attack today.
– The Crumbling Empire: Why the USA, as a “bankrupt state,” is ruthlessly sacrificing its vassals in Europe for its own interests – from deindustrialization to the destruction of vital infrastructure like Nord Stream.
“An empire that treats its vassals this way only shows how deep in the shit it is itself.”

Michael Schneider looks back on decades of work as a critical intellectual and bestselling author. He argues for a return to reason and shows why the loss of historical awareness poses the greatest threat to a peaceful future in Europe.

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Timestamps
01. Economics and History: Can a Lost War Be Won? — 00:00
02. The Russian Campaign as an Amortization Plan for German Industry — 01:45
03. “All Wars Are Bankers Wars”: The Role of Financial Capital in Modern Conflicts — 03:50
04. The Power of Banks: When BlackRock and Goldman Sachs Managers Rule — 06:10
05. Plundering Ukraine: Contracts on Raw Materials and Energy Resources — 07:50
06. Managing National Debt: How to Make Money from the Ruin of Others — 11:10
07. The Suppressed Crime Against Humanity: Commemoration Culture and Its Blind Spots —13:40
08. Perpetrator-Victim Reversal: The Creeping Inheritance of Russophobia — 16:40
09. Collective Relief: Why February 24, 2022, Was Used as a “Liberation to Hate” — 19:55
10. The Betrayal of Intellectuals: Careerism vs. Civil Courage — 25:45
11. Ideological Purge: Self-Censorship in Publishing Houses and Universities — 28:30
12. Embedded Philosophy: How the German Mind Became a Sycophant of Power — 32:20
13. Civilizational Regression: From the Enlightenment to a Historyless AI Society — 38:15
14. Identitarian Thinking as a Substitute for Reason: The Legacy of the Enlightenment in Danger — 43:10
15. Aggression Shift: How Social Anger Is Politically Instrumentalized — 50:10
16. A Tottering Colossus: The USA Between Financial Collapse and Aggression Against Vassals — 55:20
17. Nord Stream and Deindustrialization: When Empires Sacrifice Their Allies — 57:55

Footnotes

1. Patrik Baab is a German journalist and author. His research has focused on topics including intelligence agencies and political assassinations, the war in Ukraine, Russia, and geopolitical issues. He has worked in Eastern Europe and Russia, Scandinavia, Ukraine, the Balkans, and the United Kingdom. Source: Website Patrik Baab, about ↩︎
2. Gegen den Strom: @PatrikBaab-Official ↩︎
3. My comment:
   
   At 24:08 Michael Schneider makes a big mistake by stating that it was a mistake of Putin to march into Ukraine. As the Russian investigative journalist, who worked for “Echo of Moscow” and “Novaya Gazeta”, Yulia Latynina said: “They left us no choice…” in the interview with the Ukrainian Diana Panchenko: “”I WANT TO RETURN TO RUSSIA.” A Big Interview with Latynina“, published on Panchenko LIVE channel, @PanchenkoOnline on July 12, 2026.
   The cause of the decision to enter Ukraine via the start of the special operation is directly related to all what happened before that day in 2022, and which started in 2014 in Maidan, with the massacre, orchestrated by the USA and the coup, that followed, also orchestrated by the USA.[1][2][5]
   
   The anti-Russians in Ukraine even wanted to stop the foodsupplements in 2015 to Donbass and to create a genocide there[2]. In the documentary “Donbass”[6], made by Anne-Laure Bonnel in January 2015, we can even witness a long convoy with trucks, from Russia, transporting food to Donbass. The docu is available on YouTube.
   There was a war going on, because of NATO expansion[8], NATO provoked the Russians by expanding, Jens Stoltenberg even admitted it[9], they did it in order to get the answer where they were begging for and are experiencing now. To make the western citizens believe that Russia started the war.
   The correct sentence is: Russia was provoked to start te war.
   
   At the end there was indeed no other choice left, than to start with the “enough is enough”, and that is not a mistake, but a must in order to stop the NATO violations, and even till the moment of the present, NATO continues provoking. It is, since the attacks deep inside Russia not about provocations anymore, but a real war and Russia reacts on it in the legal way, in the way NATO/the collective west has begged for, laughed about, and downplayed, humiliated the Russians, making the blood of the Russians boil and finally attacking targets deep inside Russia.
   
   A filthy, vile, extremely aggressive anti-Russia rhetoric, full of slander and hatred was and is used by NATO’s secretary general Rutte, a maniacal warmonger. We have all heard it, it was/is his face, his mouth, his voice and he was not forced to walk to the microphone, and not forced to speak. He did it voluntarily. With joy and pleasure. NATO has even started with hiring two psychologists from the Cambridge university, to create a psychological system that creates “mass formation[10]”, and is named “Cognitive Warfare”. It is published on the NATO website[11] and not hidden. Even the names of the psychologists are publicly available[11].
   What we witnessed and are witnessing is the big mistake of the west. Not of Russia.
   
   So, please correct that, Michael Schneider, and start to read the following utterly important books, articles and even 2 lectures.
   
   [1] “The Russia Ukraine War And Its Origins, From the Maidan to the Ukraine War” – professor Ivan Katchanovski
   [2] “What I saw in Ukraine – 2015-2022 – diary of an international monitor – far away from the mainstream narrative” – Benoît Paré
   [3] “Ukraine: The Great Manipulation – 2022-2024 – decryption of war propaganda” – Benoît Paré
   [4] “[Stalingrad] is our reference point now more than ever, an unparalleled symbol of resistance, our enemies’ worst nightmare…Whosoever tries it will meet the end of all the others – Swedes, Napoleon, the Germans and their allies…Russians are like the Scythians: they wait, they suffer, they die, and then they kill.” Source: The Franco-British Plot to Dismember Russia, written by investigative journalist Kit Klarenberg, on Substack, June 26, 2024.
   [5] Jeffrey D. Sachs: “The ninth anniversary of the Ukraine war“, published on his website, on February 28, 2023.
   [6] Documentary “Donbass”, made by Anne-Laure Bonnel in January 2015. Published on YouTube.
   [7] “Three types of Ukrainians, how we were divided“, a lecture by the Ukrainian Diana Panchenko, Панченко LIVE @PanchenkoOnline (21 April, 2026)
   [8] YouTube “The Expansion of NATO Since 1949” by @WawamuStats
   [9] YouTube “Jens Stoltenberg admits NATO expansion provoked Ukraine War“, by @World_Politics1
   [10] Book: “The Psychology of Totalitarianism“, written by Dr. Mattias Desmet. YouTube: Neutrality Studies / Pascal Lottaz, May 3, 2026: “EU in Grip of Deadly Mass-Formation”  | Prof. Mattias Desmet
   [11] Lecture: “Dr. Jonas Tögel: Die Kognitive Kriegsführung der NATO – mein Vortrag bei W.I.R.“, published by Dr. Jonas Tögel on his YouTube channel @DrJonasToegel – Brilliantly explained in the lecture, at 1:19:56 – “Inoculation Theory and Misinformation”, published 29th October 2021 in NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence, by Jon Roozenbeek and Sander van der Linden. see post. ↩︎