Warning

A possibility of a false flag attack in Finland

From Tuomas Malinen on Geopolitics and the Economy.

In Hybrid, published on Monday, I noted

So, I am suspecting that, while he [President Trump] has been unable (unwilling) to force Ukraine into an effective capitulation, he is letting Russia do the forcing. He might play into de-escalation in the background.

The following day, we received something of a confirmation of this after the two-hour phone call between Presidents Putin and Trump. Axios reports the aftermath of the call in a follow-up call between five European leaders and President Zelenskyy:

Other European leaders on the call asked about the possibility of U.S. sanctions against Russia, but Trump said he didn't think it was a good idea and stressed that he thought Putin wanted a deal.

And there we have it. I will explain this in more detail in the paywalled section below, but the fact is that we have entered a new, dangerous stage in the Russo-Ukrainian conflict (unless President Trump flip-flops, again). I also asked Grok how the conflict could end. Here is his answer.

The most likely near-term outcome is a continued stalemate with periodic ceasefire talks that struggle to produce a lasting agreement. A negotiated truce is possible but would require significant concessions, likely under U.S. pressure, which could alienate Ukraine and its European allies. Escalation remains a risk if talks collapse, but a decisive victory for either side is improbable given current constraints. The war’s trajectory will depend on Western aid, Russian military sustainability, and diplomatic breakthroughs, with no clear resolution expected in the immediate future.

This is a good consensus scenario, but wars tend to have the habit of pushing likelihoods into the margins. This is why I issue a worst-case scenario warning considering the Europe-Russia-Ukraine conflict, which likelihood can be considered to be unpleasantly high.

I warn of the possibility of a major false flag strike in Finland.

We, at GnS Economics, have been analyzing the background for the deepening escalation in and around Ukraine for about a year. In the Weekly Forecasts published on January 11, we noted:

Since August, our base-line scenario (working hypothesis) has been the Peak Escalation. Peak Escalation simply indicates that there’s a push, most likely, by the NATO Deep State, the military industrial complex and the group-over-groups (etc.), hypothesized by Tuomas, to lead to world into a perpetual war. Most unfortunately, our hypothesis has hold true. We cannot pretend that we would o know all the motives behind the Peak Escalation this at this point, but money (vast profits created by wars to many) definitely plays a role.

We seem to have ‘dodged’ the worst possible scenarios of Peak Escalation during the past six months, partly because Kreml has not allowed itself to be provoked to over-react and partly because, for reasons unknown, NATO has not gone all the way with the escalation (e.g., there has not been a ‘false flag’ attack). Yet, we consider that the aims of Peak Escalation have not changed, while methods used to push it may have. There may be just a change in strategy.

This is why we issue two warnings:

1. There will be attempts to post-pone, or completely derail the peace process in Ukraine during H1 2025.

2. If this (peace in Ukraine) comes to be, as we suspect it eventually will, another front with Russia will be opened somewhere in the axis of Poland/Belarus, Baltics or the Nordics, shortly after.

If (when) peace in Ukraine starts to look likely, we can expect some sudden setbacks with the treaty, combined with increasing tensions in the vicinity of the Russian western border. Estimated timeline: peace in Ukraine by summer/early fall, increasing tensions by late 2025 with another conflict commencing in early 2026.

At this juncture, Finland steps into the picture.