|
Hello Reader,
A tectonic shift in the Middle East, a student revolt in Eastern Europe, and Trump’s dirty deal in Africa. Plus, I get salty with the trolls.
The Global Fight Against Tyranny
- Serbia's Rebel Youth Refuse Surrender
- Trump's Dirty Deal in the Congo
- Syria Severs Its Persian Chains
- Iran Bleeds from Old Wounds
- Made in China: Russia’s War Machine
Country names are followed by their 2025 freedom scores according to Freedom House.
Sixteen lives crushed beneath a railway canopy last November unleashed the fury of a nation. The concrete collapse in Novi Sad exposed the deadly cost of corruption and institutional dysfunction that has plagued Serbia for decades. Four months later, up to 300,000 protesters marched on Belgrade. This week, as the academic year ends, students maintaining university occupations face an agonizing choice: graduate now or go for broke in their push to bring down Vučić. Many have chosen the latter, planning for fresh nationwide protests and a blockade of Parliament later this week.
After decades of war and authoritarianism, Serbia tasted freedom when student-led resistance toppled dictator Slobodan Milosevic in 2000. But since 2012, Aleksandar Vucic has consolidated media ownership, captured the judiciary through political appointments, faced allegations of election fraud, and strangled independent press outlets. Freedom House downgraded Serbia from "Free" to "Partly Free" in 2019, citing his "accumulation of executive powers."
Today's movement echoes that victorious 2000 uprising. After forcing the prime minister's resignation in January and exposing classified documents, students have demanded snap parliamentary elections. Despite government intimidation, university occupations continue. Their principled resistance has united farmers, teachers, and professionals demanding transparent governance and institutional accountability.
A new generation of Serbians refuses to surrender their future.
M23 rebels, backed by Rwanda, stormed Goma in January—killing up to 2,000 civilians, sending families fleeing, and triggering a five-fold surge in rape cases as they rampaged through eastern Congo. With 12,000 Rwandan troops behind them, the rebel army now controls vast mineral-rich territory that once belonged to the DRC.
This week, America brokered a genuine diplomatic achievement—a peace agreement between Rwanda and Congo set for signing June 27th. The deal demands Rwanda withdraw its forces while Congo addresses Rwandan security concerns. Both countries will unlock billions in Western mining investment.
Yet troubling gaps remain. M23 rebels aren't bound by any agreement, and Trump demanded no democratic reforms or guarantees that ordinary Congolese will benefit from their own mineral wealth.
As Trump's senior adviser has made clear, America will work with whoever makes the best offer.
The message is stark: America's partnership is up for auction. Seize your neighbor's cities, terrorize civilians, control their resources—and if your bid is high enough, America will legitimize your conquest with billion-dollar mining contracts.
A Syrian man brought sweets to the shuttered Iranian embassy in Damascus, an act of contempt that speaks volumes. For thirteen years, Iran helped orchestrate a civil war that killed over 500,000 Syrians. That small gesture captured something rare in Damascus: the sweetness of watching an oppressor’s empire begin to collapse.
He represents a massive geopolitical shift in the Middle East. For decades, Iran used Syria as the linchpin of its regional dominance, funneling weapons to Hezbollah and projecting power across the Arab world. Now President Ahmed al-Sharaa—the former al-Qaeda affiliate who leads Syria's transitional government—calls Iran a "strategic threat to the entire region."
Even more surprisingly, UAE-brokered talks between Syria and Israel have quietly advanced. What's striking isn't just Syria's pivot—it's how alone Iran suddenly seems. Across the region, even longtime critics of Israel are watching Iran's strikes with quiet approval or outright glee.
Perhaps I'm too sanguine about al-Sharaa given his jihadist past. But for Syrians who have known only war, choosing your own allies, charting your own course, and defying foreign empires could be the first glimpse of freedom.
Seven stealth bombers lifted off from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri at midnight Saturday, carrying 420,000 pounds of explosives. By now, you know the rest.
The path to this moment began in 1953, when the CIA and Britain's MI5 orchestrated a coup to overthrow Mohammad Mossadegh, Iran's democratically elected leader, falsely branding him a Communist. Mossadegh wanted to keep Iran's oil wealth for its own citizens. We wouldn’t let him.
Instead, we propped up Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. For twenty-six years, his CIA-trained SAVAK forces dripped acid into nostrils, hung weights from testicles, and burned dissidents on searing hot grills.
Yet America's Cold War sins cannot excuse what Iran became after 1979: an Islamist theocracy that executes more of its own citizens per capita than any country on earth. Whose proxies—Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis—have turned Arab capitals into war zones.
A brural oppressor that imprisoned and tortured Narges Mohammadi for defending women's rights and murdered Masha Amini for showing her hair.
A dictatorship that has vowed to annihilate Israel's 9.5 million citizens.
A regime that cannot have nuclear weapons.
I wish we had never sown the hatred that led here. I wish innocent people did not have to die. I wish there had been another way. If there was, I couldn't see it. Ultimately, Donald Trump couldn't either.
When Ukrainian investigators examined the debris from Russia's June 10th assault—nearly 500 drones targeting Kyiv alone—they uncovered damning evidence. Three people were killed and 15 injured in that single night's attack, which struck civilian areas including a maternity ward in Odesa. Inside the wreckage, investigators found that thirteen of fifteen components in one Shahed drone bore Chinese markings, compared to just two smuggled American parts.
This transformation represents Beijing's calculated escalation. The Economist reports that over 80% of critical electronics for Russian drones had Chinese origins at the start of this year, according to Ukraine's Foreign Intelligence Service. Meanwhile, China has deliberately cut drone sales to Ukraine and Europe. Beijing now refuses to sell its popular consumer drones to Ukrainian forces while keeping supplies flowing to Russia.
As Russia’s war machine churns out 2 million tactical drones annually, Chinese representatives now work inside Russian weapons factories, testing their technology on Ukrainian civilians. Behind every civilian death, every destroyed hospital, stands China's systematic choice to fuel Russia's war machine.
In conflict after conflict, China's shadow falls on the side of oppression.
Our American Democracy
Social Security Races Toward Insolvency
This week, Social Security trustees delivered a grim forecast: benefits must be cut by 23 percent in 2033 to keep the program solvent. This is the actuarial reality facing a system hemorrhaging money at an accelerating pace, with its annual deficit surging over 60% in 2024.
Congress accelerated the crisis with the Social Security Fairness Act. Signed by Joe Biden in January, it repealed benefit cuts for public workers—adding $195 billion to deficits over the next decade.
Yet reform remains politically radioactive. Democrats attack Republican proposals to gradually raise the retirement age as assaults on seniors, while Trump promised to "not cut one penny from Social Security" and eliminate taxes on benefits—moves that would accelerate insolvency to 2031.
Americans trusted politicians' promises for decades. The Ponzi scheme is collapsing: declining birth rates mean 1.62 children per woman today, fewer workers support each retiree—yet neither party can summon the political courage to save the program for future generations.
Trump's Incoherent Travel Ban Logic
Earlier this month, Trump signed a proclamation banning entry of citizens from 19 countries, claiming the move was necessary to protect America against "foreign terrorists" and other national security threats. Reports this week suggest the administration is considering adding 36 more countries to the ban.
The Cato Institute released a scathing analysis of Trump's ban, finding the administration's security justifications riddled with contradictions. The proclamation claims current vetting is inadequate, yet provides no evidence of failures.
Cato's analysis reveals glaring inconsistencies. Current law already requires every visa applicant to prove eligibility; those who cannot are automatically denied. Consular officers rejected 55 percent of visitor visas from targeted countries in 2024—double the global average. Yet the ban applies even to nationals who've never lived in their birth countries.
The Supreme Court's 2018 Trump v. Hawaii ruling granted presidents sweeping authority over immigration restrictions. Cato clearly demonstrates how that ruling enables arbitrary policy-making disguised as national security.
The administration's inability to provide coherent security justifications raises questions about the true motivations behind this sweeping restriction on legal immigration. MAGA, or MAWA?
Strange Bedfellows: Tucker Carlson and Elizabeth Warren
A curious alliance is emerging in American politics: Tucker Carlson and Elizabeth Warren are singing from the same hymnal about American "endless wars." The far-right podcaster and progressive senator have both warned against U.S. intervention in Iran, revealing how MAGA's isolationist wing has embraced premises once exclusive to the anti-war left.
The Wall Street Journal editorial page notes that, like leftists after Vietnam, prominent MAGA figures now suffer from "Iraq Syndrome"—viewing every potential intervention as inevitable quagmire. Carlson blasted Republican “warmongers” and called Trump "complicit" in Israel's Iran strikes, while Marjorie Taylor Greene warns intervention will "fracture" the MAGA movement. America First now means America out.
It’s a stunning reversal. Whereas conservatives once championed American strength abroad, influential MAGA voices now accept the left's framing of America as dangerously imperialist. Although most Republicans still support striking Iran's nuclear facilities, the loudest isolationist voices are drowning out the mainstream.
Trump's response to Tucker was surprisingly satisfying: 'Someone please explain to kooky Tucker Carlson that, IRAN CAN NOT HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON!'
Captain Renault's words in Casablanca ring even truer today: “Isolationism is no longer a practical foreign policy.”
Trump 1, Newsom 0
Last week, I predicted Newsom would win this battle, believing he had the stronger legal case. I was wrong. The Ninth Circuit handed Trump a significant victory Thursday, allowing him to maintain federal control of 4,000 California National Guard troops deployed to Los Angeles immigration protests. The three-judge panel—two Trump appointees and one Biden appointee—ruled that Trump's federalization deserved "high degree of deference" and likely fell within his statutory authority.
The decision blocks a lower court ruling that found Trump exceeded his authority by bypassing Governor Gavin Newsom, who normally commands state Guard units. District Judge Charles Breyer had concluded the L.A. situation didn't amount to a “rebellion” and ordered troops returned to state control.
The appeals court rejected California's argument that Trump's order was invalid for not going "through the governor," calling it a mere technicality. The panel cited evidence of protesters throwing objects at ICE vehicles and pinning down federal officers as justification.
California officials vowed to continue fighting, potentially seeking Supreme Court review, though their odds remain uncertain. Trump's 60-day order can be renewed and applied to any state.
What (Who) I'm Grappling with This Week
Trolls – that’s who. My Meta ad showcasing brave women from Iran’s "Woman, Life, Freedom" movement and Balochistan's fight for autonomy brought overwhelmingly positive feedback, but also attracted humanity's worst impulses. "Immediate DEPORT!" demanded one commenter—from where, exactly? "Go back to Gaza!" shouted another. “Ann” is apparently unaware that Balochistan lies 2,000 miles away in Pakistan. I shouldn't engage such ignorance, but sometimes mockery proves irresistible.
While I strive to welcome criticism with an open mind, one commenter was insufferable. Summoning all his liberal arts wisdom as a “trained philosopher”, he lectured me to "have some self-awareness of your Western bias." He demanded I "check my privilege"—without knowing a thing about me —and condemned "the US Empire and its death cult called capitalism."
Sadly, he's not alone. This zero-sum worldview—Western civilization as the oppressor, capitalism as the villain keeping others impoverished—increasingly defines young American discourse.
Yes, America has committed grievous sins: centuries of slavery, the Trail of Tears, CIA-orchestrated coups, Iraq's false premises. Yet no superpower in human history has done more to advance freedom and democracy. Show me any nation wielding comparable power that proved less imperialistic.
And as this week’s essay argued, the “death cult called capitalism” has lifted hundreds of millions from poverty in recent decades—in India after independence and in China under Deng Xiaoping's free market reforms.
The West's collective memory of tyranny is fading. But the women I showcased live it every day. Iranian women risk their lives for freedoms we take for granted. Balochi activists dream of democratic institutions some casually condemn.
While armchair philosophers lecture about Western bias, these women bleed for "Western" democratic values. The yearning for freedom is not regional. It’s universal.
Refer a Friend:
If you've enjoyed this episode of "Dispatches from the Rebellion", please consider referring a friend. Forward this email and ask them to click on the "Subscribe" button below to sign up.
|