Brave New Europe tackles wrongthink
Key Markets report for Friday, 19 December 2025
On Monday, 15 December 2025, the Council of European Union (CEU) issued a decision sanctioning a group of individuals including Colonel Jacques Baud, Xavier Moreau and Nathalie Yamb. Colonel Baud was a member of the Swiss strategic intelligence service and head of the United Nations peacekeeping operations doctrine. Within NATO, he took part in programs in Ukraine after the Maidan coup between 2014 and 2017. He also authored a number of books in intelligence, war and terrorism. Xavier Moreau is a journalist and former French military officer and Nathalie Yamb is a Swiss-Cameroonian activist and entrepreneur.
None of the sanctioned individuals were convicted of any crimes. Instead, they were accused by the CEU of wrongthink and of participating in “destabilising activities of Russia.” CEU determined that Colonel Baud is “responsible for, implements, or supports actions or political measures attributable to the government of the Russian Federation that undermine or threaten stability or security in a third country (Ukraine) through his involvement in the use of information manipulation and influence.”
Having followed Colonel Baud and watched many of his interviews, I couldn’t agree less with the EC’s decision. In all his interviews and his writings he comes across as a thoughtful and rigorous scholar, adhering to carefully sourced information, almost invariably from Ukrainian or Western sources. I would say that he has been a very important source of truth about the war in Ukraine. Baud never came across as pro-Russian, nor anti-Ukrainian but an analyst concerned with the truth of the matter, which he always conveyed in a sober, rational manner. He gave a statement regarding EC sanctions against hi:
“Yes, I was sanctioned for ‘Russian propaganda.’ The fact that I never use Russian material for my books, relying exclusively on Ukrainian and Western information, and that I have consequently refused invitations from Russian media outlets, still makes me a ‘Russian propagandist’! As I stated in my books, my work isn’t about who is good and who is bad, but about how the media misrepresents the realities on the ground. I wanted to show that one can better understand the conflict even without Russian information. The idea is that how we understand a crisis defines how we resolve it! I hadn’t realized how right I was.”
Indeed, truth is a dangerous thought crime in the empire of lies and so Colonel Baud had to be subjected to an exemplary punishment, including seizure of his assets.
Because we can…
Did the Council of EU sue Colonel Baud in any court? Did they accuse him of anything illegal at all? Was he informed about such accusations and given the opportunity to confront his accusers and defend himself? None of the above: the EC issued the sanctions and that’s it. In case the term “sanctions” seems like a lenient way to correct wrongthink, it is not. Having had my bank account blocked for six months myself, I experienced how incredibly debilitating it can be. From one day to the next, you can’t pay your bills and you can’t receive any payments. This immediately turns into a cascade of problems and issues that could have very serious consequences.
Ms. Nathalie Yamb explained the effects of these sanctions, calling them a “socio-economic death penalty”:
“… at first, I completely underestimated the impact of the sanctions. But my smile quickly faded. At an extraordinary pace I experienced the tentacles of the extraterritoriality of European lawlessness. One after another, my credit cards on accounts in Switzerland, Africa and online were blocked. My accounts themselves were blocked. My cryptocurrencies were inaccessible. My PayPal account and GoFundMe were closed. So were my Amazon, AirBnB, Booking.com, Deezer and eBay accounts. Contracts were all cancelled.
I couldn’t pay my rent, my insurance, my taxes, my lawyers or my medication. I couldn’t buy a plane ticket, listen to music, watch Netflix, take an Uber, place an online order or pay a hotel bill. But it gets better: I can’t return to Switzerland to deal with emergencies, as the sanctions include a ban on flying over European Union territory, even though Switzerland is completely landlocked… When you impose a ban on entry, it must be justified by the fact that the presence of a given person on your territory or your airspace constitutes an immediate danger to your security. …
Socio-economic death penalty, the civil erasure to which they condemn me without trial, by preventing me from travelling, by cutting me off from everything in a digitalised environment, the unprecedented violence they use against me to achieve political objectives, in law, this is called terrorism. And they are using it not only to break me but also and above all to send a message to those who might be tempted to think and act like me.”
For any nation that pretends to adhere to the rule of law, it should be impermissible for any political appointee to act as prosecutors, judges and executioners, and to subject people to punishment against which they have no recourse, but this is Europe today. What’s even more alarming is the fact that CEU’s decisions become implemented almost instantaneously, executing a “socio-economic death penalty.”
The implications of this are very dark and should be deeply troubling. What was done to Col. Baud, Xavier Moreau and Nathalie Yamb can be done to anyone at any time. No due process is required, no Miranda rights are read, no presumption of innocence is admitted and no opportunity to defend oneself is offered. While I can’t say why Ms. Yamb was sanctioned, I know that Moreau and Baud were ruining the Western narrative that Ukraine was winning the war and that Russia could be defeated.
The reason why that narrative is as important to the mendacious Eurocrats is because it’s meant to encourage us all to approve wasting untold billions for Ukraine’s defense and to be willing to enlist and go to war and/or send our children. If there’s nobody to challenge the ruling establishment’s narrative, than our children could experience the mass slaughter like “our parents and grandparents” knew. As George Washington, said “if freedom of speech is taken away, then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.” Ukraine is exactly the best example of that.
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Today’s trading signals
With yesterday’s closing prices we have the following changes for the Key Markets portfolio:
