Putin’s Choice: Do I Go Full Stalin?

Good morning!

Russian President Vladimir Putin stands at a critical crossroads, a sobering analysis in today’s Telegraph argues. After more than three long years of war in Ukraine, the mood in Russia has shifted from swagger to burnout. The conflict’s costs have mounted. Economic strain, battlefield losses and drone strikes on Moscow have made a remote war hit home.

[BRIEF]

Analysts say that likely within the coming year, Putin must choose:

• Either end the war—or sustain it by increasing mass mobilization, intensifying repression, and implementing Soviet-style totalitarian controls. In other words: Embrace Stalinism.

High-ranking officials warn that Russia is running out of workers and that its economy is tottering. Some say the military spending and economic sanctions are unsustainable, and they are calling for the war to end.

Meanwhile, Putin faces a manpower shortage on the battlefield, with casualties (an estimated 35,000 per month) outpacing recruits (fewer than 30,000). The Telegraph:

For the first time in its history, Russia is attempting to fight a major war without full-scale mobilization—something even Britain did not attempt during either world war. … If Putin wants to continue the war, mass conscription may eventually become unavoidable.

When Putin has tried to mobilize more soldiers, many have fled the country. Preventing this would require rolling back the vestiges of post-Soviet freedoms, including the right to choose employment and to travel freely. Hard-liners say, Go for it.

• Prophecy indicates this is what Putin will choose.

A decade ago, Trumpet publisher Gerald Flurry identified Vladimir Putin as the “prince of Rosh” prophesied in Ezekiel 38, a powerful end-time leader who would lead a mighty Asian power bloc.

• Even then, Mr. Flurry compared Putin to the infamous Soviet dictator, writing: “No leader in Russia has equaled Putin’s diabolical evil since Joseph Stalin.”

Mr. Flurry has long highlighted Putin’s pattern of ruthless aggression, authoritarian power grabs and willingness to sacrifice lives for imperial ambitions. Now it appears the interminable Ukraine war is pressuring him to intensify his Stalinist tendencies and accelerate his fulfillment of that prophesied role.

Iran Peace Deal to Leave Israel in the Cold?

Israel and the United States are having serious disagreements on how to end the Iran war, Axios reported May 20.

As U.S. President Donald Trump continuously threatens to resume bombing Iran, he has also been negotiating a peace settlement through mediators. Israeli and American sources speaking to Axios claim Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu “is highly skeptical about the negotiations and wants to resume the war to further degrade Iran’s military capabilities and weaken the regime by destroying its critical infrastructure.”

• Trump had a “difficult” call with Netanyahu and “Bibi’s hair was on fire after the call,” these sources say. Axios: “Netanyahu has been highly worried at previous stages of the negotiations, even as deals failed to materialize. ‘Bibi is always concerned,’ one source said.”

Despite constant threats of resuming the conflict, it appears President Trump is looking for an off-ramp. For Israel, Iran remains an existential threat that takes grudges very seriously. Israel cannot afford to give the Iranian regime—battered but unchanged and extra-angry—a chance to rebuild its arsenals.

• Israel and the U.S. entered this war as close allies. They could exit it divided.

Prophecies like Hosea 5:13 and Daniel 11:40-41 describe Germany becoming Israel’s new security guarantor. These prophecies describe a time when America either loses interest in Middle Eastern escapades or cannot afford to continue them, or both. The conclusion to the Iran war could be the catalyst for this. Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry explains in his free book The King of the South.

American Students Lose Ground in Reading and Math

American K-12 education keeps getting worse, new data from the Educational Opportunity Project at Stanford University suggests. Students’ test scores in reading and math have been falling for more than a decade.

• Reading scores in 2025 were about 0.6 grade levels lower than in 2015. Math scores were about 0.4 grade levels lower. This means a typical student today is roughly six months behind in reading and four months behind in math where students were a decade ago.

Scores rose steadily from 1990 to 2013. Then American students entered what experts call a “learning recession.” Progress stopped, then began to drop. The covid-19 pandemic accelerated the downturn in math scores, while reading scores continued their steady declines.

Experts point to two main causes for the long decline: the end of strong test-based accountability programs from the 1990s and 2000s, and the explosion of social media use among teens.

• Social media shortens attention spans, hurts sleep, increases anxiety, and reduces the amount of reading students do outside of school. Heavy social media users tend to be the lowest-performing students.

This is a serious problem. Reading and math skills are especially important for building logic and critical thinking, not only for employment but for building an intelligent and virtuous population. They strengthen a person’s ability to solve problems and understand the world around him.

“I have mentioned mathematics as a way to settle in the mind a habit of reasoning closely and in train,” English political philosopher John Locke wrote; “not that I think it necessary that all men should be deep mathematicians, but that, having got the way of reasoning which that study necessarily brings the mind to, they might be able to transfer it to other parts of knowledge, as they shall have occasion.”

The rise of social media is especially worrying. It may leave America with a whole generation that must effectively rely on others to think for them. As Thomas Jefferson wrote to Charles Yancey in 1816, “If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.”

IN OTHER NEWS

German foreign minister wants Germany to lead in nato: “Germany is accepting its leadership responsibility,” German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul stated yesterday before meeting other nato foreign ministers in Sweden. His goal is a “new burden-sharing arrangement that reflects Germany’s and Europe’s economic and military potential.” To give Germany a “greater role,” he called for more “intensive defense cooperation.” nato was founded, in part, to “keep the Germans down,” as one early British official characterized it. But now, a new German war machine is rising within it.

Jews in Germany experiencing worst threats since the Holocaust: Germany’s Federal Association of Departments for Research and Information on Anti-Semitism reported on Wednesday that the capital city, Berlin, recorded 2,197 anti-Semitic incidents last year. Although that marks a 13 percent decline from the previous year, it is twice the levels seen before the Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist massacre. In the state of Hesse, 1,099 incidents were recorded last year, an increase of 18 percent from 2024 and almost six times the pre-October 7 level. According to that report, these incidents “point to a societal climate in which anti-Semitic statements and actions are possible—and too often go unchallenged.” Hesse’s anti-Semitism commissioner, Uwe Becker, stated that “the threat to Jewish life is worse than at any time since the Holocaust.” Bible prophecy warns that Germany will deepen its relationship with the Jewish nation—then betray it and launch a new Holocaust.

Italy buys European: Italy will buy six A330 tanker aircraft valued at $1.6 billion from Airbus, the European Union announced on Tuesday, a switch from the past 15 years of purchasing tankers made by American company Boeing. Bible prophecy warns that Europe’s growing military independence is an ominous sign for the world.

Turkey’s main opposition leader was ousted from office yesterday. A Turkish court deemed the 2023 party congress that elected Ozgur Ozel illegitimate, resulting in a new party chairman, Kemal Kilicdaroğlu, who lost to Turkish President Tayyip Erdoğan in 2023. This further solidifies Erdoğan’s one-man rule over Turkey, a trend significant to end-time Bible prophecy.

Syria to attend G-7: Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa will visit France as an invited guest to the June 15–17 G-7 summit, Reuters reported yesterday. A Syrian official said Sharaa will probably discuss Syria’s potential as a “strategic hub for supply chains” following Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz. A prophecy in Psalm 83 says Syria will align with Europe so that “the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance.” The G-7 summit is a sign of a strengthening relationship that will fulfill this prophecy.

America is sending 5,000 troops to Poland: “Based on the successful election of the now president of Poland, Karol Nawrocki, who I was proud to endorse, and our relationship with him, I am pleased to announce that the United States will be sending an additional 5,000 troops to Poland,” U.S. President Donald Trump announced on social media yesterday. Under Trump, the U.S. is basing the deployment of troops on political alignment. Previously, the U.S. stationed troops in Europe to keep hostile forces at bay.

The U.S. opened a new consulate in Greenland yesterday, replacing a small wooden house near the fishing harbor in Nuuk, the capital city, with a three-floor, 3,200-square-foot facility with bulletproof glass, security grilles and space for armored vehicles. The upgrade comes as President Donald Trump continues to insist the U.S. should buy, annex or otherwise increase its control over Greenland. Denmark, which governs the island, and most Greenlanders oppose this idea, and protests were held outside during the opening ceremony of the new facility. Bible prophecy indicates that the fight over Greenland and other trans-Atlantic issues will rapidly grow more intense as a revived Holy Roman Empire rises against the United States.

Supreme Court backs U.S. company in Cuban property case: Yesterday, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 8-1 in favor of a U.S. company whose docks in Havana were seized by Fidel Castro’s government more than 65 years ago. The case involves Havana Docks suing four major cruise lines—Carnival, Norwegian, Royal Caribbean and msc—for using the confiscated property during the Obama-era opening to Cuba. Justice Clarence Thomas wrote the majority opinion. He said the cruise lines used property that still legally belongs to the American company under the Helms-Burton Act. The ruling sends the case back to a lower court and strengthens claims by Americans against companies that benefit from property stolen in Cuba’s 1959 revolution. It also gives President Trump more legal and economic tools in his push for regime change in Cuba.