Global SITREP B4:22: A Covenant Among Many

15 March 2022: The unprovoked Russian war against Ukraine appears to be entering a terminal phase, one that will include a formal agreement or contract between several parties. In this case the agreement might be more akin to the definition that is applied to a covenant (treaty) as described by Joshua 9:6.

In Eschatology Today's traditional forward leaning posture, it appears at this point to be a near certainty that the cessation of hostilities in Ukraine, to include the withdrawal of Russian forces from most if not all of the country, will essentially be a treaty that ensures security requirements for the whole of Europe and not just Ukrainian or Russian requirements for security guarantees. It has only been days since the last implicit Russian threat of nuclear strikes, so an iron-clad treaty in this regard will be essential.  

This is what all of Europe, that is, the EU backed by the economic and military power of NATO will negotiate and confirm at a conference in the not too distant future. Ukraine will have won its defensive war and Russia, having virtually exhausted its ability to sustain its offensive military operations will be forced to withdraw to ensure its economic survival and independence from Red Chinese domination.

Warfare is likely to continue for perhaps the next four to six weeks, and barring an unforeseen black swan event, Russia's invasion will simply and literally run out of gas, and food, and its armies will become incapable of further action. The process being envisioned here could take several months, and European reconstruction of an independent and occupation-free Ukraine will take far longer.

Perhaps, just perhaps, this nascent treaty of security among multiple parties in Europe might be extended and confirmed for a period of seven years in the not too distant future to include the nations of a war-ravaged Middle East, as foretold by the angel Gabriel in Daniel 9:27. 

 

Global SITREP A10-22: The Next Level Crisis

The Russian Army or The Army of Gog of Magog?

Update 3 March 2022: The question has been asked about where one could locate Ezekiel 38's Magog on a map. In new searching the short answer to the question is that there are old maps which illustrate Magog being located in two geographical locations, but within the territorial continuity of the present day Russian Federation. One is in the region of the North Caucasus, and the second is in the region of far northern region of Russian East Asia. So from this aspect the Russian Federation can be identified as Magog. And then there's near-antiquity ancient writers such as Josephus, and others as well, who also put the pin on the map in the North Caucasus, and identify the people who lived there as Scythians. Again, Russian Federation.

In the comments section recommended "Potential Wildcard" article from The Jamestown Foundation (well worth the read from an intel perspective) the topic Eschatology Today brought up very recently about the demographics of the Russian Federation emerges yet again. Truly, this is keen insight about the demographics of the army Ezekiel says will be led by hooks in Gog's jaw, like a cloud covering the land, to its destruction on the mountains of Israel. The current warfighting in Ukraine by the Russian Army also provides strong clues concerning the demographic make-up of that near-future army.

And the image above taken directly from The Jamestown Foundation article speaks thousands of words to this same effect. Take a close look. Are those soldiers ethnic Russians (i.e. Slavic men)? They are citizens of the Russian Federation without any doubt. But ethnic Russians they are not. To a very high percentage they are from the Republics of the Russian Federation located in the north, central and east Asian part of the country. Ezekiel noted them as Magogites, but ethnically there are any of a number of Turkic peoples, Chechens, Avars, Mordvins, Buryats, Tungusic Evens and so on. You get the point being made here.

In Ukraine it has become apparent in less than a week of warfare that a great number of ethnic Russian troops have zero desire to be fighting their ethnic kin in Ukraine. A widely publicized letter from a Russian conscript to his mother reveals the nonsense the ethnic Russian troops were spoon-fed by leadership in Moscow about it all being an exercise that Ukrainians would welcome them as liberators from the "Ukrainian nazi's," and so on and so on. The fact is that ethnic Russian forces have surrendered to Ukrainian forces by the squadron, battalion and brigade-size formations. They sabotage their own combat vehicles so they cannot advance further; holes punched in fuel tanks are a common occurrence according to battlefield intel. So, it is the non-ethnic Russians who are continuing the advance into Ukraine; turning cities block by block into rubble despite ferocious Ukrainian resistance. A true juggernaut.

This war has led to a much closer current-day identification of the actual ethnic make-up of the "Rosh, Meshech and Tubal; Gomerites and Togarmah from the far north" who will be brought to their destruction in Israel.

Decapitated Russian T-72B3 Main Battle Tank in Ukraiine

2 March 2022: Regarding the Biden SOU speech last night, it was worthless pablum filled to the brim with platitues and banalities, and nothing that Ukrainians need to roll back the Russian invasion and its indiscriminate war crimes against the civilian population. To her diplomatic credit Ukraine's Ambassador remained at her seat and politely applauded.

Near Kharkiv a Ukrainian army unit composed of footsoldiers and one APC put its Javelins and NLAWs to great effect in causing a Russian armor battalion, including the battalion commander, to flee for their lives from the fight. The net result of this engagement was the Ukrainian Army's sudden acquisition of six, "very low milage," (i.e. brand-spanking new) T-80BVM main battle tanks that were just plain abandoned in full opeerational order. These T-80s MBTs will be dressed in Ukrainian colors and returned to the fight very soon.

Russian losses now total nearly 6,000 troops KIA; 30 strike aircraft shot down, more than 1,000 armored vehicles destroyed; 85 artillery and 9 anti-aircraft systems destroyed as well. In addition to the captured T-80BVM tanks, the Ukrainian Army has also captured 60 fuel trucks and 40 MLRS artillery vehicles.

The Russian invasion has five main lines of attack: Kharkiv, Kherson, Kyiv, Mariupol and Chernihiv. In all of these the Russian advance has been severely blunted or stalled outright. This is the rationale for expecting Putin to resort to the increased utilization of internationally banned weaponry.

1 March 2022: There are so many rumors, psyops, disinfo campaigns and just plain insanity going on that its been difficult in the last 24 hours to know what has truly taken place. I believe that reports of the EU or NATO sending fighter jets to Ukraine were false; the NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg affirmed as much a short time ago. No troops either. But that could change if certain things nobody wants to see take place actually take place.

President Zelenskyy's impassioned via internaet speech to the EU Parliament was unlike any I've heard from a national leader under similar conditions, except maybe the recording of Winston Churchill during the WWII Battle of Britain. Perhaps Zelenskyy's speech, for which he received a standing ovation, will be remembered similarly. I also believe it to be true that the Chechen Kadyrov assassination squad sent to Ukraine by Russia to take out Zelenskyy has been annihilated. Rumor is the Russian FSB is against the war and gave info to Ukrainian security services that resulted in the killing of all the assassins. Also, he Wagner group mercenaries in Ukraine are also being hunted by Ukrainian forces; several have been eliminated in recents days.

So, pending the content of the State of the Union speech by Joe Biden tonight this keyboard will be silent until then.

28 February 2022: The image above is symbolic of the risk Russia has taken with its ill-advised invasion of Ukraine - Russia has lost its head with this insanity. But the insanity continues and is in fact escalating to a point of potential, if not a probable nuclear exchange. This is reflected in the decision of Byelarus to renounce its non-nuclear state status so it can accept Russian nuclear weapons being deployed in its territory which has a common border with NATO and the EU.

The next 24-36 hours will be crucial in what developments take place, many of which have been noted in the comments of the previous Special Report SITREP A9:22. 

Marana'tha!

Global SITREP G7-21: "I will turn thee back; put hooks into thy jaws"

The Poland-Belarus Border

URGENT UPDATE 8 December 2021: As of today, the potential for a shooting war between the US/NATO and Russia has become palpable. The war would be waged in a defense of Ukraine resulting from a Russian invasion, and it could go nuclear very quickly.

10 November 2021: There have been dozens of attempts by refugees, almost certainly pushed by Belarusian forces, to breach the border throughout the day today. Additional provocations included Russia sending nuclear-capable Tu-22M3 (NATO Name: "Backfire-C") strategic bombers and MiG strike aircraft over Belarus. The flight of these aircraft clearly signaled an intent to strike deep into the European Union should hostilities erupt during this Russian manufactured crisis. 

9 November 2021: Poland has massed 12,000 of its troops on its eastern border with Belarus in anticipation of a deliberate armed escalation by Belarusian armed forces, backed by Russia. This crisis features at least 4,000 increasingly desperate migrants from the Middle East, Asia and Africa enduring sub-freezing conditions with little food or water in the forested area on the border. The migrants are being herded by the Belarussian armed forces from across the country to the common border crossing in the Grodno region. The clear objective of Belarus and Russia is to destabilize EU and NATO member nations in eastern and central Europe.

The migrants, mostly young males, entered Belarus by invitation. They may have been promised passage by the Belarusian government to travel further west into the European Union. The Belarusian tyrant, Aleksandr Lukashenko, quickly turned the migrant horde into international pawns in a power play against the European Union which enacted sanctions against Belarus over Lukashenko's fraudulent election and brutal crackdown of tens of thousands of Belarusian citizens who protested the staged election results.

Poland PM Morawiecki with Polish troops
at the Belarus border this morning

To be sure, this is an East vs West confrontation in Eastern Europe, pitting Belarus supported strongly as a sock-puppet state of the Russian Federation against the European Union and the NATO Alliance. Germany is calling upon EU member nations to fully support Poland, others are calling for invoking NATO Article V in defense of Poland's sovereignty. Migrants of this type has previously forced their way into Poland as well as fellow EU and NATO allies Lithuania and Latvia. Thus a "line in the sand" has been drawn by Poland to first defend itself from invasion and to defend the EU and NATO allies from invasion by illegal aliens.

Late yesterday came news of another migrant caravan containing women and children to exacerbate the border crisis further. These migrants are also being forced to the Polish border by armed Belarussian troops. 

This is a clear case of eastern block aggression against the western inter-related alliances, both EU and NATO. We'll watch developments closely as the title for this SITREP clearly suggests a potential relationship to events preceding the Ezekiel 38/39 fulfillment. It may also be the necessary impetus for the rapid emergence of an all-European Army for the defense of the new super state. At present, America is an unreliable ally. Also recall previous SITREPs where the ten horns are engaged in warfare with an unidentified enemy when an eleventh horn (Antichrist) suddenly rises among them according to the vision found in Daniel 7. Yes, watching this very closely indeed.

Marana'tha!

Global SITREP A4-20: Miscellaneous Items

(6FEB20 UPDATE BELOW) 23 January 2020: This SITREP is to cover miscellaneous items, some new, some just for updating purposes.

Firstly, it's necessary acknowledge the passing of televangelist Dr. Jack Van Impe. He was truly amazing in his ability to call up chapter and verse of prophetic Scripture, and his passing is mentioned here simply because he was a brother in Christ. It is irrelevant if one agreed or disagreed with some of what he taught, but I do thank the Lord that Dr. Van Impe was true to his calling for several decades. He will be missed. There is an entire generation of us who grew up with prophecy teachers in Jack's class, and now we look forward to being with them again at the Lord's side.

Secondly, in recent studies the angel Gabriel's prophecy in Daniel 9:26b, "And the people of the prince who is to come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary," has been in the forefront. Almost exactly ten years ago at the very beginning of Eschatology Today several posts were made to identify specifically who the people of the prince to come were. The prince is the coming Antichrist; the people were the several legions of the Roman Empire that besieged, sacked and destroyed Jerusalem and the Second Temple, specifically and most prominent among them was Legio X Fretensis. 

The army of the Antichrist, as has been written about here in several posts, is back in the news. One post in particular was brought to mind recently because of this, "It Was Never About the EU, But All About NATO." It's three and a half years old now, but that post deserves a revisiting because there's lots of noise of late about an EU army being stood up, one building block at a time. Breitbart published an article on this today that is worth reading. And yet, the EU army will be wholly reliant on NATO and buttressed American military power that will enable it to take the field in future combat operations as seen in our discussions on Daniel 11:40-45 taking place during the 70th Week.

The thing here, and this is a lot to wrap any one's head around at one time, but I must also be recalling other Eschatology Today posts such as "Ten Toes" and "The Little Horn," which rest upon even more very specific Bible prophecy regarding ten kings or leaders of nations among whom an eleventh little horn rises and plucks three of the ten out by the roots (making them his own). This occurs while there's a war going on. This is the fourth beast of Daniel 7:7-8. So, while some might tend to think its quiet and not much is going on, oh but to the contrary!, this world has a great deal going on andis moving inexorably down the Prophetic Road to Revelation.

Thirdly, and as an adjunct to the above (rumor intelligence (RUMINT) has been rampant all week long in advance of the Davos economic summit and the VP Pence trip to Israel) it looks as if Trump will have both Israeli PM Bibi Netanyahu and Israeli PM wanna-be Benny Gantz as his guests in the White House next week to be briefed on the so-called "Deal of the Century" peace initiative. 

Both Netanyahu and Gantz have pledged to annex the Jordan Valley to Israel, and Netanyahu acknowledging that since that is now the case, then Israel should move forward immediately an make the annexation happen. And guess who would like to blow that up in all of their faces? The Iranian Ayatollah. So little wonder that today rockets were launched again from Gaza.

Meanwhile, In Iraq, there are raging battles between anti-Iran protesters and pro-Iran forces in several cities this evening, and just about every evening this week, most involving life fire automatic weapons. In the Iraqi-Syria border town of al-Qaim unknown aircraft attacked the 45th Brigade of Kata'ib Hezbollah with reports that a commander was killed. This coincides to today with the United States warning the new IRGC-QF commander, MG Esmail Qa'Ani, that he faces that same fate of MG Qassem Soleimani if any US forces are harmed in Iraq.

Finally, the truth about the coronavirus that emerged in China and has spread around the world is finally being acknowledged. There are over 20 million people trapped in Chinese cities as that government attempts to get a handle on an epidemic in the making. Wars and rumors of wars, earthquakes in diverse places, plagues and pestilences... sounds like a Jack Van Impe telecast, but its real and its all happening today just as our Lord said it would in the Olivet Discourse.

UPDATE 06 FEB 20: Taiwan News recently leaked the actual numbers of 2019-nCoV in the PRC. Infected 154,023; Suspected infected 79,808; Deaths 24,589, Victims cured 269. These numbers dwarf the "official" numbers being reported. The 2019-nCoV Infected and Suspected Infected total is well over one-quater million people (circa 234,000). 

2019-nCoV Data
Left to Right: Confirmed cases, Suspected cases, Cured cases, Deaths.

Other data from Taiwan strongly suggests that 2019-nCoV may be an "unkillable" virus due to the many insertions of other viruses in the core. That may mean in 2021 it may resurface again with unknown consequences. Also, H5N1 Bird Flu has recently made a reappearance in the People's Republic just south of Wuhan.

UPDATE 25 January 2020: Another of the older posts, one from December 2018, is worth noting again. "Psalm 68: A Messianic Prophecy for a Snowy Israel." There are a couple of interesting passages in it, with a reference to a specific season of the year; when snow is present upon a certain mount. This has me recalling what Jesus said in the Olivet about the middle of the 70th Week as Matthew 24:20 recorded. More convinced than ever that nothing here is coincidental.

Marana'tha!

Global SITREP E1-19: Conflict in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea

TOP Image: Greek and Internationally recognized East Med EEZs
Bottom Image: Turkish unilaterally imposed East Med EEZs

UPDATE 28 December 2019: As noted in the last paragraph of theoriginal 3 December posting, there are significant issues to be addressed and they grow more critical day by day. 

On the front lines in the outskirts of Tripoli there are Turkish soldiers (supporting the GNA) in urban combat against Russian mercenaries of the ChVK Wagner Group (supporting the LNA). The Russians are the spearhead of the LNA offensive. 

The fighting has escalated in Tripoli and Misrata with the news that new deployments of Turkish Army troops, Turkomen militia from northwestern Syria, and ships of the Turkish Navy are enroute to join the battle. There they will oppose the Haftar-led LNA that has been buttressed by more Russian mercenaries, counter-drone technology, Egyptian armor and UAE UCAV aircraft. The Turkish military deployments are in response to the slow but steady advance of LNA forces westward. 

20 December 2019: Egyptian Navy has conducted exercises in the Mediterranean Sea that include submarine-launched Harpoon cruise missiles. The exercises simulate naval warfare against the Turkish Navy.

Egypt has also deployed T-72 tanks to Haftar's LNA Army for their offensive to liberate Tripoli and Sirte from GNA militias. The LNA has given a 72-hour ultimatum for the militias to withdraw from both cities. 

8 December 2019: On the sidelines of the NATO Summit in London last week, direct talks between Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Greek President Kyriakos Mitsotakis failed to find a resolution to the Eastern Mediterranean Sea exclusive economic zone (EEZ) crisis. No great surprise here, as the Greeks have noted to the international community, there isn't a neighboring country on any Turkish border that is not in a bilateral conflict with Turkey. 

By way of publication in the Turkish Government's Official Gazette and ratification by the Turkish Parliament, the Istanbul Accord, a maritime exclusive economic zone agreement between Turkey and Libya's internationally recognized GNA government in Tripoli, Libya went into effect yesterday to divide the Eastern Mediterranean Sea between them. Erdogan also announced yesterday that accord has been delivered to the United Nations by Turkey.

Greece, which views the Accord as a violation of its sovereign rights and having no legal standing in international law, expelled the Libyan GNA Ambassador Mohamed Menfi. Ambassador Menfi has until Monday to depart from Greece. 

For his part, Greek President Mitsotakis said the Turkish move in denying Greek sovereignty over its many islands has placed Turkey in "unprecedented diplomatic isolation." Greece has announced it will use military force to immediately halt any Turkish oil or gas drilling in the sea southeast of Crete. The application of a European Union sanctions regime against Turkey is also imminent.

3 December 2019: Last week Turkey and the Government of National Accord (GNA) in Tripoli, Libya signed a military pact that essentially divides the whole Eastern Mediterranean Sea between them. Eschatology Today will refer to this pact as the 'Istanbul Accord.' 

As if the Middle East didn't need another point of conflict that could spark a war between two supposed NATO allies (Greece and Turkey), the Turkish government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan with a single stroke of their pen annexed a massive swath of the Greek economic zone. For their part the Greeks describe the Istanbul Accord as being "ridiculous." 

The Turkish action is noted in the Eschatology Today map above (click to enlarge). It is in the stripped fluorescent yellow portion. This map is based upon initial reports of the Istanbul Accord as none has as yet been published by Turkey or the GNA. The Turks claim their maritime border now extends from southwestern Turkey all the way across the Eastern Mediterranean Sea to the Libyan coast line of Derna (Darnah) and Tobruk (i.e. all of the Libyan coast to the Egyptian border).

The Istanbul Accord pretends as if the Greek island of Crete and hundreds of other Greek islands going back into antiquity simply no longer exist. Greek citizens inhabit all of those sovereign Greek islands. Eschatology Today would liken Erdogan's Istanbul Accord to that of Adolf Hitler's 1938 military annexation (invasion) of the Czechoslovakian Sudetenland. 

The Istanbul Accord also involves Israel and Cyprus who are, as we've discussed here before, in a military alliance with Greece. The Turkish move directly threatens the proposed gas and oil pipelines between Israel and Cyprus to the Greek mainland and European Union Markets. This move also occurred just prior to the NATO Summit of this week, and alliance fallout is likely to be severe against Turkey, not to mention European Union anger at what the Turks have done. Current levels of EU sanctions against Turkey stand a very good change of becoming far more harsh. Turkey's status within NATO is also in peril. 

Additionally, the Istanbul Accord tosses a wrench into the Berlin peace talks scheduled for January 2020 between the two governments in the Libyan Civil War. Most international recognition is with the GNA Tripoli government led by Fayez Sarraj, while an assortment of other nations, including Russia, Egypt and the UAE are militarily supporting the eastern Libyan National Army (LNA) in Benghazi under Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar's leadership (whom we've also discussed previously). There are approximately 1,500 Russian Wagner Group mercenaries that have intervened in the war to fight alongside Haftar's LNA. Armed UAE drones also routinely bomb the Tripoli airport. The Istanbul Accord is likely to cost the GNA in Tripoli dearly in terms of international recognition.

The prophetic implications are obvious and numerous, touching on the fulfillment of Scripture from Daniel through Ezekiel. The issues between Turkey and Russia alone stand out profoundly so that clearly major changes will have to occur for the Magog Confederation to materialize as many interpret Ezekiel 38/39 indicating Turkey being part of that confederation (also discussed in-depth previously on Eschatology Today).

Global SITREP C3-16: It Was Never About the EU, But All About NATO

24 June 2016: This is a special SITREP that I think is necessary because Bible prophecy teachers will be talking about it in their sermons this weekend.  So I see the need to tell you where I stand, and because I anticipate there are more than a few who will ask questions on this subject.

When it comes to Bible prophecy and 'last days' eschatology, I hold to the opinion that the EU was never the central theme of the fifth and final world empire. This final world empire has been discussed at length in many Eschatology Today posts over the past 7 years which have looked at the angel Gabriel's prophecies recorded in the Book of Daniel, chapters 2 and 8 through 12, as well as Revelation 13. In my view the central eschatological focus should never have been on the EU, but always should have been on NATO. And this is the bottom line on why I see the BREXIT vote as much ado about nothing. It is irrelevant when it comes to the eschatological 'big picture.'

Why? Because the EU is not a military force, NATO is. And the dominant theme in last days prophecy of the 70th Week is one of a final world-dominating empire of the Antichrist wielding overwhelming military power. Without NATO the Antichrist would be a great big nothing. The final dominating world empire is "Rome" in the 21st century, and this time "Rome" will include not only the United Kingdom and other European nations, but also the whole of North America and its peerless arsenal.

"And authority was given him over every tribe, tongue, and nation." 

Revelation 13:7b

Addendum 29 June 2016: So how does this relate to prophetic events just prior to the 70th Week (Ezekiel 38/39) and that week itself? What follows is my forward-looking view on how it plays out.

As discussed briefly above, the EU is not powerful; it never has been since 1958.  

NATO, on the other hand, is where the real power lies since right after the end of World War II. NATO was created by its member nations within 1 year of Israel's rebirth: Israel in 1948, and NATO in 1949. Given the type and duration of negotiations that occurred, the establishment of Israel and NATO were contemporaneous. 

NATO and its adjutant North Atlantic Council (NAC), established by Article 9 of the 1949 North Atlantic Treaty (NAT), stand as the empowerment of Article 3 and Article 5 of the treaty. This is where the true power of "Rome" in the late 20th century and early 21st century AD abides. The North Atlantic Council has been in active session from 1952 to the present moment - that's 64 years in continuous session. This is where NATO's legal power to engage in warfighting in defense of the alliance's member nations and the Council's interests exists.

By definition, the North Atlantic Treaty (NAT) is a currently existent "covenant among many." (Reference: Global SITREP C2-16: Israel Takes a Big Step Towards the "Covenant Among Many")  In the near future, at the start of the 70th Week, this NAT (covenant among many) will be expanded to include Israel, and a few other nations. Most likely the post-Psalm 83 rump of modern day Jordan and other Sunni Arab states are among those nations. 

Antichrist will "confirm" this expansion of the NAT for a period of 7 years, and after which those nations would be extended full membership in the treaty organization. At the present, this legal mechanism is known as NATO's "Partnership For Peace." And as we know from Bible prophecy this extension of the NAT to Israel will be unilaterally abrogated halfway into the 70th Week. Antichrist's NATO forces would enter into Israel during the Daniel 12:40-45 war under the provision of NATO's Article 5. 

So, this 70th Week "covenant among many," just as its pre-70th Week version, will be crafted, maintained and enforced from a position of military strength, not weakness. These are core principles that have governed the politics of world empires from Nebuchadnezzar to the present. This is accordance with Ecclesiastes 1:9.

Has the UK withdrawn or threatened to withdraw from NATO? From the North Atlantic Council and the North Atlantic Treaty? No, and it never will. 

Consider this as i have mentioned previously on Eschatology Today: are these nations prior to the 70th Week truly dealing from a position of weakness as some interpret Ezekiel 38:13?  All should now be aware of my disagreement with that interpretation. I think the initial response of NATO to the sudden appearance of the Magog horde suddenly coming south towards Israel from the Crimean Peninsula and the Caucasus is one of incredulity ("Are you blankety-blank kidding me!?"), and that quickly shifts to a response of massive retaliation (warfighting) in support of Israel. This becomes a brief world war as seen in Ezekiel 39:6 and elsewhere in Ezekiel's prophecy.

The EU Army?

1 July 2016: With the UK's BREXIT vote still resonating around the globe the French and German foreign ministers jointly issued an obviously prepared in-advance dictum announcing the European Union's transformation into a "political union" that would include massive rearmament to enable future offensive military operations anywhere around the globe. 

The website German-Foreign-Policy.com (click link) published on 28 June its own report, entitled "The European War Union," which included the full text of the joint position paper written by German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier (a Social Democrat) and French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault (a Socialist). 

This dictum might well be seen as a whole lot more than the words of European socialist dreamers bent on creating a European Superstate. German Chancellor Angela Merkel very recently declared that Germany's defense budget would converge with that of the United States on the basis of Germany's GDP. Based upon World Bank GDP figures the 2014 German GDP was $3868.29 Billion, so the announced German defense spending increase would rise from the current $36.6 Billion to $131.5 Billion. France would be required to do the same, as would the other eight nations necessary to form the prophetic 10-nation confederacy, as would other attendant and necessary requirements for the establishment of a European Superstate. Such a thing would truly be unprecedented in world history and will be watched to see if the development of this "European Security Compact" truly matches or even exceeds the dream it is to be built upon.

UPDATE 5 July 2016: Something I've noticed that is sticking out like a sore thumb and which remains unmentioned by prophecy teachers in all of the discourse and sermon pronouncements since the UK vote to leave the EU late last month. That something is that neither The Netherlands, Germany, Poland, Denmark, Norway, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Estonia, Lithuania or Latvia were a part of the Roman Empire in 70 AD nor at its greatest extent in 116 AD. Neither were, of course, any North American nations. On the other-hand, there are other nations which were within the Roman Empire in ancient times but have no connection whatsoever to either NATO or the EU since their establishment after World War II.

This indicates to me that spending a lot of time looking at maps of ancient Rome should not be a key part of any exegesis regarding the geographical nature of the final beast empire; that the ten, reduced to seven, political entities represented by ten crowns on the heads of the beast do in fact symbolically represent something which simply did not exist in ancient times, but which does exist in these latter days. That something is an artificial global construct which symbolically would appear as dissimilar material being partly strong and partly weak, like iron and clay. Something which had its origins in and is based in the West, but has legal extraterritoriality as a primary feature. Is it from this recent man-made artificial "sea" of nations that the rise of 10 crowns have their origin?

Global SITREP C2-16: Israel Takes a Big Step Towards the "Covenant Among Many"

18 May 2016: This is too important of a subject to be just an update added to the bottom of the previous SITREP. This subject is of an importance which is ultimately prophetic to an incredible degree as the passage of time will surely make very clear.  

Upon the approval of the North Atlantic Council, on Wednesday, 4 May 2016 NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg extended an offer to the State of Israel to establish an Israel Mission Office at NATO Headquarters in Brussels. Israeli Prime Minister accepted the offer yesterday during a phone call to Stoltenberg and then invited him to come visit Israel. Ambassador David Walzer, Israel's current Ambassador to the European Union (established June 2000), will now become the Israeli Chief of Mission to NATO.

Also, joining Israel in establishing Mission Offices in the NATO Headquarters are a quintuplet of Sunni Arab nations: Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain. (Sheba and Dedan, anyone?)  The invitation to Israel was extended by the unanimous consent of the NATO ministers, and which included the NATO minister from Turkey. This is a major step forward towards bringing Israel into the NATO military alliance which will also, eventually, include the four Arab nations seen in close alliance with the "merchants of Tarshish and all the young lions thereof" spoken by the prophet Ezekiel. The past is prologue to the future.

Israel's process of inclusion into the NATO alliance began in 1994 when the North Atlantic Council created the Mediterranean Dialogue which is composed of six non-NATO countries of the Mediterranean region: Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Morocco and Tunisia, plus Mauritania in the heart of West Africa. The purpose of the Dialogue is for stability and security. More recently the nations of NATO and the Dialogue have been referred to as NATO+7. Military cooperation and coordination constitute 85% of the activity engaged in, making the NATO+7 essentially a military precursor to full integration into the NATO alliance. Opening a Mission in NATO's Brussels HQ is, again, a major step in that direction.

I cannot think of a single 'last days' prophecy from this point forward where there is not some significant aspect involved either prior to or during the 70th Week. Most important of the significant prophetic aspects, I believe, is the "confirming of the covenant among many" which initiates the 70th Week. This is truly a goose bumps breaking news story, with some serious 'past is prologue' implications as well.