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In 2014, defense industry analysis website Daegel.com published an alarming forecast of massive population and economic collapse by 2025, with collapse focused on USA allied countries and China allied countries largely unaffected. Forecast was updated in 2020, then removed in 2021. Population, GDP and other numbers in forecasts appear to have been generated by feeding publicly available statistics for each country into formulas devised by forecast author. IMO, numbers in forecasts are less interesting than accompanying commentaries to forecasts.
My guess is that owner/manager of Daegel.com was retired government official or retired defense industry worker, who felt increasingly alienated by USA government policy and trends in USA culture, and that forecasts emerged from this attitude of alienation: "cri de coeur", so to speak, and attempt to startle readers into recognizing that USA was heading down the wrong path. Deletion of forecast from website in 2021 might be because website was turned over to new owner/manager, who regarded forecast as "crackpot conspiracy nut" distraction from rest of website.
Other possibilities are that forecast was CIA pysops designed to confuse Chinese/Russians, or FBI honeypot designed to attract and identify "crackpot conspiracy nuts" who might engage in terrorism, or author may have projected his own impending doom (old age and declining health or maybe financial or love life problems) as USA citizen onto doom for USA society as a whole.
Barring nuclear war or more serious pandemic than Covid-19, I don't expect USA allied countries to experience anything like massive population collapse of Daegel forecasts (I am writing in August 2024). But I do agree with many of points made in commentaries to forecasts:
1) Western societies are fragile and unaccustomed to hardship and chaos. If and when there is one crisis, that crisis may give rise to other crises in domino fashion, resulting in complete collapse of society. Police are less than 1% of population and can do little if 4% of population begins shooting at police while dressed in civilian clothes and hence indistinguishable from 95% silent majority who initially support police. If police use harsh tactics, they alienate silent majority. If police do nothing, they lose confidence of silent majority. Either way, society becomes chaotic. Economic, political and cultural fragility means chaos is not self-limiting until there is massive economic collapse, and possibly population collapse as well (though probably not as dire as in Daegel forecasts).
2) Western leadership class no longer appeals to logic but rather uses emotion, sophistry and other cheap tricks ("snark", out of context quotes, "gaslighting", threats, censorship of opposing views, etc) to gain public support. This is related to fragility point, because support built upon emotion and sophistry is likely to collapse under pressure.
3) Center of world economic and military power is shifting to China led bloc. Western leaders are behaving hysterically at prospect of losing world economic and military leadership and might tip world into nuclear war in their desperation to maintain power. We are seeing this now (August 2024) with NATO tolerance for Ukrainian attacks on Russian nuclear power plants, probable NATO tolerance for Ukrainian creation of dirty nuclear bomb, NATO tolerance of nuclear armed Israel provoking near nuclear capable Iran, etc.
4) GDP calculations tend to inflate GDP of USA and other developed western economies compared to rest of world. Spending on criminal justice, healthcare, wars and natural disasters adds to GDP but surely crime, illness, wars and natural disasters don't make a society wealthier. Child and elder care provided by unpaid family members does not add to GDP whereas care provided by paid government or private sector workers does. In general, informal and untaxed hidden sector of economy add value to society but doesn't add to GDP. Free education and leisure (reading free books, free physical fitness activities, etc) benefit both individual and society society but do not add to GDP. Huge portion of GDP consists of annual value of owner occupied housing, which can be calculated either as market rent of equivalent unit of housing (imputed rent) or much lower annual depreciation of owner occupied housing. Etc.
There have been many questions about the countries forecast specially the one focusing on the United States of America (USA). They won’t be answered one by one but below you can find some explanation, thoughts and reflections. We are going to keep this as short as possible.
The majority of the economic and demographic data used in the making of the forecasts is widely available by institutions such as the CIA, IMF, UN, USG, etc. You can see the most relevant data at every single country’s page. There is a tiny part of data coming from a variety of shadow sources such as Internet gurus, unsigned reports and others. But all these sources are from the internet and are of public domain for at least a minority. For example, several years ago Dagong, the Chinese ratings agency, published a report analyzing the physical economy of the States comparing it with those of China, Germany and Japan. The conclusion was that the US GDP was something between $5 to $10 trillion instead of $15 trillion as officially reported by the USG. We assume that the official data, especially economic, released by governments is fake, cooked or distorted in some degree. Historically it is well known that the former Soviet Union was making up fake statistics years before its collapse. Western as well as other countries are making up their numbers today to conceal their real state of affairs. We are sure that many people out there can find government statistics in their own countries that by their own personal experience are hard to believe or are so optimistic that may belong to a different country.
Despite the numeric data “quantity” there is a “quality” model which has not a direct translation into numeric data. The 2014 strain of Ebola has a death rate of 50-60% but try to imagine what would happen if there is a pandemic of Ebola with hundreds of thousands or millions infected with the virus. So far the few cases of Ebola-infected people have “enjoyed” intensive healthcare with anti-viral and breathing assistance but above all with abundant human support by Physicians and nurses. In a pandemic scenario that kind of healthcare won’t be available for the overwhelming number of infected leading to a dramatic increase of the death rate due to the lack of proper healthcare. The “quality” factor is that the death rate could increase to 80-90% in a pandemic scenario from the stated 50-60% rate. The figure itself is not important what is relevant is the fact that the scenario can evolve beyond the initial conditions from a 50% death toll to more than 90%. By the way, no pandemic or nuclear war is included in the forecast.
The key element to understand the process that the USA will enter in the upcoming decade is migration. In the past, specially in the 20th century, the key factor that allowed the USA to rise to its colossus status was immigration with the benefits of a demographic expansion supporting the credit expansion and the brain drain from the rest of the world benefiting the States. The collapse of the Western financial system will wipe out the standard of living of its population while ending ponzi schemes such as the stock exchange and the pension funds. The population will be hit so badly by a full array of bubbles and ponzi schemes that the migration engine will start to work in reverse accelerating itself due to ripple effects thus leading to the demise of the States. This unseen situation for the States will develop itself in a cascade pattern with unprecedented and devastating effects for the economy. Jobs offshoring will surely end with many American Corporations relocating overseas thus becoming foreign Corporations!!!! We see a significant part of the American population migrating to Latin America and Asia while migration to Europe – suffering a similar illness – won’t be relevant. Nevertheless the death toll will be horrible. Take into account that the Soviet Union’s population was poorer than the Americans nowadays or even then. The ex-Soviets suffered during the following struggle in the 1990s with a significant death toll and the loss of national pride. Might we say “Twice the pride, double the fall”? Nope. The American standard of living is one of the highest, far more than double of the Soviets while having added a services economy that will be gone along with the financial system. When pensioners see their retirement disappear in front of their eyes and there are no servicing jobs you can imagine what is going to happen next. At least younger people can migrate. Never in human history were so many elders among the population. In past centuries people were lucky to get to their 30s or 40s. The American downfall is set to be far worse than the Soviet Union’s one. A confluence of crisis with a devastating result.
The Demographic crisis in the former Soviet Union countries has extended for over two decades, if we accept that it ended early in this decade (2010s). The demographic crisis will hit the World in the near future and is projected to last between three and eight decades more or less depending on technological breakthrough and environmental issues. The aftermath is more likely a frozen picture with the population numbers staying the same for a very, very long period of time. The countries forecast population numbers do reflect birth/deaths but also migratory movements. Many countries are going to increase their gross population due to immigration while their native population may shrink.
Over the past two thousand years we have witnessed the Western civilization built around the Mediterranean Sea shifting to Northern Europe and then by the mid 20th century shifting to an Atlantic axis to finally get centered into the States in the past 30 years. The next move will see the civilization being centered in Asia with Russia and China on top. Historically a change in the economic paradigm has resulted in a death toll that is rarely highlighted by mainstream historians. When the transition from rural areas to large cities happened in Europe many people unable to accept the new paradigm killed themselves. They killed themselves by a psychological factor. This is not mainstream but it is true. A new crisis joins old, well known patterns with new ones.
Sorry to disappoint many of you with our forecast. It is getting worse and worse every year since the beginning of the pre-crisis in 2007. It is already said that this website is non-profit, built on spare time and we provide our information and services AS IS without further explanations and/or guarantees. We are not linked to any government in any way, shape or form. We are not a death or satanic cult or arms dealers as some BS is floating around the internet on this topic. Take into account that the forecast is nothing more than a model whether flawed or correct. It is not God’s word or a magic device that allows to foresee the future.
Sunday, October 26th, 2014
In 2014 we published a disclaimer about the forecast. In six years the scenario has changed dramatically. This new disclaimer is meant to single out the situation from 2020 onwards. Taking about the United States and the European Union as separated entities no longer makes sense. Both are the Western block, keep printing money and will share the same fate.
After COVID we can draw two major conclusions:
The Western world success model has been built over societies with no resilience that can barely withstand any hardship, even a low intensity one. It was assumed but we got the full confirmation beyond any doubt. The COVID crisis will be used to extend the life of this dying economic system through the so called Great Reset. The Great Reset; like the climate change, extinction rebellion, planetary crisis, green revolution, shale oil (…) hoaxes promoted by the system; is another attempt to slow down dramatically the consumption of natural resources and therefore extend the lifetime of the current system. It can be effective for awhile but finally won’t address the bottom-line problem and will only delay the inevitable. The core ruling elites hope to stay in power which is in effect the only thing that really worries them.
The collapse of the Western financial system - and ultimately the Western civilization - has been the major driver in the forecast along with a confluence of crisis with a devastating outcome. As COVID has proven Western societies embracing multiculturalism and extreme liberalism are unable to deal with any real hardship. The Spanish flu one century ago represented the death of 40-50 million people. Today the world’s population is four times greater with air travel in full swing which is by definition a super spreader. The death casualties in today’s World would represent 160 to 200 million in relative terms but more likely 300-400 million taking into consideration the air travel factor that did not exist one century ago. So far, COVID death toll is roughly 1 million people. It is quite likely that the economic crisis due to the lockdowns will cause more deaths than the virus worldwide.
The Soviet system was less able to deliver goodies to the people than the Western one. Nevertheless Soviet society was more compact and resilient under an authoritarian regime. That in mind, the collapse of the Soviet system wiped out 10 percent of the population. The stark reality of diverse and multicultural Western societies is that a collapse will have a toll of 50 to 80 percent depending on several factors but in general terms the most diverse, multicultural, indebted and wealthy (highest standard of living) will suffer the highest toll. The only glue that keeps united such aberrant collage from falling apart is overconsumption with heavy doses of bottomless degeneracy disguised as virtue. Nevertheless the widespread censorship, hate laws and contradictory signals mean that even that glue is not working any more. Not everybody has to die migration can also play a positive role in this.
The formerly known as second and third world nations are an unknown at this point. Their fate will depend upon the decisions they take in the future. Western powers are not going to take over them as they did in the past because these countries won’t be able to control their own cities far less likely countries that are far away. If they remain tied to the former World Order they will go down along Western powers but won’t experience the brutal decline of the late because they are poorer and not diverse enough but rather quite homogenous used to deal with some sort of hardship but not precisely the one that is coming. If they switch to China they can get a chance to stabilize but will depend upon the management of their resources.
We expected this situation to unfold and actually is unfolding right now with the November election triggering a major bomb if Trump is re-elected. If Biden is elected there will very bad consequences as well. There is a lot of bad blood in the Western societies and the protests, demonstrations, rioting and looting are only the first symptoms of what is coming. However a new trend is taking place overshadowing this one.
The situation between the three great powers has changed dramatically. The only relevant achievement of the Western powers during the past decade has been the formation of a strategic alliance, both military and economic, between Russia and China. Right now the potential partnership between Russia and the European Union (EU) is dead with Russia turning definitively towards China. That was from the beginning the most likely outcome. Airbus never tried to establish a real partnership but rather a strategy to fade away the Russian aerospace industry. Actually Russia and China have formed a new alliance to build a long haul airliner. Western Europe (not to mention the United States) was never interested in the development of Russia or forming anything other than a master slave relationship with Russia providing raw materials and toeing the line of the West. It was clear then and today is a fact.
Russia has been preparing for a major war since 2008 and China has been increasing her military capabilities for the last 20 years. Today China is not a second tier power compared with the United States. Both in military and economic terms China is at the same level and in some specific areas are far ahead. In the domain of high-tech 5G has been a success in the commercial realm but the Type 055 destroyer is also another breakthrough with the US gaining a similar capability (DDG 51 Flight IIII) by mid of this decade (more likely by 2030). Nanchang, the lead ship of the Type 055 class, was commissioned amid the pandemic and lockdown in China.
Six years ago the likelihood of a major war was tiny. Since then it has grown steadily and dramatically and today is by far the most likely major event in the 2020s. The ultimate conflict can come from two ways. A conventional conflict involving at least two major powers that escalates into an open nuclear war. A second scenario is possible in the 2025-2030 timeframe. A Russian sneak first strike against the United States and its allies with the new S-500, strategic missile defenses, Yasen-M submarines, INF Zircon and Kalibr missiles and some new space asset playing the key role. The sneak first strike would involve all Russian missile strategic forces branches (bombers and ground-based missiles) at the different stages of such attack that would be strategic translation of what was seen in Syria in November 2015. There was no report that the Russian had such a capability of launching a high precision, multiple, combined arms attack at targets 2,000+ kilometers away. Western intelligence had no clue. The irony is that since the end of the Cold War the United States has been maneuvering through NATO to achieve a position to execute a first strike over Russia and now it seems that the first strike may occur but the country finished would be the United States.
Another particularity of the Western system is that its individuals have been brainwashed to the point that the majority accept their moral high ground and technological edge as a given. This has given the rise of the supremacy of the emotional arguments over the rational ones which are ignored or deprecated. That mindset can play a key role in the upcoming catastrophic events. At least in the Soviet system the silent majority of the people were aware of the fallacies they were fed up. We can see the United States claims about G5 being stolen from them by China or hypersonic technology being stolen by Russia as the evidence that the Western elites are also infected by that hubris. Over the next decade it will become obvious that the West is falling behind the Russia-China block and the malaise might grow into desperation. Going to war might seem a quick and easy solution to restore the lost hegemony to finally find them into a France 1940 moment. Back then France did not have nuclear weapons to turn a defeat into a victory. The West might try that swap because the unpleasant prospect of not being Mars and Venus but rather a bully and his dirty bitch running away in fear while the rest of the world is laughing at them.
If there is not a dramatic change of course the world is going to witness the first nuclear war. The Western block collapse may come before, during or after the war. It does not matter. A nuclear war is a game with billions of casualties and the collapse plays in the hundreds of millions.
This website is non-profit, built on spare time and we provide our information and services AS IS without further explanations and/or guarantees. We are not linked to any government. Take into account that the forecast is nothing more than a game of numbers whether flawed or correct based upon some speculative assumptions.
Friday, September 25th, 2020