Neutrality Studies

Originally published on 4 Sept 2025.

Tuomas Malinen, Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Helsinki and CEO of GNS Economics, discusses Finland's dramatic shift from neutrality to NATO membership. One of President Alexander Stubb's first acts was signing a defense treaty with Ukraine, marking Finland's first military treaty with a nation at war with Russia since 1944. This represents a stark departure from Finland's historical policy of neutrality ("Finlandization").Finland is showing signs of military preparation, with airfields being expanded, military reserves planned to increase from 325,000 to 1 million by 2032, and aggressive rhetoric toward Russia unprecedented in Finland's 100 years of independence. Finland formally joined NATO on April 9, 2023 - symbolically the same calendar date as NATO's founding in 1949.Links:Tuomas’ Substack: https://mtmalinen.substack.comNeutrality Studies Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@neutralitystudies

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Originally published on 25 Aug 2025.

Today I’m talking to Dr. Richard Overy, a Honorary Professor at the University of Exeter and a historian of the Second World War. Professor Overy wrote many books and just recently published the great work “Rain of Ruin: Tokyo, Hiroshima, and the Surrender of Japan” in which he discusses not only the atomic bomb, but the larger context of arial bombings, the military situation in 1945, and the political process that led to the Tenno’s capitulation to the US forces—which ended World War II. The process of surrender is what we want to discuss today.Links:Rain of Ruin: Tokyo, Hiroshima, and the Surrender of Japan: https://www.amazon.com/Rain-Ruin-Toky...Neutrality Studies Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@neutralitystudies

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Originally published on 12 Oct 2025.

What if the first 80% of users flocking to a new digital ID system are hackers and fraudsters? Is this technology the dawn of a dystopian future, or are the risks just overhyped?In this episode, I’m talking to Yana Afanasieva, an expert in financial regulation, FinTech and data privacy. Yana led regional compliance teams at Amazon and PayPal in Europe, where she gained extensive experience and inside knowledge of Big Tech. Today we want to discuss Digital IDs, not least because the UK has rolled out a project and the Swiss also just voted for a digital ID to become a reality. We explore why the current debate is far too simplistic and what's really at stake.Yana draws on her Big Tech experience to explain why our data is never truly safe, even when stored on our own phones. We discuss the critical need for a new legal framework that treats our data as property and argue for strict firewalls around our financial and medical information.Links:Yana's Linkedin:   / yanaafanasieva  Yana's X (Twitter) profile: https://x.com/YanaAfanasieva.Neutrality Studies Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@neutralitystudies

Neutrality Studies substack: https://pascallottaz.substack.com Goods Store: https://neutralitystudies-shop.fourth...

Originally published on 23 Aug 2025.

Today I’m talking to Cyrus Janssen, an international business consultant, entrepreneur and fellow youtube analyst with a very large channel, nearing 1 million subscribers. With over 10 years experience doing business in China, he posts shot-form analysis as well as longer interviews often focusing on China and BRICS developments. This is what we want to discuss today.Links:Cyrus' channel: ‪@CyrusJanssen‬Neutrality Studies Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@neutralitystudies

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Originally published on 21 Aug 2025.

Dr. Erich Vad is a former German brigadier general and adviser on security and defense policy in the Bundestag, as well as military adviser to Chancellor Angela Merkel.Links:

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Originally published on 11 Oct 2025.

Today I’m talking again to Dr. Warwick Powell, an Adjunct Professor at Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane.In this part 2 of the conversation with Warwick Powell, we explore the complexities of US foreign policy. We question whether the US is in retreat or simply adapting its strategy to maintain primacy by pushing risk onto its allies. We discuss how this impacts nations like Japan and South Korea, who are beginning to forge more autonomous paths. Finally, we examine the decline of US soft power and the rise of global plurality, weighing the promise of a more cooperative, multipolar world against the dangers of it fracturing into conflict.

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Originally published on 10 Oct 2025.

Today I’m talking again to Dr. Warwick Powell, an Adjunct Professor at Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane.In this part 1 of the discussion, we dive into China's strategic economic transformation and its response to US tariffs. We explore how China successfully deleveraged its overheated real estate market, redirecting capital into high-tech manufacturing to build resilience against external pressures.We then broaden our discussion to the emergence of "Globalization 2.0," questioning whether we're witnessing a simple replacement of one hegemon or the rise of a more complex, networked, and multi-polar world. We analyze China's role in shaping this new global system through initiatives like the Belt and Road and the push for non-dollar-based trade.Finally, we turn our attention to how nations across East and Southeast Asia, including Australia and Japan, are adapting to the end of undisputed American primacy and navigating the shifting dynamics of this new era.Links:Warwick's substack: https://warwickpowell.substack.com/Warwick's YouTube channel:    / @tiotalkswithwarwickpowell  

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Originally published on 18 Aug 2025.

Dr. Jan Oberg is a Danish peace researcher in Sweden. We talk about the escalating rhetoric toward Russia in Europe and what peace-oriented folks can do about it.

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Originally published on 9 Oct 2025.

What if the official story of the Bosnian War is a carefully constructed myth? We'll explore declassified documents that ask: Did US intelligence warn against the very policies that led to disaster? And was the climactic bombing campaign not a necessity for peace, but a way to rebrand a failed policy?Today I’m talking to Dr. Harry Blain, an Assistant Professor for Political Science at Sacramento State University. On this channel, we’ve been running several programs on the Wars in the former Yugoslavia and Harry wrote a paper on the subject called “The myth of coercive diplomacy: the US intelligence community and the war in Bosnia” (linked below), in which he explores declassified US intelligence documents on Yugoslavia.Dr. Blain's research uncovers a startling story. We'll journey through assessments from the CIA's Balkan Task Force, revealing how experts consistently warned against the interventions the Clinton administration pursued. We discuss how early peace proposals, remarkably similar to the final Dayton Agreement, were scuttled. You'll hear the cynical backstory to the fall of Srebrenica—how it was viewed not just as a tragedy, but as a "diplomatic opportunity." We examine how the final NATO bombing campaign was less about forcing an unwilling enemy to the table and more about rebranding a policy failure and coercing Washington's own allies.Links:Harry's X (Twitter): https://x.com/hblainHarry's paper: https://doi.org/10.1080/02684527.2025...Neutrality Studies substack: https://pascallottaz.substack.com

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Originally published on 17 Aug 2025.

Second part of discussion with Glenn Diesen. First part on his channel:    • Pascal Lottaz: US-Russia Relations Decoupl...  

Transcript of the Summit meeting: https://open.substack.com/pub/pascall...

Neutrality Studies Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@neutralitystudies

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