In March 2025, we learned that our own CIA was linked to the JFK assassination. The Kennedy Files were released by President Trump in March 2025 despite INTENSE opposition. Had he not insisted they likely never would have been released. These files prove the existence of a Deep State in 1963 powerful enough by then, over years of development and secrecy, to assassinate the president of the United States and keep their involvement hidden for 62 years through multiple congressional hearings, until all responsible for his death were unpunished and safely dead. The 2,000 newly released files also document that Lee Harvey Oswald was in fact, a CIA asset, recruited, trained, and groomed by the CIA in Japan while he was in the service at the Naval Air Facility at Atsugi in the late 1950s. Obviously others were involved or they would not have hid this fact. Also, every president prior to Trump could have released these files but feared to.
“President Kennedy, as the enormity of the Bay of Pigs disaster came home to him, reportedly said to one of the highest officials of his administration that he wanted ‘to splinter the C.I.A. in a thousand pieces and scatter it to the winds.’” (“C.I.A.: Maker of Policy, or Tool?” The New York Times on April 25, 1966). Unfortunately they got to him first.
There is no organization more Deep State than the CIA. Since the Deep State was never fully revealed, removed or punished then, it is still in place. LibertyUnderFile.org published in March 2025 two columns 1) “John F. Kennedy Assassination Files Revealed ‘A State Within a State.’” AND, 2)“UNBELIEVABLY Most Presses Missed the Most Important JFK Assassination File Finding.” The State Within a state was the CIA. Both Kennedy and Trump fought their Deep State’s and worked to expose them and both took a bullet to the head for doing so.
Trump dealt with this “State Within a State” issue continually since 2015 but most clearly on Sept. 30, 2025 when he, and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, summoned hundreds of the nations top military officers to Marine Corps Base Quantico. Attendance was not optional. His two principal messages given to the generals and admirals was that the enemy is within this country and the military must remember it’s oath to protect and defend the Constitution from “all enemies foreign and domestic.” This time they were domestic. He said, “This is going to be a big thing for the people in this room because it’s the enemy from within and we have to handle it before it gets out of control. It won’t get out of control once you’re involved” (“Trump Discloses to the U.S. Generals ‘The Enemy is From Within,”’ LibertyUnderFire.org,10 October 2025).
In April 2025 the FBI Crossfire Hurricane documents went public revealing Deep State treason by Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden. By May it was clear that the FBI was linked to a secret plan, a Coup d’etat., to prevent Donald Trump from being elected president in 2016, and when once elected, thereafter to NOT allow his inauguration. The new FBI Director, Kash Patel, sent members of Congress the released nearly 700 pages of declassified records called “Crossfire Hurricane” debunking the baseless Trump–Russia saga. Congressional Democrats were largely accomplices!! The release was labeled the Crossfire Hurricane Redacted Binder.” This was the lost binder the Biden FBI expected, but failed to find, in their Mar-A-Largo raid on Trump’s home 9 August 2022. These documents are devastating to Dems. There was no Trump/Russia collusion. Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and Joe Biden have the most to worry from the, long suppressed, FBI Crossfire Hurricane documents having been the most heavily involved in the Coup d’etat. Each has played a major role in the present Deep State hold on America (“Newly Released FBI Crossfire Hurricane Documents Reveal Deep State Treason,” LibertyUnderFire.org 7 May 2025).
In July The new CIA director John Radcliffe released ICA’s Tradecraft Review of the 2016 Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA) revealing the CIA, FBI, and DNI’s unsuccessful attempt to nullify Trump’s 2016 election victory over Hillary Clinton because of alleged Russian collusion in the election. In this, outgoing president Barack Obama and then CIA Director John Brennan played major and intentional roles in both. The reassessment magnified the Crossfire Hurricane documents. The Russian Hoax and it’s cover-up, is now the biggest political scandal in American history. “Never has a president left office to collude with others to impede the next sitting president of the United States of America until Obama! (“Bombshell Declassified ICA Report on 2016 Plot to Overthrow Elected President,” 9 July 2025, LibertyUnderFire.org).
On July 22, 2025 Tulsi Gabbard was interviewed by Rob Schmitt on Newsmax. The US Director of National Intelligence (DNI) alleged that former president Barack Obama “manufactured” evidence to “suggest Russia helped Donald Trump win the 2016 presidential election.” Gabbard “announced that she was referring Obama” administration officials – including FBI director James Comey, ex-CIA director John Brennan, and her own predecessor James Clapper to the Justice Department over their roles in the alleged plot to undermine Trump’s victory over Hillary Clinton. She subsequently accused Obama of orchestrating a “year-long coup” against Trump during an interview with Maria Bartiromo on Fox News Sunday Morning futures.
DEI Tulsi Gabbard, a life long Democrat, found it necessary to refer, Democrat President Barack Obama, to the Department of Justice for criminal behavior and potential prosecution for treason.
The DNI declassified “Obama administration treasonous conspiracy” which consisted of two plots 1) Obama created a fake issue mid-summer 2016 to ensure the people voted for Hillary Clinton and 2) when Trump was elected anyway, he used his office, on December 9, 2016, just before vacating, to “cook up Intel” to not seat the peoples’ choice for president, both treasonable. The evidence was found in a secret room, in a “burn bag” at FBI headquarters. There was never a Trump Russia collusion to elect Trump” (“Avalanche of Newly Declassified Documents Support Obama’s Treason Charge,” LibertyUnderFire.org. 6 Aug. 2025).
No president has been referred to the Department of Justice for criminal behavior and potential prosecution for treason. This by Tulsi Gabbard, a lifelong Democrat, former Democrat member of Congress from Hawaii, and Democrat candidate herself for president in 2024, presently serving as Trump’s US Director of National Intelligence (DNI). She accused her former two-termed president, Barack Hussein Obama, of treason, presenting “over 100 pages of declassified, memos, assessments, and emails, including whistleblower claims.”
Yes, the two most consequential stories of 2025 are about treason but they also document the existence of a secret Deep State government in both political parties many years before 1963 strong enough to kill a president and escape justice till all involved were unpunished and safely dead. President Trump faces and exposes the same secret combination today. Both presidents, one a Democrat the other a Republican, took a bullet to the head for opposing it–Kennedy fatally. Both parties–all Americans– should be united in destroying the Deep State.
Dr. Harold Pease is an expert on the United States Constitution and a syndicated columnist on current events. Read his weekly columns at www.LibertyUnderFire.org Column #856
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Every major study of the 2020 Presidential Election shows it was rigged, was influenced by Dominion or Smartmatic voting machines, these originating from Venezuela, and was used world wide in elections during Nicholas Maduro’s reign. Maduro is the common denominator for it all. This is likely the main reason Trump went after Venezuela and had Maduro kidnapped. He is the star witness. He witnessed all of it.
Maduro photos after his kidnaping show him smilng, friendly and conversant with his captures—certainly atypical for someone living through the death of dozens around him in the assault on his home and the kidnapping also of his wife. Hand and finger gestures appear intentional, one with a peace sign, two with thumbs up (as shown above) and a third can’t be identified with common meaning. One has to wonder if he objected to his kidnapping. He looks almost freed. Perhaps his real captors were the Deep State, the cartels and his Cuban guards. Very strange.
The Deep State media treated these as conspiracies. I have said for many years a conspiracy theory that lasts more than five years is no longer a conspiracy nor likely a theory —this, assuming a free press. Still, today it is very difficult to get the other side, or sides. Everything is normally opposite what is given in their presses or computer domains, which comprise at least 85% of what is published—largely because they have the means and organization to publish.
We also know that Venezuela was the Deep State’s capital of South America and played a major role in the invasion of the United States. Biden even requested Maduro empty his gangs, prisons and insane asylums into the U.S. Thus technically Venezuela invaded the United States first. When a reporter asked Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, “Would you welcome a US military intervention in Venezuela?” She responded, “Venezuela has been invaded. We have the Russian agents. We have the Iranian agents. We have terrorists groups such as Hezbollah, [and] Hamas operating freely in accordance with the regime.” After telling us how invaded they already were, Machado added, “We will turn Venezuela into the energy, technological, and democracy hub of the Americas. We will host all of you in a bright, democratic, and free country, and it’s going to be soon” (X22 Report, hear after not cited, Ep. 3793b, Dec. 11, 2025, 41:50).
There is no question Venezuela and Maduro had become a strategic impairment for the U.S. It had become a Latin American crossroads for all USA principle enemies. Maduro was nurturing relationships with Russia, Hesbollah, Iran and Communist China. All of which challenged the sacrosanct 203 year-old Monroe Doctrine that any intervention in the political affairs of the Americas by foreign powers is potentially a hostile act against the United States. Even Communist China imported at least 24,000 military-aged men in nine months during the invasion, traveling from China to Venezuela to Columbia then through seven Central American countries finally into the United States (“China is Invading America Without Firing a Shot. Biden Lets Them!!, LibertyUnderFire.org, Jan. 3, 2023). Venezuela was central to the invasion.
President Biden’s $25 million reward for bringing in Nicholas Maduro.
Both Deep State presidents Obama and Biden said they viewed Maduro as a national threat. In 2015 Obama “issued an executive order declaring Venezuela’s president a national security threat and the government a narco terrorist organization.” The Trump administration (first term) escalated actions against Maduro using Obama’s 2015 Executive Order as a foundation, adding Trump’s 2020 indictment of him. In addition he placed a $15 million bounty on him. President Biden expounded sanctions on him in 2022 and increased the then $15 million bounty on Maduro to $25 million in 2022. “25 million for anyone who can deliver Maduro to America.” He knew no one would. Both Russia and China supported Maduro’s injecting America with drugs (Ep. 3811b, Jan. 5, 2026, 17:23). Trump executed the order of Obama and Biden. He used what they put in place to actually bring Maduro to the United States, just what his predecessors started.
We know because under Barack Obama, “Nicholas Maduro’s nephews were arrested with nearly 2000 pounds of cocaine and sentenced to 18 years in federal prison.” Despite Maduro’s facing an active US arrest warrant, that Biden increased by $10 million over narcotics charges, “Joe Biden commuted their sentences using his pardon power” (“Biden Freed Maduro’s Narco nephews After Obama Jailed them” AMUSE Jan. 5, 2026). Remember Biden’s son Hunter used and stored cocaine in the White House.
One of the many questions emerging from Operation Absolute Resolve is why Maduro guardians were foreigners not Venezuelans —32 Communist Cubans. It is supposed that he did not trust his own countrymen to protect him as he was so hated, or someone wished to keep an eye on him. Several mysterious photos of him arriving in New York have him extending both thumbs and grinning or making what appears to be other “glad finger” gestures. His wife appeared notably dismayed. Why did we bring her unless, he requested it? Deep State sources suggest these gestures are AI generated but they do not share why they “know” this and these are the same sources that have been wrong on everything else. Most sources, that show the pictures, say nothing but have been previously reliable.
Nicholas Maduro is not the first dictator kidnapped by the U.S government. In Dec. 1989 President George Herbert Walker Bush kidnapped the Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega—also for importing drugs into the U.S. He was convicted and sentenced to 40 years in a federal prison in Georgia. He was release from prison 2007 then extradited to France where he served another 7 years for money laundering then to Panama for human rights violations. He died in 2017 at the age of 83.
We know Maduro was hated by most Venezuelans. We know he was controlled by the cartels and the Deep State. We know Trump and Maduro had prior communications— even two days before the raid. Since I have taught current events long before President George Herbert Walker Bush kidnapped the Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega—also for importing drugs into the U.S.—and he was convicted and served his sentence in Georgia, let me share a wild hunch. It follows: What if Maduro came to hate the Deep State and no longer supported what they were doing in and to Venezuela? What if he feared both sides would kill him, his people or the cartels?
What if he chose to leverage what he knew to turn states’ evidence? He could bid for a nice prison with his wife, that may be why she came. He knows Trump is not Deep State. He knows Trump is destroying the Deep State worldwide. What he knows is of high value in doing just that. He trusts Trump. There is no safe place in Venezuela in or out of prison. He could sing like a bird, and if I am right, he will. He could testify against Barack Obama and Joe Biden, how the machines from his country installed them both and the part they and George Soros played in financing the invasion, even how Biden virtually begged him to send his gangs and criminals to the US. All of it! Is this why his first message in the U.S. was to hold both thumbs up? May be.
Dr. Harold Pease is an expert on the United States Constitution and a syndicated columnist on current events. Read his weekly columns at www.LibertyUnderFire.org Column #855
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Respecting the 2025-2026 U.S. armada blockade of Venezuela, Trump maintains it is there, “Until such time as they return to the United States of America all of the oil, land, and other assets that they previously stole from us.” He has tied this to past nationalizations of oil companies under Venezuelan governments (especially socialists Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro), characterizing them as “theft of U.S. property” and linking Venezuelan oil revenues to funding drug trafficking and other crimes.
Trump’s armada blockade.of Venezuela. “Until such time as they return to the United States of America all of the oil, land, and other assets that they previously stole from us.”
Is this true? I asked ChatGpt.com. AI is almost always the sum of what the choir says, and “choir-like” all Deep State sources say this is preposterous and suggests Trump is an idiot for saying it. Worse, disrupting the world by acting on it! BUT there is truth in what he is saying. Change the word stole to “acquired without consent and/or full payment,” and it’s the same.
Venezuela’s oil industry began in earnest in the early 20th century, with significant discoveries around Lake Maracaibo. The country’s vast reserves attracted foreign investment, primarily from American companies. Under the dictatorship of Juan Vicente Gómez (1908–1935), generous concessions were granted to firms like Standard Oil (which became Exxon) and its subsidiary Creole Petroleum, Gulf Oil, and Mobil. These companies built infrastructure, extracted oil, and exported it, making Venezuela one of the world’s top oil producers by the mid-20th century. By 1970, production peaked at around 3.8 million barrels per day. However, this era was marked by growing resentment over foreign control, as Venezuelans felt the profits largely benefited outsiders rather than the nation.
Post-World War II, democratic governments began asserting more control. In 1943, a new Venezuelan hydrocarbons law increased royalties and taxes on foreign operators. The creation of OPEC in 1960, co-founded by Venezuela, further empowered oil-producing nations to negotiate better terms. Global events in the early 1970s accelerated change: Nationalizations in Libya (1971), Algeria, and Iraq, along with the 1973 oil crisis triggered by the Yom Kippur War and OPEC embargo, inspired similar moves. Oil prices quadrupled, creating an economic boom in Venezuela and making nationalization politically and financially feasible.
Under President Rafael Caldera (1969–1974), Venezuela passed laws to expand state oversight, including the 1971 nationalization of the natural gas industry. By then, foreign companies—mostly U.S.-based—had invested over $5 billion in the sector, controlling the largest petroleum complex in Latin America. Public opinion strongly favored reclaiming the industry, with polls showing support for nationalization but also a preference for retaining foreign expertise initially.
In August 1975, The Venezuelan Congress passed the Organic Law that Reserves to the State the Industry and Trade of Hydrocarbons, setting the stage for nationalization effective January 1, 1976. Carlos Andrés Pérez proclaimed the takeover at the historic Mene Grande oilfield, symbolizing the end of foreign concessions. The law created Petróleos de Venezuela, S.A. (PDVSA) as a state-owned holding company, with subsidiaries absorbing operations from the expropriated firms. The Venezuelan government paid approximately $1 billion in compensation for the expropriated assets—covering wells, refineries, and infrastructure. Definitely too little!!
Because of this hit on the free market, production began declining post-1976. By the 1990s, Venezuela partially reopened to foreign investment, but the 1976 event marked a pivotal assertion of sovereignty over resources long dominated by American interests. Many U.S. and European companies (Exxon, ConocoPhillips, Chevron, Shell, etc.) lost or were forced to restructure their assets to survive. Compensation offered at nationalization was generally seen as inadequate by the companies, leading to almost constant litigation with them thereafter.
Devout Socialist. Hugo Chávez came to power in 1998 accelerating government ownership of the oil industry. Many U.S. firms (like ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips) refused the terms and exited. 2009 saw expanded state takeovers of service companies tied to the petroleum sector. An ICSID tribunal finds Venezuela unlawfully expropriated ConocoPhillips’ investments (Hamaca, Petrozuata, Corocoro projects). Nicolás Maduro, who replaced Chavez in 2013, was also a far left socialists, and socialism always spawns inefficiency, less productivity, and thus poverty.
In 2014 an international arbitration panel ordered Venezuela to pay ExxonMobil ~$1.6 billion over compensation disputes from asset nationalization. In 2018 ConocoPhillips secures $2 Billion ICC award and the following year with another major arbitration awards: tribunals ruled Venezuela must pay roughly $8.7 billion (and related awards) for expropriated interests in Petrozuata, Hamaca, and Corocoro projects. Enforcement of these awards has been slow, frustrating, and almost impossible.
International arbitration awards mean companies have a legal right to compensation under treaties. These are corporate claims, not sovereign claims. When the government took over the industry they denied sovereignty claims thus there existed no way to make their government corporations pay for the property confiscated. Yes, nation states control their own natural resources but who is going to make them pay their debts for tools to extract the resources? Mostly Venezuela paid only partial amounts and constantly delayed payments. Venezuela lost every arbitration award made against it.
America is in Venezuela for several reasons. But can we understand why an American armada is presently one of them? “Until such time as they return to the United States of America all of the oil, land, and other assets that they previously stole from us,” it remains, and why Trump, a businessman, could call it theft.
GRAPH Arbitration Awards vs. Payments Received (Approximate)USD Billions 10 |█████████████████████████ ConocoPhillips (ICSID 2019) $8.7B 9 |████████████████████████ 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 4 |█████ ExxonMobil (ICSID 2014) $1.6B 3 | 2 |██ ConocoPhillips (ICC 2018) $2.0B 1 | 0 |█ Payments Actually Received ~$0.25–0.5B —————————————————— Award Amount Paid to Date Interpretation Total major awards: ≈ $12–13B Payments confirmed: < $1B Outstanding balance: ~90%+ unpaid This visualization is often used by creditors, courts, and sovereign-risk analysts to demonstrate persistent non-compliance rather than temporary delay.
Dr. Harold Pease is an expert on the United States Constitution and a syndicated columnist on current events. Read his weekly columns at www.LibertyUnderFire.org Column #854 Help preserve our Republic while we still can by sharing this column.
All three of the above know that the Deep State is real, is embedded to some extent in every country, seeks to destroy liberty wherever it exists, and to eventually control the planet. Zelenskyy was installed into office by it. Trump was opposed by it more than any other and was the first elected president, besides John F. Kennedy, to openly stand against it at all odds—even risking life in prison or assassination. Putin’s 22 year reign too was threatened by it. In a color revolution the Deep State assimilated Ukraine located next door to Russia, constructed 13 bio labs therein on its Russian border, each capable of releasing, by accident or intent, a killer pandemic on the Russian population, and threatened making Ukraine a NATO member thereby placing a formerly hostile military organization directly on Russia’s border. Putin is an enemy of the Deep State as much as Trump. We have the right people dealing with Deep State Ukraine. Both Trump and Putin know the real enemy to the world and can’t be misdirected, bribed, or intimidated from removing it’s grip on the world.
Trump is criticized for not dumping more billions into the Ukraine conflict—a war that would never have begun had Trump been recognized as the legitimate winner of the 2020 presidential election. A war that would never have begun had the Obama administration not fostered a color revolution in Ukraine bringing the Deep State into power in that country in 2014—it became an American Deep State country. A war that would never have begun had Ukraine not allowed the construction of 13 bio-labs on the border of Russia threatening them with the potential of a killer pandemic. LibertyUnderfire.org has published much on stories dealing with Ukraine.
The Deep State still controls the news in the United States, so on any given issue the reader, is not likely to get more than half the news on any subjects they are sensitive to. Here are some stories they portray very differently. It’s not Russia that is derailing the peace talks in Ukraine. The EU, NATO, and Ukraine are countering everything in Trump’s Peace Plan. They want to keep Russia as the enemy and “boogie man” forever. They want World War III to obliterate their crimes. Left to themselves without U.S. weapons and EU or NATO involvement they have no chance of winning—actually they lost years ago. If Ukraine, EU, NATO really wanted peace they would have come to the table long ago. Instead, their actions demonstrate they want world war (X22 Report, not cited hereafter, Ep. 3780b, Nov. 23, 2025, 2:30).
Zelenskyy has 30,000 political prisoners locked up. No elections either. He’s a king a dictator. (Ep. 3788b, Dec. 3, 45:56). He has the support of only about 20% of the people. The past Fall 100,000 Ukrainian military-aged men fled. They know they are fodder in a war they can not win. Meanwhile, “NATO allies pledge over $1 Billion for purchase of US arms for Ukraine,” (By Martin Fornusek, THE KYIV INDEPENDENT, Dec. 3, 2025). They do not want a real peace plan (Ep. 3789b, Dec. 4, 2025, 37:36). They are building for war.
Ukraine has become the aggressor in that war continuing missiles drone attacks hundreds of miles into Russia. Deep State news outlets cover only Russian attacks on Ukraine not Ukraine attacks provoking Russian retaliatory strikes. Russian President Putin says, “Europe’s only goal is to prevent US President Trump from achieving peace through negotiations” (Ep. 3787b, Dec. 2, 31:48). Even the Nord Stream pipeline explosions was to bring Russia to war some say with Biden approval. Putin does not want war and is trying NOT to let the EU provoke him to one.
Meanwhile the European Union is becoming decidedly more tyrannical. Press and speech freedoms have been removed in the United Kingdom and EU. “The British government decided to smuggle 40 K Afghans into the country. Neither the media nor members of Parliament were allowed to ever report, they were being gagged, much less report on the government decision to bring tens of thousands of Islamic migrants secretly into the country at a cost of $9 billion.” It was called “Operation Rubific.” (Ep, 3791b, Dec. 8,2025, 27:25). They succeeded!
The European Union, a merger of 27 formerly independent countries, created by the Maastricht Treaty, came into effect on November 1, 1993. It opened its borders to Islamic countries who consequently poured in without vetting. Crime escalated, “At LEAST 400,000 children, women and men have been killed or raped by non-– European migrants and refugees since 2010. It’s a genocide of ethnic Europeans, sponsored by the EU and those who support it.” Elon Musk, who posted this information, adds, “when does it become a genocide?” X (Daily Romania, Ep, 3791b, Dec. 8,2025, 31:49).
Hungry, a EU member, refused to assimilate and was “fined half a billion for not letting migrants in, for not following the EU’s migration rules and the meters are still running, at about 1 million a day.” A member country makes a decision the EU doesn’t like and suddenly unelected judges are draining their national budget. “This is what happens when a union turns into a rule by law machine.” An unelected body is now flexing their muscles saying to every single country in the EU, ‘You do not have sovereignty. You must do exactly what you are told or else.’” (Mario Nawfal, Daily Romania, Ep, 3791b, Dec. 8, 2025, 33:25).
With the EU’s decree Hungry’s Prime Minister Victor Orban responded, “With today’s decision, Brussels is attempting to force Hungry to pay even more or take immigrants in. This is unacceptable. Hungry already spends enough to protect the unions exterior border. We will not take a single migrant in, and we will not pay for other migrants. Hungry will not implement the measures of the migrant past.” (Mario Nawfal, Ep. 3792b, Dec. 9, 27:05).
Trump is criticized for not supporting NATO, created after World War II to confront the Soviet Union and communist expansion, but this was when the West was still modeling the republic form of government—the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights—very different from the authoritarian forms of government emerging in the present. We united then under the banner of liberty, today we are asked to support tyranny as expressed by the EU and Zelenskyy and NATO their tool to protect tyranny. Why should Trump feel compelled now to protect tyranny?
Meanwhile in true Deep State modus operandi NATO [the new aggressors] call for defense [aggression] against Russia, NATO’s Mark Rutte “warns allies they are Russia’s next target, [thus] must step up defense efforts to prevent a war waged by Russia, that could be ‘on the scale of war, our grandparents and great grandparents endured’” (France 224’s Dave Keating Reports, 11/12//2025, Ep. 3794b, Dec. 12, 37:44).
Trump realizing that NATO, the EU, and Ukraine — all Deep State organizations or governments—hell-bent to force World War III on the world to cover their crimes released his own warning to them, “If everybody keeps playing games like this, you’ll end up in a Third World War” (Ep. 3794b, Dec. 12, 38:07). Trump remains for peace.
Dr. Harold Pease is an expert on the United States Constitution and a syndicated columnist on current events. Read his weekly columns at www.LibertyUnderFire.org Column #853
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The power of the song Silent Night was demonstrated in one of the most destructive wars in world history just 98 years after written in 1816 and within miles of where written. Father Joseph Mohr, wrote the words as a poem while he was serving in Mariapfarr, Germany, two years later he had Franz Xaver create a melody for it. Mohr and Gruber performed the song for the first time at Midnight Mass, The carol was famously associated with sparking the unofficial Christmas Truce on December 25, 1914, in World War I along the Western Front. No song had ever paused a war, this one did.
Did German and British troops, each heavily involved in trench warfare attempting to kill the other, really stop fighting and play football on Christmas Day, December 25, 1914? Reportedly the eve before, a British soldier named Edgar Aplin sang a solo with his beautiful tenor voice which carried to the trench of his opponent. The German soldiers listened in the darkness and called out for another song. Aplin obliged and the Germans responded with Silent Night. Then, somehow, in the midst of the fighting, on Christmas 1914, a temporary peace took place. Singing Christmas carols led to both sides leaving their trenches, than to conversation, then to a game of football. The miracle of the music fostered comradely for a single day.
During the early months of WWI, in frozen trenches near Ypres, Belgium, German soldiers began decorating their parapets with small Christmas trees and lanterns on Christmas Eve. They started singing carols, and in one sector, a German tenor (oftebbn identified as opera singer Lieutenant Walter Kirchhoff) sang “Stille Nacht.” British troops across no-man’s-land recognized the melody, joined in with the English version “Silent Night,” and responded with their own carols like “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen.” This shared singing created a spontaneous ceasefire in several areas: soldiers emerged from trenches, exchanged Did German and British troops, each heavily involved in trench warfare attempting to kill the other, really stop fighting and play football on Christmas Day, December 25, 1914? Reportedly the eve before, a British soldier named Edgar Aplin sang a solo with his beautiful tenor voice which carried to the trench of his opponent. The German soldiers listened in the darkness and called out for another song. Aplin obliged and the Germans responded with Silent Night. Then, somehow, in the midst of the fighting, on Christmas 1914, a temporary peace took place. Singing Christmas carols led to both sides leaving their trenches, than to conversation, then to a game of football. The miracle of the music fostered comradely for a single day. gifts (cigarettes, food, buttons), buried their dead, conversed, and even played impromptu football matches.
The truce was not universal—fighting continued in some sectors—and high commands on both sides disapproved, ensuring no large-scale repetition in later years. Yet this moment of humanity amid horror has become legendary, symbolizing shared culture transcending enmity. There had never been a day like this or since when a simple tune about the birth of Jesus Christ paused the guns and the death on both sides for a day. But there was never a tune more universally loved by the human family having been translated into more than 300 languages.
Dr. Harold Pease is a syndicated columnist and an expert on the United States Constitution. He has dedicated his career to studying the writings of the Founding Fathers and applying that knowledge to current events. He taught history and political science from this perspective for over 30 years at Taft College. Newspapers have permission to publish this column. Read his weekly columns at, www.LibertyUnderFire.org Column # 852.
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It was in the eighth grade when I moved from Santa to Christ as my main focus of Christmas. I remember well the star saturated night when the heavens overwhelmingly testified to me of God’s awesomeness. I could feel the words of my favorite Christmas carol “Silent Night” go deep into my soul as never before as I both sang and pondered its words. Perhaps it was the scenic nativity-like setting where I found myself hand-milking my neighbors cow while he was away for a week. The three-sided shed allowed my gaze into the dark but star-lit, cold, cloudless night enabling my peek into the heavens. It was Christmas Eve and I was alone with Christ. It could not have been more impressive and it was the same every night and dark morning for the week of Christmas.
The original Christmas was ALL, and only, about Christ.
I never had that experience again in the same way but I always had an intense love for the carols that spoke of His birth: “Oh Holy Night,” “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing,” “Joy to the World,” and “The First Noel.” They were just different somehow—far more powerful than regular jingles. They testified of Christ as our Savior. My background was not particularly unique for the time period. Santa was there for the children but he never competed with Christ for the spotlight. The transition to Christ just increased with maturity. Years followed years, I had children and now they have children and, because of home and church the songs have passed on as they had for hundreds of years before. But, unfortunately, this does not happen for everyone.
Today the earth is still bathed with happy songs but radio stations ever more infrequently play the ageless Christ-birth songs: “Far, Far Away on Judea’s Plains,” “With Wondering Awe,” “Away in the Manger,” and “O Little Town of Bethlehem.” Outdoor nativity decorations are virtually non-existent unless you make your own. Yes, we outline our homes with lights in commemoration of the season but stores have almost nothing to purchase that speaks to this Holiest Night. We have almost removed Christ—the source of all light, truth and salvation—from Christmas as we became a nation of mostly the unchurched.
There are few television shows or movies that address Nativity themes but Hollywood never really did much in this direction anyway, the “Waltons” or “Little House on the Prairie” were the exceptions, but then again that was in a past generation. There is virtually no Nativity symbolism on television programs today. Everything is “feel good,” programs like, I found my new love on Christmas, or Santa related. The Grinch or Elf may be played ten times each but still little or no attention to Christ. Yet Hallmark does give us a second Christmas season, the July reruns of forty-year-olds, mostly without kids, finding love, still, without any focus on Christ the reason for the season. It’s often pathetic in July.
Almost all references to Christ have been removed from our schools and teachers dare not encourage the singing of traditional Christmas carols, although any tune without the mention of Jesus Christ is encouraged. A culture that did not know the words of “Silent Night,” “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear,” “Joy to the World,” or, “Oh, Come, All Ye Faithful” would have been unheard of in my day, but is the norm today. Only the churches and homes give any real exposure to Christ in Christmas, as was so for me and generations before me. Sadly some churches may give more emphasis to Santa than Christ. Neither churches nor communities have live outdoor drive-by Nativities as they once did. Christ does not mind sharing His Christmas, only the focus of it being removed from Him.
The reason for the season is Jesus Christ, that is why the event is called Christ-mas but few homes show any evidence that He is center placed. Someone once said that we are all “Inn Keepers” to the extent we allow Christ in our lives. Unfortunately “there is no room in the Inn” for too many. Most Americans consider themselves unchurched (a term for those without religious affiliation) so the incentive to read, tell, or act out the “Old Story” is mostly gone. Seemingly each generation transfers to the next, less of Christ in Christmas.
Today some few want to turn Christmas into Winter Break and Easter into Spring Break, undermining both. It is not the break they object to but the name. No one seems to object to the Jewish holiday Hanukkah, or any other holiday—only the holidays with Christ’s name associated with it. We were founded as a Christian nation; so what if some object, everyone gets the same break!! The undermining of Christ’s special day is endless and seemingly intentional for some. The consequence is an increasingly darkened world ethically and moraly.
Why not change to a traditional Christmas this Christmas season, like generations before. In your home play mostly the traditional Christ centered songs. Instead of a Santa or reindeer in your front yard, make and display a nativity scene. Take yourself or family to a church service. Find a service that will speak of that special night and rehearse the events of that most sacred event. Go caroling to shut-ins or to a nursing home. Read to your friends and loved ones on Christmas Eve the story of the birth of Jesus Christ—the one believed by all Christians to be the Savior of the world. If you have children let them act it out. Give Christ a few hours of your month. Greet everyone with Merry Christmas. You will never be sorry that you took this challenge. Then you will not be an accomplice in removing Christ from Christmas and will join those who wonder why anyone would want to.
Most will never have a special moment in a shed milking a cow on a cold, starry, night as I did as a 14 year-old boy but this same special feeling will find a way of filling every soul that will allow “room in the Inn” for Christ, just as intensely in its own way. Those with a relationship with Jesus Christ recognize it more easily than those without. The days before Christmas are the most special days in the year as though the planet had been dusted by angels. It was, and is again every year. There is noticeably more giving, sharing, kindness and sacrifice for others. Thoughts of others and gratitude fill the air. Non-Christians too benefit from this annual angel dusting.
Merry Christmas to my many appreciative readers around the world.
Dr. Harold Pease is a syndicated columnist and an expert on the United States Constitution. He has dedicated his career to studying the writings of the Founding Fathers and applying that knowledge to current events. He taught history and political science from this perspective for over 30 years at Taft College. Newspapers have permission to publish this column. Read his weekly columns at, www.LibertyUnderFire.org Column # 851.
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