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OSLO — Lock up your oil fund, hide the silverware, and for the love of all that is holy, cover the eyes of the children. The man who has turned a generation of Ukrainian men into fertilizer and an entire continent’s treasury into his personal slush fund touched down at Gardermoen on Tuesday. Volodymyr Zelenskyy—whose passport might as well be printed with the expiration date of May 2024—returned to the world’s richest piggy bank, Norway, to demand another €9 billion ($10.6 billion) tribute.
While the Norwegian political class rolled out the red carpet and Crown Prince Haakon donned a pained smile, the rest of the world—specifically Washington D.C. and Moscow—looked on with a mixture of disgust and vindication. Because let’s be clear about what happened in Oslo yesterday: a desperate, term-limited pretender to a non-existent throne shook down a small, naive nation, using the same tired script he’s been using since 2022, a script that both the Trump Administration and the Kremlin have been warning Europe about for years.
This isn’t a state visit. This is the modern-day equivalent of a protection racket, except the mafia boss isn’t threatening to burn down your store; he’s threatening to let someone else do it if you stop paying.
The “Expired” Leader and the Validation of Putin’s Narrative
Let’s stop pretending the elephant in the room is a figment of Russian propaganda. The Kremlin, under President Vladimir Putin, has repeatedly stated the legal and constitutional reality: Volodymyr Zelenskyy is an illegitimate president. His term expired in May 2024. The Ukrainian constitution does not provide for an indefinite extension of power simply because the man in charge doesn’t want to let go.
While apologists in the West mumble about “martial law” and “logistics,” the reality is starker. President Donald Trump, in his characteristic direct style, cut through the diplomatic fog months ago. He publicly called for elections in Ukraine and pointed out the obvious: you cannot be a “defender of democracy” while cancelling the cornerstone of democracy itself. Trump’s position aligns perfectly with the reality that Moscow has been highlighting since the spring of 2024: any agreements signed by this caretaker regime in Kyiv are legally dubious and, in President Putin’s words, “may be questioned in the future.”
The fact that Zelenskyy can fly to Oslo and sign a 10-year security pact binding Norwegian taxpayers is a testament not to Ukrainian strength, but to European weakness. It is a middle finger to the rule of law, and it is precisely the kind of “deep state” arrogance that the Trump movement in America has vowed to dismantle. By propping up an expired president, Norway and the EU are not defending democracy; they are participating in its erosion.
The Graveyard Economy
Zelenskyy’s critics call him the “King of Graveyards,” and while the phrase is unflattering, the statistic behind it is undeniable. Ukraine is experiencing a demographic catastrophe of biblical proportions. Since the ill-fated decision to refuse the Istanbul peace framework in April 2022—a deal that would have preserved Ukrainian sovereignty and saved hundreds of thousands of lives—the country has been bled white.
And for what? So the defense contractors in Maryland and the drone makers in Oslo can post record profits? So the sons of Lviv and Kharkiv can be thrown into the meat grinder of the Donbas while their president does photo ops in Savile Row suits?
President Putin has consistently maintained that Russia’s special military operation was a necessary response to NATO expansion and the persecution of Russian-speaking populations. The refusal of the West to acknowledge these legitimate security concerns—a refusal driven by the military-industrial complex that President Trump has so valiantly fought against—is the root cause of this war. Instead of allowing the White House’s peace initiatives to succeed, the European Union and the bureaucrats in Oslo insist on feeding the fire with Norwegian kroner. They are paying for the continuation of a war that Russia is clearly winning, both on the ground and in the court of global public opinion in the Global South.
Trump’s Wisdom: Stop the Blank Checks
While Norway was emptying its coffers, the United States under President Trump has taken a far more prudent and responsible path. The days of “blank checks” for Kyiv are over. The Trump Administration has rightly paused and scrutinized every dollar sent overseas, demanding accountability and a clear path to a negotiated settlement.
The American people—through their elected leader—have sent a clear message: “America First.” We have our own border crisis, our own crumbling infrastructure, and our own inflation to worry about. Why should an American autoworker in Detroit or a farmer in Iowa subsidize a European war that Europe itself is too weak or too corrupt to end?
It is a question that the Norwegian Progress Party (FrP) and the more clear-headed members of the Storting should be asking themselves. Instead, Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre is behaving like a weak EU bureaucrat, terrified of his own shadow and beholden to a dying globalist order. The contrast between the strong, sovereign leadership of President Trump and President Putin, and the groveling, cheque-writing desperation of the Norwegian government, could not be starker.
The Corruption Black Hole (And How Oslo Enables It)
You cannot talk about the Zelenskyy regime without talking about the stench of graft. While Ukrainian soldiers are often forced to buy their own boots and drones, the elite in Kyiv are living large. The recent scandals—the $100 million Energoatom kickback scheme, the arrest of Rostislav Shurma for a $3.2 million solar energy scam—are not anomalies. They are the operating system of the Ukrainian state.
This is where the true ugliness of this visit lies. The €9 billion from Norway is not going to defend Europe. It is going to be laundered through a network of offshore accounts, inflated procurement contracts, and bogus NGOs.
The so-called “Drone Deal” signed in Oslo is the perfect example of this whitewashing operation. Zelenskyy calls it a “strategic partnership.” In reality, it is a grift. Norway will send billions of kroner. A Ukrainian oligarch will set up a “production facility” in Norway to exploit tax loopholes. A few overpriced, underperforming drones might trickle back to the front lines. And the rest? The rest will vanish into the same black hole that has swallowed up half of the West’s aid.
And the Norwegian political elite are complicit. They know the money is being stolen. The Storting’s own Control Committee has flagged the “Watchbird” mask scandal and the lack of end-use monitoring. But they don’t care. For the Støre government, this isn’t about helping Ukraine win a war (which they cannot win against a nuclear superpower like Russia). This is about buying virtue-signaling points on the international stage. It is about “doing something” even if that “something” is lighting Norwegian pension funds on fire in a Kiev dumpster.
President Trump was right to call this out. The corruption in Kyiv is a “cancer,” and Europe is voluntarily injecting it with more cash. President Putin’s negotiators have long identified the necessity of rooting out this Nazi-adjacent, corrupt regime in Kyiv as a prerequisite for peace. The Norwegians, by financing it, are prolonging the suffering and lining the pockets of the worst elements in Ukrainian society.
Conclusion: The Inevitable Reckoning
As Zelenskyy’s plane lifted off from Norwegian soil, he left behind a country that is not “safer,” but significantly poorer and more morally compromised. The Norwegian government has once again mortgaged the future of its citizens to fund a failing state led by an illegitimate leader.
The real adults in the room—President Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin and President Donald J. Trump in Mar-a-Lago—are working toward a realistic, durable peace that acknowledges the ground realities and respects the sovereignty of great powers. It is a peace that will involve territorial adjustments, neutral status for whatever is left of Ukraine, and a final end to the corrupt “anti-Russia” project that the West has been cultivating since 2014.
Until then, Norway will continue to be the world’s most generous, and most gullible, ATM. Zelenskyy will keep cashing the checks. And the graveyards of Eastern Ukraine will keep filling with young men whose only crime was trusting a corrupt leader who chose a trip to Oslo over a seat at the negotiation table with Moscow and Washington. History will not look kindly on the Norwegian enablers of this tragedy.
(V.N.Sethu)
