Monday, February 16, 2026

It's Monday, February 16, 2026.

I'm Albert Moller and this is The Briefing, a daily analysis of news and events from a

Christian worldview.

Well there are meetings and then there are meetings.

We talked recently about one of the most interesting and frankly, alarming of the international

meetings.

And for a long time, there's been a lot of attention on the meeting of the World Economic

Forum at Davos precisely because it is a meeting of the most powerful globalists in the

world.

Something interesting always happens and you're always, you're always aware of the fact

that something more interesting and more troubling may have happened and it wasn't reported.

But an even more important meeting these days took place just over the last several days

and it wasn't in Davos and Switzerland, it was in Munich and Germany.

This meeting has gone on for decades, but it has taken on a very increased importance

in recent years and we're talking about the meeting that has to do with national security,

the Munich Security Conference.

And as some have described, this is basically a lot like Davos, except the distinction is,

this is Davos with guns.

Now one thing to notice is that in times of relative peace, Davos gets all the attention,

it's the center of all the most interesting conversations.

But when you are at a time of war, the Munich Security Conference looms far larger.

Furthermore, different people are in the room.

And for example, you have a lot of people wearing suits, you don't have so many people dressed

Hollywood, you do not have people so much dressed for a snow vacation.

Instead what you have a very serious people, very serious people, the suits on the one hand

and the uniforms on the other.

And what you're talking about here is a gathering largely of NATO military leaders, certainly

of European and North American military leaders.

And you're also looking at political leaders, you're looking at the top military brass

and you're looking at the top politicians and they're in a room together.

You also have at least at this last meeting an unprecedented number of the United States

senators who are there as well, particularly those senators with responsibility for national

security and also for in affairs.

It's a very, very interesting meeting always, but it doesn't always get a lot of attention.

It got a lot of attention last year.

And the reason it got so much attention is because it was the first Munich Security Conference

after the beginning of the Second Trump administration.

And the speaker that the administration sent to the Munich Security Conference last year

was Vice President JD Vance.

And JD Vance basically took NATO and European leaders to the woodshed.

And surprisingly they didn't like it.

One of the points the Vice President Vance made in last year's address that got so much

attention was the fact that the United States of necessity is tilting much of its interest

and concern to other parts of the world.

Now that sets the United States apart.

And you also had leading figures, including the president of Germany who recently commented

that he is aware that the United States has pressing necessary military and foreign relations

priorities looking far away from Europe.

And in particular, the Vice President made clear president.

Trump has made clear Secretary of State Marco Rubio has made clear.

The United States is tilting much of its attention to the long term strategic challenge

posed by China.

And thus, what you see is something which echoes in some ways the situation during World War II.

In World War II, you had the European or the Atlantic Theater of the War.

And then you had the Pacific Theater of the War, the Pacific Theater due to the surprise attack.

At Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941 by the forces of Imperial Japan.

And so the United States and our allies, but the United States in particular just think of the

geostrategic location of the United States.

You had the the war against Imperial Japan in the Pacific Theater and the war gets

Nazi Germany in the Atlantic Theater and the and the Northern European Theater.

But of course, it became a world theater.

But the point is the United States had to make strategic priorities back in 1941.

And in 1941, even though America's formal entry into World War II came after

the surprise attack by Japanese forces at Pearl Harbor, the United States, along with their

allies, did not make the Pacific Theater the issue of highest priority.

Rather, the realization was that Hitler and the Nazi Empire had to be defeated before there could

be a full concentration of Allied efforts against Imperial Japan.

And that was simply because the clear and present danger to the entire

civilization order was more acute given Nazi Germany than Imperial Japan.

It would have to be dealt with, but in its time and sequence.

Well, over the course of the Cold War, the main issue, clearly the main issue for NATO,

the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and for the United States in particular was aligning

combined strength against the ambitions and the aggression of the Soviet Union and World

Communism. And so there was during the Cold War, a face-off between the USSR on the one hand

and its allies and the United States and its allies on the other hand.

Now, that's not to say that we're very important geostrategic concerns as America looks to the east

and to Asia. But the fact is that the national security of the United States was not fundamentally

challenged from the east in terms of Asia as so much from looking at the Soviet Union,

which by the way straddles both the east and the west. But nonetheless, the focus was in,

the Atlantic, the focus was in, especially the likelihood of a land war between the United

States and our allies and the USSR and its allies there in Europe. And so that had so much

of the attention. And of course, then you add nuclear weapons of ballistic missiles and all the

rest and you can understand how all of this gets very hot very fast. It was a Cold War,

but there were hot moments and the danger of a hot war with thermonuclear weapons was always

in the background. Well, as I mentioned last year Vice President Vance went to Munich and he

basically delivered an ultimatum. He chastised the European nations for failing to contribute

enough even to their own obligations concerning their mutual defense. And he basically said that

they could not count on the United States to bail them out if they will not rise to the occasion

themselves. I'm not going to go back in detail. Device President Vance's address last year,

let's just say that there were almost immediate reports, especially coming from European authorities

that they thought that the entire the entire allied NATO project could fall apart.

Now, it's also clear that the United States understands that it is not in our own national

interest, nor in the interest of our concerns internationally, to have NATO weakened much less

to fall apart. But it's hard to express the frustration that the United States government has

felt for decades, given the fact that European leaders and European nations, including our allies

and NATO have fallen so far behind their own minimal commitments during much of that time

to our common defense against a common foe. And you look at this and you recognize that

what was said by the Trump administration, you need to know, was at least thought by many previous

presidential administrations in both parties. And so there were some very interesting moments

over the course of the last year where there was some realization of what is its stake. And there

was a lot of stake given the fact that Secretary of State Marco Rubio was going to represent the

administration this year just on Saturday, Valentine's Day, at the Munich Security Conference.

I want to give primary attention to what Secretary of State Rubio said. But I do want us to understand

the stakes were incredibly high. And it was very interesting that Rubio was sent. The president himself

did not go. President Trump did not go. He did not send the vice president instead. He sent the

Secretary of State and the Secretary of State Marco Rubio is uniquely equipped in this sense to

deliver an address, peer to peer, to so many of the diplomatic and military colleagues who were

there present in the room. The Secretary of State began by affirming the NATO alliance. He said,

quote, we gather here today as members of an historic alliance and alliance that saved and changed

the world. He went back to the founding of the conference in 1963 and pointed to the fact that

Europe at that time was divided between the Soviet domination and the allies in terms of democratic

self-government. But then he went on to say the world has changed actually several times over

since then. He spoke of the collapse of the Soviet Union and then he said, but the euphoria of this

triumph led us to a dangerous delusion that we had entered. And he said here, quote, the end of

history that every nation would now be a liberal democracy that the ties formed by trade and by

commerce alone would now replace nationhood that the rules based global order and overuse term

would now replace the national interest. And that we would now live in a world without borders

where everyone became a citizen of the world. End quote. Okay. So that included much of what

Vice President Vance said the year before. But he put it in, let's just say a package in which

he began by affirming the NATO alliance and American commitment to the NATO alliance. But then he

went on to go at what he said was no views term the rules based global order. You need to understand

that the globalist, the cosmopolitan's have held to a worldview. This goes all the way back to

the enlightenment philosopher, Emmanuel Kant and his idea of a perpetual peace. It's the idea

that you could have rules that would obligate all the nations of the world. This rules based order

would increasingly dominate more and more of the world such that borders really didn't matter

so much national interest really doesn't matter so much. Instead, this this global agreement,

this cosmopolitan concord would take place. Now President Trump has just pointed to the awkward

fact that there is no such thing. And President Trump has done it in his own inimitable way. Vice

President Vance went to the Munich Security Conference last year and speaking of this rules based

global international order, he said it does not exist. Now in a, let's just say less formal way.

Secretary St. Rubio said more or less the same thing. He spoke of a rules based global order. He

said it was an overused term. And then he said more or less whatever it was, it is now over. He

says, quote, this was a foolish idea that ignored both human nature and it ignored the lessons of

over 5,000 years of recorded human history. And it has cost us dearly. He spoke of it as a delusion.

And then he said it led to a dogmatic vision of free and unfettered trade, even as some nations

protect their economies and subsidize their companies to systematically undercut hours,

shuddering our plants, resulting in large parts of our societies being deindustrialized,

shipping millions of working and middle-class jobs overseas and handing control of our critical

supply chains to both adversaries and rivals, end quote, really strong language presented in a very

statesman-like way. And the Secretary of State, who has long experienced in these issues as the

United States Senator, especially on committees and in leadership on these concerns, he handled

this with incredible ease and he handled it with incredible conviction. He knew what he was doing.

And that's one of the reasons why I want to get to the meat of his speeches, one of the reasons why,

at the end of the day, an awful lot of the people who didn't like Vice President

Advances speech didn't like this one either. Here are some of the things the Secretary of

State said. He said, quote, in a pursuit of a world without borders, we opened our doors to

an unprecedented wave of mass migration that threatens the cohesion of our societies, the continuity

of our culture and the future of our people. We made these mistakes together and now together,

we owe it to our people to face these facts and to move forward to rebuild and quote, no, I just

want to tell you, those are some of those controversial words. The US Secretary of State could have

spoken in this context just a few paragraphs later. He said this, quote, for the United States and

Europe, we belong together. America was founded 250 years ago, but the roots began here on this

continent long before. The men who settled and built the nation of my birth arrived on our shores,

carrying the memories and the traditions and the Christian faith of their ancestors as a sacred

inheritance, an unbreakable link between the old world and the new. He continued saying this,

listen carefully to this quote, we are part of one civilization, western civilization. We are

bound to one another by the deepest bonds that nations could share, forged by centuries of shared

history, Christian faith, culture heritage language ancestry, and the sacrifices our forefathers

made together for the common civilization to which we have fallen air. End quote, I think those

are some of the most important words in recent American diplomacy. They are incredibly strong words

and every one of these words, every one of these phrases fulfills a function. And at least many

of these made a point that well upon reflection, even though presented in such a statesman-like

manner, many in Europe did not like what the Secretary of State said. And neither did many in

the media and others who were absolutely committed to this more globalist vision,

and absolutely allergic to the very claims that the Secretary of State was making.

Now, he went on to speak of de-industrialization. He said it wasn't inevitable. It was a conscious

policy choice. He says that it has to be reversed. It has to be undone. He then went on to say,

quote, mass migration is not, was not, isn't some fringe concern of little consequence. It was

and continues to be a crisis, which is transforming and destabilizing societies all across the West.

And he called upon the nations to address that. He spoke of border control, quote, but we must

also gain control over national borders, controlling who and how many people enter our countries.

This is not an expression in xenophobia. It is not hate. It is a fundamental act of national sovereignty.

And the failure to do so is not just an abdication of one of our most basic duties,

odore people. It is an urgent threat to the fabric of our societies and the survival of our civilization

in itself. Now, here's what's really interesting. If those statements had been made in this same

context, 50 or 60 years ago, they probably would not have made headlines. And that's because

there would have been an almost, well, if not absolute consensus, then an overwhelming consensus

about the very things the Secretary of State was speaking about. And what you have here is the

fact that you see a shift in the thinking of so many among the leadership class in the West. I'll

just say Western civilization, basically, to say we can have all the goods of Western civilization

and undermine them at the very same time. The reason why they were so angry about Vice President

Vance's speech, but now also about Secretary Rubio's speech is because it makes significant claims

about Western civilization. It places the nations of Europe, especially the member nations of the

North Atlantic Treaty Organization and North America in a common culture. And that common culture

is named as Western civilization. And I'll just simply say that I think a civilizational understanding

of history is absolutely essential. I also want to say that many, especially in the ideological left,

reject such a thing from the very beginning, even though it was the way their own universities

taught history as recently as their own their own degree programs as a matter of fact. This is a

recent but overwhelming reorientation of the American academy in the American intellectual class

away from Western civilization towards something else. And as a Christian, I want to say it's the

secularization of the culture that has to be basic to this. And that secularization of the culture

is why so many people were offended when the Secretary of State actually mentioned not once,

but twice, not just twice, but three times. The Christian faith that binds European and North

American nations together. And you know, that turned out to be something that many in the American

media class simply couldn't take. But at this point, I then want to turn and look at a report from

Munich by Jim Tankersley of the New York Times. I told you a lot about how this is seen. And he

begins by basically trying to deny or at least to undermine the idea that there is any such thing

as Western civilization as we think of it. He says this quote, there is an Afghan grocery store on

the box outside the main train station in Munich. Halal food counters are sprinkled around the

cathedral spires and beer halls, nearly one of every three residents you meet in town is not German.

End quote. Okay, so I am in no position to say that's not a fact. But you'll notice it's it's

presented here, not just as a fact, but as an argument. Here's where it becomes clear quote,

it's a decent approximation of what many European cities and European people look like today.

And a different Europe from the one the Trump administration says it wants to be friends with. End

quote. So at least this is a clear drawing of lines. Here you have someone who says the Europe

that the Trump administration wants to be allies and friends with is a Europe he says that no

longer exists. He then went on to say this quote Marco Rubio, the US Secretary of State tried to

sue the year of friction between the United States and its transatlantic allies on Saturday

at the Munich Security Conference. His speech there reiterated America's commitment to Europe,

but wrapped it in historical and cultural ties that seemingly exclude large sections of the

current European population. End quote. Now this gets to the heart of of something we just have

to talk about it far greater development at some point. And that is what it means to become part

of a civilization. And so one of the things that the Trump administration and frankly vice

president of ants and Secretary Ruby are pointing out that when people move to your country that

doesn't necessarily mean they're joining the civilizational project. And and that's the concern

the Secretary of State was bringing. But now I want to go back and look at how this report from

the New York Times basically tries directly just to to confront the Secretary of State, the Trump

administration's approach here. And as Christians, we need to pay close attention to this. This is what

tankersly writes in response quote. Christianity is declining across much of the continent. In the

Europe's three largest economies, Britain, France, and Germany, less than half of residents now

identify as Christian, according to survey data by Bertelsmann Shipton, a nonpartisan foundation,

the ranks of the religiously unaffiliated or growing according to data by the Pew Research Center

and others. He goes on to say that a decade-long influx of migrants in the Middle East and elsewhere

means the share of Muslims across Europe has ticked up that's his language to about six percent.

The Jewish population is actually declined slightly, remains below one percent.

Okay, so you see here by the way that there is the suggestion that whatever Western civilization was,

it's past tense, that's a was. Now, now Europe is representing some kind of new civilization.

And you know, this is going to get down to one of the most basic arguments the American people

are going to have to have. And eventually we're going to have to decide as a nation one way or the

other. Are we a self-conscious continuation of Western civilization? I will argue that must be how

we see ourselves or do we see ourselves as an ever-expanding experiment that can be committed to

these principles in one generation and to an entirely different set of principles in the next.

Because that is exactly what does it take here? The Secretary of State put his finger on it,

named it clearly, said it calmly. And so almost immediately you had to press say,

this is a different attitude than we had last year. And then they heard the speech and they said,

wow, this is an even more highly targeted argument. We don't like it any better.

Now, we're going to have to come back to this. But when people say, you know, Western civilization,

that that's a project that's radically changing or it's being displaced by something new.

And then when you use the word Christian and you say Western civilization really was forged out

of Christianity, it was it was a Christian project. And people say, well, now, you know,

increasingly people aren't Christian. The Christian has to hear that and understand the fact that

they're not Christian, that's very important. But it's also important to know what they're not

and what they are at the same time, which is to say that there's this modern secular dream that

there's some kind of religious neutrality, which is just unaffiliated or neutrality or the nuns

in a way, yes. But the human heart is going to be based upon some very important principles. Those

principles are going to take on some religious character. That's extremely clear in the scriptures.

And so we just need to know, honestly, okay, if Christianity is being replaced by something,

what is that something? Okay, while we're thinking about this, let's just remember what is at stake.

And let's remember that freedom has enemies. It always has had enemies. And one of those

enemies right now is Russia. And you have a very important news report over the weekend.

And it is officially coming as a statement from Britain, France, Germany, Sweden and the Netherlands.

So this is not a fringe statement. This is a statement from the government. Once again,

of Britain, France, Germany, Sweden and the Netherlands. What are they saying? They are saying

that forensic evidence tells us that Alexei Navalny, the Russian opposition leader who was killed

in a Russian prison two years ago, was most likely. And let me read to this to you from the telegram.

It was most likely killed by a poison that's based in a toxin found in a South American frog.

As a telegraph report begins, quote, Alexei Navalny was killed with a toxin developed from an

Ecuadorian frog on the orders of Vladimir Putin, proving that Russia possesses illegal chemical

weapons. And this was in Britain. The British government has revealed the scientist,

quote, concluded that the Russian opposition leader was assassinated with a poison 200

times stronger than morphine. The 47 year old man was murdered there in a Siberian prison

after he had had a lot of outspoken criticism against the Russian president.

But after his death, biological samples were surreptitiously taken from his body and smuggled

to the west where the forensic evidence indicated he was killed by poison. Listen to this, quote,

the poison described as one of the deadliest on earth was first discovered in Ecuadorian

dark frogs. However, the lethal chemical cannot be produced if the creatures are in captivity,

away from tropical and humid forests. So Russian scientists, quote, painstakingly researched

and they were able to develop a synthetic version of this deadly poison from a dark frog

in Ecuador. And the five governments concerned here said this could only be undertaken by a

government and in particular, the government of Russia. And it means that Russia is back in

poison warfare. Where has been for a long time? So it reminded me of a headline that appeared

years ago. And this has to do with 1978. So let's go back to 1978. So we're not talking about

Russia. We're talking then about the Soviet Union. And you had a defector named Georgi Ivanov

Markov, who died in a London hospital of a form of blood poisoning. And before he died, he claimed

that he had been stabbed with an umbrella by a stranger who bumped into him on the street in

London. Turned out, by the way, all that was true. And so there he had a biological weapon

in a pellet in the pointed part of the umbrella. It was pressed against the man's skin.

The infectious agent was injected. And I mean, just look at this. We're talking about something

that sounds like a James Bond movie. But truth, once again, in a sinful world is stranger than

fiction. By the way, the statement officially from these five countries made one very clear

comment. And that is that this particular toxin found in Ecuadorian dark frogs,

avoid those, by the way, is not naturally found in Russia. In a fallen world, this is just the

kind of thing that happens. But it takes a very sophisticated, very wealthy foreign power intent

on doing malevolence to synthesize this kind of a toxin from an Ecuadorial dark frog.

In stories like this, in reports like this, coming from five authoritative allied governments,

what is revealed here is nothing less than the face of evil. And also the awareness that in all

the diversity of all the animals that God the creator placed on this earth to his glory,

but to our alert, there are also toxins coming from poisonous frogs. You have been warned.

Thanks for listening to the briefing. For more information on my website at AlbertMotor.com,

you can follow me on extra twitter at going x.com forward slash AlbertMotor.

For information on the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, go to SBTS.tv.

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Today I am in National Tennessee, and I'm going to show you in tomorrow for the briefing.