Friday Bite 16 January 2026

Perfidy

“If the aircraft flying above is not identifiable as a combatant aircraft, it should not be engaged in combatant activity. The Defense Department manual concerning the law of war explains that combatants must distinguish themselves from the civilian population and may not “kill or wound the enemy by resort to perfidy.” Retired Major General Steven J. Lepper, 12 January

PERFIDY TURNED OUT to be the perfect title for this Friday Bite, even though I had just randomly jotted the word down on my notepad. Earlier in the week, the New York Times reported that in September 2025, when the US military launched its first attack on a small boat in the Caribbean (that number has now reached thirty-five), it used a secret aircraft disguised as a civilian plane. This act of concealment is a war crime called “perfidy”.

Perfidy – treachery, faithlessness, corruption, breach of trust.

These words turned out to be full of meaning during the course of the past seven days. Take for instance Robert Jenrick, the former UK shadow justice minister, who planned to defect to the far-right Reform party and in so doing inflict as much damage as possible on his former party, but was hoisted by his own petard when Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch sacked him, and immediately went on television to denounce him. Jenrick had denied any such intention of joining Reform when questioned by the Tory leader earlier in the week, so when Badenoch was faced with “irrefutable evidence” of his treachery she took immediate and incisive action. She later commented that Jenrick was now Nigel Farage’s problem and that the Reform leader had done her spring-cleaning for her.

There was something akin to perfidy in Maria Corina Machado’s gift of her Nobel Peace prize to Donald Trump – also on Thursday. We have become inured to leaders abandoning  their moral compass in order to win the American president’s favour, sometimes with a result – Sir Kier’s gift of a second state visit to the United Kingdom won him a reprieve on some Trump tariffs and Zelensky’s homage to the president (plus a designer suit) succeeded in getting him back on side once or twice – but Machado’s humiliating sacrifice won her nothing at all, other than a large carrier bag full of “swag”.

At the same time as the Venezuelan Opposition leader was waxing poetic about her gift of the Peace Prize being a nod to Lafayette’s gift of a gold medal featuring an image of George Washington to the revolutionary leader Simon Bolivar back in the eighteenth century, Karoline Leavitt, White House press secretary, was informing a press gathering that while the president had accepted her gift of the gold medal, he had not changed his opinion and that Ms Machado “does not have the respect and support of her country.”.

The phrase own-goal comes to mind, which is deeply sad given that this extraordinary and courageous woman deserves so much better. And the Venezuelan people certainly deserve a leader who can serve them as opposed to a continuation of the Maduro authoritarian regime.

The time of birth given for Machado cannot be verified, so please take it with a pinch of salt. However, some of the more important detail does not rely on an accurate birthtime. For instance, her Mars at 18 degrees Sagittarius is conjoined to Trump’s Moon and opposed to his Sun and Uranus – fiery is one way of looking at these connections, antagonistic is probably nearer the mark. On the other hand, Machado’s Venus-Jupiter conjunction falls on the US president’s Mars and Ascendant, which is certainly reflective of the sacrifice she has just made for him. Her Sun in Libra is opposed to Saturn, which provides her with tenacity and resolve, and with natal Mars in square to her Uranus-Pluto conjunction, she is a true activist and someone prepared to die for her country. Let’s hope she doesn’t have to.

Uranus is currently squaring her Jupiter and will return to cross over her Moon in the future – April, if this time of birth is correct. It remains to be seen whether this combination will enable her star to rise once more or prove to be something far less welcome.

YOU MIGHT ALSO say that Donald Trump’s threats to acquire Greenland are an act of perfidy, given that Denmark has been allied to the United States for more than two centuries, during which time it has not only worked closely with America in protecting the Arctic region but also sent its soldiers to their deaths as they fought side by side with US forces in Afghanistan.

I’ll take a deeper dive into the Greenland situation shortly, but another development worth mentioning in regard to perfidy is what is happening in Minneapolis. Since last week’s fatal shooting of Renee Nicole Good, the street protests have grown bigger and more confrontational while the number of ICE officers has increased to three thousand. Operation Metro Surge appears to have exceeded its brief as mass deportations of immigrants and is now eerily reminiscent of the Nazi raids in Hitler’s Germany. Far from attempting to tone down the situation, President Trump is threatening to invoke the Insurrection act, which would bring the military onto the streets to preserve law and order.

It is quite the irony that while Donald Trump is promising to rescue the people of Iran from its lethal regime, the American people appear to need protection from the Trump administration’s efforts to quell dissent. Maybe Iran’s Revolutionary Guard should issue a similar promise…

Next week’s powerful astrology will certainly bring push to shove in regard to one or more festering global situations, and it wouldn’t surprise me at all to see the Insurrection Act invoked and/or other threats and promises issued by Trump made manifest.

Which brings us to Greenland.

I REMEMBER WHEN the American president first announced his intention to acquire Greenland. It ranked with the desire to rechristen the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America and turn Canada into the fifty-first state. It was kind of funny. It certainly couldn’t be real. But here we are, not only with a renamed Gulf of America and a renamed Fort Bragg and Mount McKinley, but Denmark is facing the reality that Donald Trump means exactly what he said and he will acquire Greenland the “easy way or the hard way”.

On Wednesday, foreign ministers of Denmark met with JD Vance and Marco Rubio at the White House, after which the Danish contingent acknowledged that it had not managed to change the American position. No matter how united the Greenlanders may be to remain under the Danish flag and not the Stars and Stripes, nor how such an acquisition would override the territorial integrity of Denmark and throw the NATO alliance into disarray, Donald Trump is determined to get what he wants.

Denmark, Sweden, Germany and France are in the process of sending troops to Greenland, ostensibly to support Denmark’s assertion that contrary to Mr Trump’s fears, its military forces can protect the land and its surrounding waters from any Russian or Chinese threat. Yet there is another message being sent to the Trump administration that Europe is prepared to defend its territory. The USA is a member of NATO (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization) as is Denmark and Greenland, and according to Article Five, should any member of the alliance be attacked the others must come to its defence. Thus, the prospect is raised of Europe going to war with its long-time ally America.

The prospect of war is not something immediately leaping out of Denmark’s chart, however, it is rowing into trouble. Pluto has been squaring natal Pluto and Uranus for the past three years, during which time Queen Margrethe II abdicated in favour of her son, so Denmark has a new King and Queen. (Out with the old, in with the new.) Saturn is returning to its natal position, and it will get there in April of this year. A Saturn return is always about the coming of age, it is a time of reappraisal, a time when chickens come home to roost. So, Denmark is going to face some challenges this year, especially as there are two eclipses to take into consideration too: the first, a total lunar eclipse of 3 March will square its Sun and the second, a lunar eclipse on 28 August, will fall on its Neptune. Somewhat ironically, Donald Trump’s natal Uranus (18 degrees of Gemini) falls on Denmark’s Midheaven…

It seems unlikely that the United States will go to war with Denmark and Europe over Greenland. Yet at this point in time, Denmark is in no mood to allow a takeover of its territory and America has too many battles on its hands. What may happen, however, is that Donald Trump will issue a proclamation that the United States owns Greenland, and wait and see what anyone does about it. Maybe he’ll even find a way to plant the American flag on the ice somewhere in the country. Ownership is nine tenths of the law…

We are on the crest of a turbulent few weeks, and next week with the Sun, Venus and Mercury conjoining Pluto and Mars the following week, anything and everything can happen. Amanda Walsh of the Astrology Hub asked me recently what in a word would sum up 2026. I replied: crisis and opportunity.

We’re about to understand what that may mean.

Friday Bite 9 January 2026

The Edge of Reason

“If the United States chooses to attack another NATO country militarily, then everything stops. That is, including our NATO and thus the security that has been provided since the end of the Second World War.” Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, 6 January

New York Times, Question: Are there any limits on your global powers?

Donald Trump, Answer: “Yeah, there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me…I don’t need international law. I’m not looking to hurt people. [Also] it depends what your definition of international law is.” New York Times, 7 January

“Trump didn’t attack Venezuela because it produces fentanyl. It doesn’t. He didn’t attack Venezuela because President Nicolás Maduro controls the Tren de Aragua gang. He doesn’t. He didn’t attack Venezuela because Maduro is the head of the Cartel de los Soles. It doesn’t even exist.  It’s about the oil, stupid! Mehdi Hassan, Zeteo 5 January

BACK IN DECEMBER when I was writing my forecasts and recording the audios for the first two weeks of January, I noted that Jupiter would be in pride of place – opposing Venus, the Sun and Mars. Quite a bullish climate, you might say. But a little voice in my head warned: you can have too much of a good thing. Jupiter is not only the bringer of joy but the hurler of thunderbolts, and what we might be looking at instead was an escalation of tensions and controversial power-based actions on the part of certain nations. (Jupiter’s principles of expansion are neutral: the good can get better, and so too can the bad.)

And so, indeed, it came to pass.

On Saturday, 3 January, around 2:00 am local time, the United States Armed Forces attacked strategic infrastructure in Venezuela and captured President Nicolàs Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, arguably not just the power behind the throne but the brains of the presidency. The couple were flown to New York and later charged with weapon and drug offences. They are currently residing at the notorious Metropolitan Detention Centre in Brooklyn, New York.

Two days later, Venezuela’s vice president and minister of oil, Delcy Rodrìguez, was sworn in as interim president. (Apparently, the opposition leader whose party claimed victory in the 2024 election and who was recently awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, Maria Corina Machado, didn’t have enough support…)

In the last five days, it has become clear that Venezuela’s abundant oil supplies are the main objective of the US administration. Indeed, President Trump has been unashamedly open about it, “I am pleased to announce that the Interim Authorities in Venezuela will be turning over between 30 and 50 MILLION Barrels of High Quality, Sanctioned Oil, to the United States of America…This Oil will be sold at its Market Price, and that money will be controlled by me, as President of the United States of America, to ensure it is used to benefit the people of Venezuela and the United States!” Trump, Truth Social, 6 January.

However, the motive behind the motive may have even more to do with the US dollar remaining the world’s reserve currency.

I’ll get back to the United States in a moment, but another concern, presided over by the Jupiter oppositions, is the developing situation in Iran. The protests began on 28 December after the Iranian rial plunged against the US dollar making an already challenging cost-of-living crisis even worse. The protests that originated in the capital have spread nationwide and turned deadly. Yesterday, the Iranian authorities cut off the internet and cancelled flights, isolating the country from the rest of the world.

There are two charts worthy of consideration for Iran, the first – 1 February 1979 – marks the return of Ayatollah Khomeini to Iran, and the second – 1 April 1979 – which represents the moment the country became an Islamic Republic. Both charts have resonances with the country and its people. The return of Islam’s spiritual leader to Iran is thought to be more truly representative of the “soul” of Iran while the declaration of the country as an Islamic State reflects its façade – Iran and its place in the world.

Currently Saturn is hovering over the Republic’s Mars and Mercury in the eighth house, which chimes with the financial problems the country is experiencing. Piling on the economic pressure is solar arc progressed Midheaven (26 degrees Gemini) squaring natal Mars and Mercury. A double whammy no less.

As far as the February chart is concerned (the soul of the people) the progressed Midheaven has reached 12 degrees of Aquarius, which is conjoined to the nation’s Sun and Venus while solar arc progressed Mars is squaring the natal Midheaven.

Given that in both charts Saturn is squaring Neptune, albeit widely, the approach of the Saturn-Neptune conjunction is almost certainly significant. The end of regimes is a Saturn-Neptune theme, and with the forthcoming transits of the personal planets to Pluto, which march over Iran’s Aquarian Sun, Mercury, Mars conjunction, the potential for a major upset is looking increasingly likely. According to The New Statesman, Iran is “facing its biggest crisis since the 1979 Iranian Revolution… the economic foundations of the Islamic Republic have eroded beyond repair” and this, combined with domestic exhaustion, despotism, elite fragmentation and strategic failure, is bringing the state to a point where, “the question is no longer whether the system is under strain, but whether it retains the internal coherence necessary to survive.”

The author of this article, historian Abbas Milani, reminds us that all authoritarian regimes thrive on fear, and in recent months that fear has “visibly weakened” and the people, especially women, appear increasingly empowered.

Which brings us back to the United States, a once great democracy that is now quite openly becoming an authoritarian regime. Since Christmas, the regime has bombed Nigeria, attacked Venezuela and kidnapped its president, seized three oil tankers in three different oceans, and threatened Greenland’s sovereignty. And all this in spite of Mr Trump’s assurances that the United States is no longer going to be the “policeman” of the world and instead is focussing on making America great again.

And what exactly is going on within the United States itself?

ICE agents currently “protecting” the streets of Minneapolis appear to have crossed a line. On Wednesday, one of the federal agents shot and killed Renee Nicole Good, a thirty-seven-year-old mother of three. According to the Trump administration, Ms Good was attempting to flee the scene in her car and run over the ICE agent who shot her in self-defence. Clearly, Ms Good was no domestic terrorist, simply a mother who was a devoted Christian and held a degree in English.

On 3 January, hours after Operation Absolute Resolve achieved its objectives in Venezuela, there was a full moon in Cancer. And this was no ordinary full moon. At 13 degrees of Cancer-Capricorn, the Moon fell on the United States Sun and squared its natal Saturn.

I have marked in pen the relevant connections between the full moon chart and both the horoscopes of the USA and Venezuela, which I find compelling. As you may know, I talk a lot about resonances, and this is what we are seeing in these connections.

The story of the full moon from the perspective of the United States is about power and ownership – the degree of the Moon is the USA Sun, which is conjoined to Jupiter in the eighth house and on the axis of finance, values, self-worth and shared interests. The Sun is conjoined to Venus and Mars, and squaring the US natal Saturn. At the moment the full moon peaked, nine degrees of Sagittarius was rising – Venezuela’s Midheaven (1830 chart) – Saturn and the IC fell on Venezuela’s Mars (1830 chart) while Venezuela’s Sun in the 1811 chart is 12 degrees of Cancer, – minutes apart from the US’ Sun – and therefore also the focus of this full moon. Endings, indeed.

You might say that this string of degrees has as much value as statistics – statistics, statistics and damn lies – but in the world of astrology, they are everything. Numbers are resonances. They are vibrations, and therefore pick up anything resonating at the same pitch.

I was thinking earlier on today as I sketched out this Friday Bite, that what is happening to the United States is reflective of its Pluto return, which has just passed, and the Uranus return, which is to come next year.  And, of course, the Saturn-Neptune conjunction on its IC. Everything is changing.

When America achieved its independence in 1776, the founding fathers enshrined the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness in the Declaration. Two hundred and fifty years later, those principles are being recalibrated. Accordingly, democracy has ceased to be a viable way forward and it is being replaced by the rule of authority.

To return to the recent full moon. While the Trump administration may be congratulating itself on mission-accomplished, that full moon was squaring the nation’s Saturn, which suggests that victory may be short-lived and that the karmic effects of such an imperialistic move may come back to bite it in the posterior.

In a matter of days, the Sun, Venus, Mercury and Mars will all begin to form conjunctions to Pluto. These powerful transits with their theme of reformation, endings and beginnings, death and rebirth will continue the process that was begun in January 2025, one year almost to the day Donald Trump was sworn in as president and some five years, almost to the day, of the “January Insurrection”.

I’d say, we’ve seen nothing yet.