Every weekend (almost) I share five articles/essays/reports with you. I select these over the course of the week because they are either insightful, informative, interesting, important, or a combination of the above.

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Remember Europe’s drive for strategic autonomy?

It’s history now…little more than an interesting footnote from the first quarter of this new century. It’s a concept that never managed to gain traction as most of the countries that make up the European Union rejected this French-led proposal. Future academics will make reference of it, while future historians will ask “what could have been?”

The war in Ukraine dealt strategic autonomy a mortal blow, and the new trade deal between the USA and the EU has buried its corpse deep in the ground, so deep that it is now mixed in with dinosaur fossils. What took place in Scotland over a week ago was not a deal, but was instead a capitulation.

Quite a lot of what I laid out in my original Turbo America essay has come to pass, but one prediction that I had made in that piece is only coming into view now: that the USA has entered its extractive phase of empire. Gone are the multilateral trade deals that ushered in US-erected globalist structures that did benefit it in the original phases of that era. Instead, they are being replaced with bilateral deals that can be described as extortion.

The fact of the matter is that the USA has three things that everyone wants access to:

1. the US dollar
2. the US domestic consumer market
3. US capital markets

Thanks to decades of globalist-driven economic integration and inter-dependencies, it is incredibly, incredibly difficult to untangle economic relations with the USA (even if actually desired). This has left the Americans with an insane amount of leverage over most of the world’s economies. “Want access to our consumer markets? Want to find money for investment? Now you have to pay the piper. If you don’t, you will destroy your own economy.” It’s as simple as that.

Europe, led by national branch managers of USA Inc. instead of actual statesmen, walked right into this trap by first signing onto the US-led war against Russia. It was this initial capitulation to US hegemony that laid the ground for this later economic capitulation. Europe was doing relatively fine economically while buying natural resources from Russia, and with Russia serving as a large consumer market for European exports. By permitting the USA to tear the EU away from Russia economically, it was forced to rely on imports from the USA, giving Washington more leverage over their economies. This trade “deal” means that Europe is now a de facto protectorate of the USA.

The most epic reverse colonization in history happened with a handshake. At the Scotland Summit (July 27), European leaders queued up to sign away their continent’s economic sovereignty while cameras flashed and everybody smiled.

The irony would be breathtaking if it weren’t so tragic: the heirs of empires that once carved up Asia and Africa with fountain pens have themselves been carved up by an American president with a Truth Social account.

Donald Trump’s genuine achievement is that the law of the jungle has been consecrated as legitimate in international relations. What makes this transformation particularly grotesque is how willingly Europe has contributed to its own subjugation.

Scotland marked the precise moment when the EU ceased pretending to be a global power and embraced its true calling: America’s preferred payment app.

Considering that Europe will now be footing the bill for the Ukrainian side in the war in that country, it’s worse than just being a preferred payment app. (BTW, this Trump-Putin summit will go nowhere).

While Brussels officials celebrated their compromise with Washington—accepting 15% tariffs on European exports while exempting American goods entirely—they missed the essential truth of their capitulation.

European citizens, do not believe your leaders: Europe had not negotiated. It had been robbed at gunpoint while applauding the thief’s negotiation skills.

Instead, once the dust has settled from Trump’s second inaugural, a new world order has crystallized with brutal clarity. In this new arithmetic of power, America coerces, China contains, Europe complies.

The tripolar world that European elites spent years theorizing through “strategic autonomy” has collapsed into an unambiguous bipolar certainty, with Brussels relegated to the role of sponsor to a competition it cannot influence.

Europe agreed to the demand that their exports will cost more (and therefore be less competitive in the US market), while getting nothing in return from the USA.

The butcher’s bill:

The “Liberation Day” tariffs announced in April—10% baseline with “reciprocal” rates reaching 50%—were never about freeing America from unfair trade practices or correcting imbalances but blackmail elevated to statecraft. Finally, they tested which powers would resist and which would capitulate.

The message was simple: pay up or face economic devastation. While China refused the costs, Europe volunteered to satisfy them, following an arc of self-deception: first, came the ritual announcements of counter-tariffs, theatrical gestures well applauded by the sycophants, meant to preserve dignity rather than impose costs.

Then came the inevitable retreat, justified through euphemisms about “maintaining dialogue” and “preserving the relationship.” Finally, the political cowardice of European leaders was exposed and came total surrender, dressed up as “the best possible deal we can get.”

The Scotland arrangement represents the apotheosis of Ursula von der Leyen’s incapacity to govern, negotiate and lead: US$750 billion in American energy purchases, $600 billion in additional investments and acceptance of punitive tariff rates in exchange for absolutely nothing—terms that would have triggered wars in previous centuries.

I like this line:

However, European negotiators emerged from a golf course claiming victory, justifying it because Trump had apparently threatened even worse terms. In sum, the logic of the beaten spouse—gratitude for lighter beatings.

The Chinese did something else entirely:

Beijing watched Europe’s humiliation with the amusement of a casino owner seeing gamblers double down on losing hands. Because China’s response to American pressure reveals a sophistication that European leaders cannot fathom: the power of saying no.

When Trump escalated tariff threats, China responded with drastic precision. Export restrictions on rare earth elements created immediate supply chain crises across Western manufacturing while avoiding the escalation that might force Washington into total confrontation.

The message was calibrated perfectly: we can hurt you, but we aim not to. The choice remains yours, for now.

The June rare earths framework that followed demonstrated China’s mastery of tactical minimalism. Beijing agreed to resume limited shipments under strict licensing arrangements—creating enough supply stability to prevent Western economic collapse while maintaining enough uncertainty to preserve leverage. Beijing gave Washington face-saving concessions while conceding nothing of substance.

and

Compare this to Europe’s approach during the same period. While Chinese factories hummed with restricted but continuing production, European manufacturers faced supply shortages. VDL cried: “We all witnessed the cost and consequences of China’s coercion through export restrictions! This pattern of dominance, dependency and blackmail continues today.”

Later, Brussels scolded Beijing about its relationship with Russia while simultaneously begging for rare earth provisions. European officials seem incapable of grasping the contradiction; you cannot lecture your supplier while depending on their mercy.

The irony is exquisite: European leaders acted as if Russia were a Chinese satellite just as the EU itself became a US military and economic satellite, complete with matching uniforms.

Europe’s pathological weakness:

Europe’s collapse stems from confusion about the nature of power. European leaders believe that moral posturing can substitute for material leverage and legal frameworks can constrain actors who recognize no law but strength.

The EU’s response to the Russia-Ukraine war exemplifies this delusion. Brussels imposed sanctions on Russian energy while simultaneously financing Moscow’s war efforts through continued purchases. In 2024, EU energy payments to Vladimir Putin totalled €23 billion ($26.3 billion).

Since the invasion began, the bloc has transferred to the Kremlin the equivalent cost of over 2,400 fighter jets. European officials banned technology exports to Russia while maintaining dependence on Chinese supply chains that, according to the EU leaders, ultimately serve Russian interests.

This schizophrenic approach to security extends to European defense spending, which provides another illustration of confusion masquerading as resolve. EU leaders agreed to increase military expenditures to 5% of GDP—a figure that would bankrupt most member states—without any coherent rationale beyond American demands.

The Treaty of Versailles imposed lighter burdens and triggered a world war: this is not burden sharing but tribute payment dressed up as NATO solidarity.

It’s rather funny that the EU is still gung ho about criticizing China regarding human rights and demanding changes on that front while being very reliant on Chinese supply chains. Moralism is just empty posturing, but in this case, it might lead to devastating economic consequences for the continent.

Surrender:

The Scottish-Golf-Course Summit crystallized Europe’s strategic bankruptcy. European negotiators arrived believing that compliance with American demands would elevate their status from junior partner to indispensable ally. Instead, the leaders’ submission confirmed their role as a source of funds to be extracted rather than a partner to be consulted.

European officials (Von der Leyen, Kallas, Sefcovic) first denied the reality of what they signed, then seemed surprised by this outcome, as if their years contributing to institutional weakness might suddenly transform into strength through bureaucratic alchemy.

When your victories align perfectly with your opponent’s interests, you are not negotiating, but surrendering. They should finally go—preferably before they auction off the remaining pieces of European sovereignty.

Note this bit:

The emerging global architecture has three distinct layers.

America has perfected coercive extraction. Washington discovered that threatening allies produces better results than persuading them, that ultimatum yields more than negotiations.

It secured concrete gains—military contracts, energy purchases, duty-free market access—without resistance. This confirms America’s transformation from alliance leader to alliance predator.

The golf course arrangement proves that European compliance can be purchased through blatant intimidation. Why build partnerships when you can operate protection rackets with diplomatic immunity?

Just like I said in Turbo America:

Geopolitica

Turbo-America

Niccolo Soldo

·

April 21, 2022

“Don’t get me into a shooting war with the Russians”, Obama told his CIA Chief during the Syrian Civil War.

Read full story

From the piece:

Turbo-America means that the USA openly engages in coercion of both opponents and allies to get its way. There is little to stop them, so why not do it? Hiding behind the mask of “democracy” and “global norms”, the USA introduces new concepts of rule globally to further cement its rule and gain advantage for its corporations.

Back to the analysis:

European leaders have discovered that capitulation pays better than resistance: playing the client to Washington and the scold to Beijing is more comfortable than actual competition. But the tragedy of European passivity extends beyond economics to existential questions about the nature of sovereignty itself.

Can political entities that refuse to defend their interests claim to represent anything more than geographical expressions? Does the European Union exist as anything beyond a mechanism for collecting and transferring resources to more assertive powers?

European officials console themselves with fantasies about eventual American gratitude, imagining that sufficient compliance might restore their voice in global affairs. This is the thinking of the colonized, the belief that servitude might eventually earn respect. History suggests otherwise.

Ouch.

There is one potential silver lining in all of this if you are European: this trade deal benefits the Brexit argument:

As world leaders and economists across Europe digest the news of the EU-U.S. trade agreement, some experts told CNBC that while it may be bad news for the bloc, the deal could serve as an unexpected boost to the U.K.

The European Union is facing a higher 15% tariff rate on its goods imported to the U.S. compared to the 10% levy the U.K. has agreed to.

“In theory, the UK benefits,” Philip Shaw, chief economist at Investec, told CNBC.

“The new EU tariff of 15% means that UK exports to the US have become relatively cheaper, which could boost British trade with the US as American firms buy goods from Britain rather than the EU,” he explained.

U.K. goods would also be cheaper for U.S. consumers due to the lower tariff rate, meaning they may favor British products over those manufactured in the EU, Alex Altmann, partner and head of Lubbock Fine LLP’s German desk, suggested in a note published shortly after the EU-U.S. deal was announced.

Why rejoin the EU if they have a better deal with the USA already in place?

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The amount of information that we are bombarded with daily via media would terrify the average late 19th century European urban dweller. A medieval peasant in 14th century France would most likely lost his or her mind if they had to experience the blast of infoterror that we moderns are quickly evolving to absorb and digest. “Quantity has a quality all its own”, someone once said, but our brains have become more scrambled as a result.

The most negative impact of these permanent tsumanis of information is the collapse in epistemic truth. We are having more and more difficulty in being able to ascertain what is objectively true and what is objectively not true. Not only that, the institutions that we have traditionally relied on to tell us the truth (and form wide-ranging social consensus) have lost our trust, the result of which is almost entirely the fault of these same institutions.

For societies to function, certain truths that work as wide-ranging consensus must exist as they form the basis of how to process news, developments, events, and so on. Without social consensus and without trusted institutions upon whom we can rely to tell us the truth, we are rendered afloat in a sea of information, divided from each other, as we seek to somehow stay afloat while experiencing these continuous and permanent deluges of information.

Am I sounding too much like a ‘pseud’? I think I am. Thankfully,

is here to do a better job at explaining what I am trying to say than I ever could:

Roots & Wings with Frank Furedi

Epistemic crisis – a bad case of truth decay

I am sure that you all have heard of one of the many recently invented Orwellian words that raise questions about the status of truth. Terms like post-truth, fake news, misinformation, alternative fact, truthiness, truth-decay or post-fact draw attention to the unprecedented epistemic crisis that afflicts the contemporary world…

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9 days ago · 62 likes · 3 comments · Frank Furedi

The term epistemic crisis refers to a world where trusted sources of knowledge are conspicuous by their absence. Norms and values that assisted society to determine what counts as knowledge and truth have lost much of their force. People no longer automatically believe what they see or hear on the media. Society no longer possesses a social consensus on some of the most fundamental issues that touch on everyday life.

Some refer to the disintegration of trust in previously recognised sources of knowledge – the media, expertise, the courts – as a form of ‘truth decay’. According to the think-tank Rand, truth-decay is defined in part by ‘increasing disagreement about objective facts—a trend that exists on a scale not observed in previous eras of American history’[i]. Other manifestations of truth decay are the blurring of the line between opinion and fact, and a decline in trust in established sources of information.

One of the most dramatic symptoms of truth decay is the public’s loss of trust in institutions that have served to sustain society’s fundamental standard of truth such as ‘science, universities, professional journalism, and public health agencies’[ii].

What underpins the absence of a consensus about the meaning of truth is the absence of a recognized form of epistemic authority. Epistemic authority is the authority ascribed to institutions and individuals who serve as the source of trusted forms of knowledge and of the truth. Those who possess epistemic authority can be trusted to provide truthful information on matters that pertain to different dimensions of our lives.

One of the reasons why you are here is that you are savvy enough to know that mainstream media cannot be relied on to tell you the whole truth, or quite often, even a solitary morsel of truth. Most of you reading this appreciate my attempts to separate fact from fiction, something that is becoming increasingly more difficult as we enter the Age of AI.

Today there are no institutions that can claim to possess unquestioned epistemic authority. Our political establishment suffers from a credibility gap. Instead of openly justifying its actions and policies it relies on subterfuge and outright lies. Just this week we have discovered that the British Government’s ‘spy unit’ has asked tech companies to monitor their social media platform for content about two tier policing and illegal migrants’ hotels.[iii] The aim of the Government information strategy is to both monitor and censor opinions that call into question its policies on sensitive issues such its policies towards illegal migrants.

We know our governments lie to us on a daily basis and we are left with the task of trying to figure out what is true, what is false, what is somewhat true, what is misleading, what is being buried, what is being minimized, and so on. Gone are the days when you could turn on the TV and listen to Walter Cronkite and go to bed assured that you are well-informed (we were naive back then, but that is a story for another day).

Frank rejects the elite consensus notion that social media is responsible for this decay:

The most common explanation for the cause of truth decay focuses on the social media. It is also an argument that possesses the least merit. Factually speaking the loss of epistemic authority preceded the emergence of the social media[vi]. As far back as the early 19^th century there the status of epistemic authority was put to question. This problem was the central theme of Sir George Cornewall Lewis’s book, On the Influence of Authority in Matters of Opinion, published in 1849. G. C. Lewis was a well-known Liberal politician, who was at times the Secretary of State for War, Home Secretary, and Chancellor of the Exchequer. His inquiry was directed at the ‘influence of authority in matters of opinion’, by which he meant the capacity to resolve disputed issues by an individual, group, or institution that is recognised as the authority on that subject. Lewis himself noted that ‘there is no one body of persons who are competent to judge on all subjects, and who are qualified to guide all sorts of opinions; that there is no one intellectual aristocracy, separated from the rest of the community, and predominating over them indiscriminately’

The mid-20th century hegemony of the technocratic managerial elite:

The issues raised by Lewis were never resolved in modern society. However, despite the controversy that surrounded the authority of truth it was possible to develop a working consensus around the question of which institutions were reliable sources of knowledge and information. During the 20^th century, particularly during the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s such a consensus emerged under the hegemony of a liberal technocratic managerial class. This consensus was institutionalised throughout the dominant political and cultural institutions of society.

So long as the hegemony of the technocratic managerial elites remained stable a degree of consensus on its version of the truth prevailed. Those who questioned the epistemic authority of the ruling elites were consigned to the margins of intellectual and cultural life. As Jeffrey Friedman explained;

‘with most of the media, the universities, and all other cultural institutions in the hands of consensus liberals, there was nothing the conservatives could do but complain about the uniformity of opinion in these institutions; and criticize the claims to objectivity of the liberals (liberal ideologues, in the conservatives’ opinion) who staffed these institutions, and who more often than not viewed themselves as disinterested, scientifically neutral experts’.

This consensus has suffered a significant collapse over the past two decades:

The polarisation thesis provides important insights into working of the contemporary epistemic crisis. But the context for understanding the emergence of this crisis is the unfolding of the loss of elite authority. Indeed, the precondition for the intensity of political polarisation is the decline of the hegemonic influence of the political and cultural establishment.

In the current debate on polarisation and post-truth culture the finger of blame is frequently pointed at the political right. Conservative and populist influencers are blamed for an epidemic of scepticism towards the status of truth. Trump and other right-wing politicians are held responsible for the normalisation of lies and for the scandalous attacks on the integrity of science and expertise. A typical example of this approach is Michiko Kakutani’s book, The Death of Truth which blames Donald Trump and a host of anti-liberal on-line trolls for the demise of truth and wilful promotion of ignorance.

Libera-lish critics like Kakutani appear to overlook the dishonesty and deception that is widely practised within the cultural institution of society. Institutions of higher education -where scholarship is often trumped by academic activism – are not any longer friends of truth. The influence that they exert on generations of young people ensures that their version of post-truth is complicit in creating the phenomenon of credentialised ignorance. Once scepticism toward the truth has become institutionalised in the Academy is it any surprise that this attitude gains currency in other parts of society?

The reality is far more complicated than the simplistic scapegoating of a malevolent right. The concerns of the liberal left regarding the pernicious influence of dishonest influencers on the social media is no more legitimate than the concern of conservatives regarding the constant output of anti-right propaganda on the mainstream media. Even today the power of the social media is no match for the influence of Hollywood, the mainstream media and the dominant cultural institutions -including schools and institutions – of society.

“Credentialized ignorance”. I like this.

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I find the Yazidi fascinating; an ethnoreligious group whose faith pre-dates both Christianity and Islam, and who have somehow managed to stay alive in the Middle East through to the present.

Most westerners are ignorant of their existence, with the Yazidi only really landing on our radars during ISIS’ drive through Western Iraq, when young Yazidi females were taken as sex slaves by these Sunni radicals.

Living in a rough neighbourhood like the Middle East is tough enough for the established, larger players. Being a permanent minority like the Yazidi increases the difficulty level significantly. It is a miracle that they still exist.

The wannabe commies over at Jacobin have published a very, very long piece on the Yazidis and their current plight, and it is well-worth reading in its entirety if you have the time to do so:

Mount Sinjar rises from the arid plains of northwestern Iraq like a grassy sentinel — ancient, scarred, and unyielding.

Today marks eleven years since the Islamic State launched its genocidal assault on the Yazidis in Sinjar.

To the Yazidis, the mountain is sacred; they believe Noah’s ark rested here after the biblical flood. Its slopes are dotted with shrines, sacred places where fires are lit and prayers spoken. Under starlit skies, Yazidi oral histories of creation, exile, and survival are passed down from generation to generation.

Mount Sinjar has also served as a shield for the Yazidis through generations of persecution. The historically marginalized ethnoreligious community, with roots in pre-Zoroastrian belief systems, blended with Sufi influences, has long relied on the mountain for protection.

Escape:

So when the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), or Daesh — a Salafi-Jihadist group that branded the Yazidis as infidels — stormed the Yazidi heartland of the Sinjar region on August 3, 2014, hundreds of thousands instinctively fled toward the mountain.

While many escaped to Iraq’s Kurdistan Region, an estimated fifty thousand Yazidis took refuge on Mount Sinjar’s upper plateaus.

ISIS horror:

For those unable to reach higher ground, unimaginable horrors ensued. Within days, ISIS had killed thousands. Nearly seven thousand Yazidis were kidnapped — women and girls sold into sexual slavery, boys indoctrinated as child soldiers. Over a thousand Yazidis, mostly children and the elderly, died from starvation, dehydration, or injuries during ISIS’s siege of Mount Sinjar, which cut off tens of thousands from food, water, and medical care.

The entire Yazidi community of around four hundred thousand was displaced, captured, or killed.

The present state of affairs:

Over a decade after ISIS’s genocidal assault, a fragile calm has returned to Mount Sinjar, interrupted occasionally by Turkish drone strikes targeting Yazidi militias aligned with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), a Kurdish militant group that has waged a decades-long insurgency against Turkey. However, following PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan’s recent call for disarmament, such strikes have grown less frequent.

Threaded between military posts, checkpoints, and tunnel entrances etched into the mountainside, rows of makeshift tents stretch along Mount Sinjar’s northern edge. Hundreds of Yazidi families remain here, unwilling to return to villages below where the past feels perilously close.

Most have stayed on the mountain since ISIS’s initial onslaught; others returned after years in internally displaced persons (IDP) camps in the Kurdistan region, where over two hundred thousand Yazidis still live. All are drawn to the mountain as their last true protector against a genocide they fear may yet return.

ISIS no longer holds Sinjar, but the district is now split between armed groups backed by outside powers. Caught between rival militias — and sometimes compelled to join them — Yazidis remain in limbo. Their future in Sinjar is uncertain and shaped by forces beyond their control.

This is a very good long read for your weekend. Click here to read it in its entirety.

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It would be remiss of me to not note the passing of Ozzy Osbourne, a legend of modern music.

I was never a ‘Metalhead’, but I do have a great respect for Black Sabbath (the band for which he is best known), and whose first few albums I consider to be excellent. To me, Ozzy and Black Sabbath represented that Midlands cohort of Englishmen for whom the foppishness of the upper middle class was completely alien. These were working class lads from the lower classes, and they did not put on any airs.

For your average North American, it’s difficult to comprehend just how ingrained the British class system remains in the UK to this day, and just how different these classes are from one another. In the extreme, they are practically different peoples altogether. Understanding this class system is the foundation for understanding the British people of today, their culture, their society, and their politics. One really needs to experience up close to gain an understanding of it.

Anyway, back to Ozzy, and back to Metal, which was originally a product of England’s urban working class:

At least in its early years, heavy metal was a genre of urban Britain. Black Sabbath’s most high-profile contemporaries, Deep Purple (London), Judas Priest (Birmingham), and Led Zeppelin (London), all formed in English cities under Harold Wilson’s Labour government at the height of the post-war welfare state. This was at its most stark in Black Sabbath: Iommi’s distinctive style came from losing two fingertips in a sheet metal accident. Iommi has also stated that original drummer Bill Ward — who played with the band for the first time since 2005 for their final show — would ‘pick up rhythms from the factory press’. Speaking in 2017, bassist Geezer Butler described wanting to put ‘that industrial feel’ into their music.

The working-class life of 1960s Britain was imprinted in metal’s DNA. No matter what direction Osbourne’s life may have taken him in as the decades passed — becoming, by the 2010s, a multimillionaire media figure who publicly supported Israeli apartheid, not to mention credible allegations of domestic violence — centring the innovation of metal in post-war Britain’s social democratic state should not be forgotten.

Here comes the ideological bit:

One explanation for this is what the late cultural critic Mark Fisher called ‘indirect funding’, meaning Britain’s post-war welfare state. Left-wing governments may not have typically funded these cultural products directly, but unemployment benefits and house prices kept low by the abundance of council housing gave individuals the space and free time in which to be creative.

By the end of the 1960s, you could reasonably expect the working-class jobs that Ozzy and his band took before their big break to pay a decent, livable wage. Sure, they would not have had much money, but it would have been more than the innings provided by a contemporary world of zero-hours contracts, gig economy labour, with unpredictable shift patterns and constant surveillance enacting a psychological as well as financial toll on employees.

In short: they were poor, but they were taken care of while “on the dole” (British term for welfare).

This world no longer exists:

But what now of the city that birthed Sabbath, and metal itself? After four decades of ‘unleashing the free market’, the world that Black Sabbath was born in no longer exists. The Crown, the Birmingham pub that Black Sabbath played their first ever show in, has been closed for over a decade. More than just part of the city’s music history, it is part of a wider trend — over 2,000 pubs have closed across the UK in the last five years, a rate of one a day. Music Venue Trust’s 2024 Annual Report shows similarly grim news for grassroots music venues; 40 percent of all venues operating at a loss in the last year and an average of two are closing for good every month.

There is no one reason for this. Some pubs never recovered after covid, a decade and a half without real terms wage growth for their customers as the average price of a pint of beer increases from £2.89 in 2010 to £4.83 in 2025 (significantly higher in cities) has hurt demand. Pub landlords and music venue owners have to subsidise the profits of private electricity companies just like the rest of us, paying more than double what they did a few years ago.

I’d go even further and suggest that the alienation borne of extreme screen attachment prevents even friend groups from being formed.

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We end this weekend’s SCR with a report on how human footprints have been found from an era (and in a place) where they should “not” have ever been found:

A uniquely preserved prehistoric mudhole could hold the oldest-ever human footprints on the Arabian Peninsula, scientists say. The seven footprints, found amidst a clutter of hundreds of prehistoric animal prints, are estimated to be 115,000 years old.

Many fossil and artifact windfalls have come from situations like this special lakebed in northern Saudi Arabia. Archaeologists uncovered the site, deep in the Nefud Desert at a location nicknamed “the trace” in Arabic, in 2017, after time and weather wiped the overlying sediment away. It’s easy to imagine that a muddy lakebed was a high-traffic area in the Arabian Peninsula over 100,000 years ago.

Click here to read the rest.

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