The Iberian Front: Spain & Portugal Go Dark As The Global Hybrid War Escalates

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Right now, we have a front-row seat to a rapidly expanding global hybrid war. It is unfolding in real time—triggered by the rapid disintegration of the post–World War II order. At the heart of this seismic shift are three primary power blocs: the United States, Europe, and China. In my most recent article, I explored how these tectonic forces are grinding against one another, producing friction that’s igniting new fronts—some overt, others cloaked in subterfuge.

The chief aggressor in this confrontation is, without question, the US—a lion in its proverbial winter. Once the undisputed king of the jungle, it is now the world’s largest debtor nation and purveyor of the greatest ponzi scheme in human history. Which is why internally, America is unraveling. Standards of living are collapsing, especially for those born after Generation X. Public health is a mess. Cities are mired in crime, homelessness, and rampant substance misuse. From the outside, it increasingly resembles a collapsing empire—and at its core sits a thoroughly corrupted political elite, serving the banking oligarchs and the corporate entities who fund them.

And yet, the US still retains a substantial amount of power, in comparison to their competitors. They control the world’s major maritime chokepoints, operate over 90 military bases abroad (compared to China's four), and maintain economic dominance through the global reserve currency. Which they still retain, just. Also of note, America has a near-monopoly on information warfare, with American media, narratives, and cultural exports shaping opinions across the world.

In short, the US remains a colossus, albeit one with crumbling feet. Yes, they're in trouble, but they have a lot of cards left in their hand still to play. Having said that, in order for the US to retain its hegemony at this point, they need to flip the chessboard entirely—reinventing itself through whatever means necessary. Which is precisely what we're seeing now. The sabotage of Nordstream was, in my view, a clear crossing the Rubicon moment—an open declaration that America is willing to do whatever it takes to retain power as the post WW2 order collapses.

But what does any of this have to do with Spain and Portugal? Yes, once upon a time these nations were global powers in their own right—but those days are long gone. Today, they’re better known as sun-soaked escapes for northern Europeans. Yet beneath the surface of beaches and sangria, both countries now occupy a quietly pivotal position in the global chess match.

The Iberian Peninsula—housing both Spain and Portugal—has become a key geopolitical fault line. In the wake of the Nordstream sabotage, the significance of this region has grown immensely. With a disproportionate share of Europe’s LNG import and regasification capacity, both Spain and Portugal now hold outsized leverage in a struggle increasingly defined by energy flows and infrastructure control.

Which is why it came as no surprise to me when, just this week, both countries experienced a major and highly unusual total blackout. This didn’t happen in a vacuum. Tensions between the Iberian nations and the US have been building for years—but accelerated dramatically following Trump’s so-called Liberation Day tariffs. For those taking notice, it was clear that at some point the threats that have been emanating from the US, towards both Spain and Portugal, were going to spill out into real world action. Is this, in fact, what we just saw take place?