Wired for War: The empire’s propaganda wing honors Palantir

Politico’s parent company is bestowing its highest award on Peter Thiel, who serves the same globalist agenda Germany’s Axel Springer media monolith is about to award its highest honor to Palantir founder Peter Thiel, in a ceremony illustrating the incestuous relationship between the mainstream media, the defense tech industry, and the US-Israeli order.

Read more Wired for War: Palantir rewards its best Ukrainian salesman Thiel will receive the ‘2026 Axel Springer Award’ at a ceremony in Berlin on Thursday.

According to Axel Springer CEO Mathias Dopfner, Thiel “is one of the rare entrepreneurs who does not merely found or finance companies but helps determine the direction of technological development.” “He reminds us that progress requires courage and nonconformism,” Dopfner added.

Previous recipients of the Axel Springer Award include Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, and Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky.

None of these laureates have proven as controversial as Thiel, however.

According to Status News, employees at Politico and Business Insider – both of which are owned by Axel Springer – have pushed back against the decision.

In a letter to management on Tuesday, 120 staffers argued that Thiel, who funded the lawsuit that destroyed Gawker, should not be honored by a company which, in the words of Dopfner, “stands for freedom of speech and a culture of open discussions.” They’re missing the point.

Palantir and Axel Springer are cogs in the same machine.

They share an almost identical world view, marked by a devotion to US-Israeli hegemony, a belief that private companies must serve the interests of this hegemony, and a common parent: the CIA.

The CIA connection During the Cold War, the US saw strategic control of media outlets as key to preventing the rise of socialism and communism in Western Europe.

Axel Springer, the anti-communist press baron who gave his name to the company, was a natural ally in this fight.

Springer received $7 million in funding from the CIA in 1957, two former agents told The Nation in 1982.

Adjusted for inflation, the donation would be equivalent to more than $80 million today. (L) Axel Springer stands next to the Berlin wall in an undated archive photo; (R) A 1982 letter introducing Springer to CIA Director William Casey © Getty Images; CIA Although the agents claimed that Springer ended his relationship with the agency in the mid-1970s, declassified documents show that he was still in contact with the United States Information Agency (USIA) – which funded pro-American news outlets – in the early 1980s.