Category: astronomy

Disclaimer. This is a Tarot reading only, for readers generally interested in the modern use and applications of Tarot and cartomancy divination.

War is raging, people are dying. The political seas are boiling, the news is non stop, but we will all be glad if it gets no worse in light of Putin’s threats to use nuclear weapons.

This deeply unprepossessing personage below, Chechen warlord Ramzan Kadyrov, 46, son of a Muslim cleric, Head of the Chechen Republic, who is apparently nicknamed Putin’s lap dog or Putin’s attack dog, has reportedly been urging Putin to up the ante, deploying tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine. He has just been promoted to the rank of general and looks like a choleric killer-gnome with high blood pressure. Better learn to calm himself down if he wants to make old bones.

Kadyrov fought against Russia in the first Chechen war, when he was pro Chechen independence. It is only natural and laudable to defend one’s own homeland, but he swapped sides in the second Chechen war. His province is economically weak, it has been reported. He relies on the Kremlin for money, and has a reputation for ‘human rights abuses.’

Kadyrov has said he will send his three sons to fight in Ukraine – aged 14, 15 and 16.

Putin’s PR man, Dmitry Peskov has apparently lamented that Kadyrov gets ‘too emotional at difficult moments’.

If this isn’t an exceedingly difficult moment for President Putin…

Let’s hope that Kadyrov’s promotion is actually Putin’s way of managing him, kicking him upstairs,keeping him sweet while at the same time, putting the frighteners on everyone.

Biden has said that Putin is not joking. Ukraine knows he isn’t, and we have all seen that Putin’s regime is capable of pretty much anything. It’s not that he’s bluffing. But I am not seeing that he will do it.

President Xi meantime has plainly intimated that the deployment of nuclear weapons is a red line that Russia had better not cross, while Saudi Arabia has joined up with Russia to agree a managed reduction of oil stocks from November, which will drive up prices, and which the Biden administration views as an act of betrayal by OPEC and the Saudis, driving up the price of Brent crude oil just before peak season demand. US views this as an act of solidarity with Russia. OPEC says they have done this to stabilize the market.

Will Putin deploy nuclear weapons? On the face of it it may seem entirely plausible that he will do so, given the current desperate circumstances, but he has many different audiences, each with their own stakes in play.

What does the Tarot show in respect of this nuclear threat this coming month?

Events in October

Tweeted 6 October

@truetarottales

23h

#Tarot #Ukraine #Putin October direct nuclear attack not shown, test not unlikely. 5 Swords=defeats. King Cups=water/Poseidon/threat +message to Biden. Week 3 fiery+4 unstable. 9 Pentacles/Temperance/3 Coins-China would be alienated. No clear gain +P hopes winter splits opposition

Tarot readers don’t claim to know ‘the future’. They use their cards, that is all, to try and sense the coming weather, and articulate their findings.

October is deeply worrying, The fourth week is potentially most worrying as seen in the cards. November too, highly likely. But I am not being shown an impending nuclear Armageddon outcome. Let’s consider the cards in more depth.

Issue: The Five of Swords and The Seven of Cups

The Five of Swords is Defeat, rage, mortification, humiliation and chagrin. This is a reflection of the recent defeats experienced by Russian forces, but is also holding up a mirror to the defeat he wants to inflict. He wants it finished by Christmas. This may not be possible. The Five of Swords is Aquarius, late January to late February. Putin could make use of a pause at this juncture. Ukraine has no reason to seek one, but it does have every reason to push harder and not lose momentum

The Seven of Cups talks about ‘castles in the air.’ Daydreams and potentially, delusions. This is about Putin’s dream, his vision. This card generally talks about those things which inspire us, but which are not realized. In terms of timing, this is a card of Scorpio and late Scorpio time, late November, suggesting that Putin is envisioning a next stage strategy working towards that date frame. This is a card of deep water, which in the context of the Poseidon submarine being deployed in the Kara Sea, is not a reassuring card. This card therefore, benchmarks the threat. (Not forgetting the nuclear train being deployed to the border with Ukraine.)

Week One: The King of Cups

This card represents a number of possibilities:-

1. A man acts as a broker or peacekeeper. The suit of Cups is calming in general
2. The card represents Neptune- dominant planet in 2022 and the alter ego of Neptune is Poseidon- well, here we are, in week one, talking about the Poseidon missile threat.
3. The deployment of the submarine-and the train- is a direct threat and intended as a rebuke to the ‘King of Cups’, which is the court card representing Scorpio native President Biden in response to recent further US armaments to Ukraine and the new Lend Lease.

The Russian Poseidon submarine is in the Kara Sea, in the Arctic, a prime fishing ground with vast reserves of untapped petroleum and gas. The US government sanctioned Exxon from drilling there in 2014. One wonders whether this is Putin’s way of reminded the US government that he has the means to prevent them from accessing those energy fields.

If I am understanding this correctly, for Putin to use that Poseidon submarine to carry out a nuclear attack on Ukraine it would need to enter the Baltic undetected.

However, this Neptune card conveys a strong sense of key coastal or maritime developments.

Aug. 24, 2022 

On the 31st anniversary of Ukraine’s independence, the United States is reinforcing its long-term commitment to the nation with $2.98 billion to train and equip the Ukrainian armed forces for their struggle against the Russian invasion.

President Joe Biden announced the aid at the White House. He said the people of the world have been awed and inspired by Ukrainian resistance and pledged the United States will stand with the people of Ukraine as they fight to defend their sovereignty. 

The aid “will allow Ukraine to acquire air defense systems, artillery systems and munitions, counter-unmanned aerial systems, and radars to ensure it can continue to defend itself over the long term,” the president said. – SOURCE

Week Two: The Empress Reversed.

I am struggling with this one, to gauge its meaning apropos of the question. The Empress is Demeter, so, land and agriculture. The Empress is mothers and motherhood eg; Mother Russia. Maybe to Putin she is a vision of Catherine The Great, and attached to this, the city of Odessa which she founded. If so, perhaps this card is detecting that Putin may seek to scatter Ukrainian forces with further attacks on Odessa this month.

I think this card pertains to the problem Russia now has during this time, of identifying and declaring the boundaries of the land they have claimed via the four ‘sham’ referendums, now that Ukrainian counteroffensives are reclaiming ever more territory in those four Oblasts, Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia. Wherever Russia now declares those lines to be drawn, are the lines that Russia must be seen to defend. They have not as yet made that announcement. Let us wait and see if Putin’s military chief minister, Shoigu falls down the stairs this month in weeks three or four.

There has been a sense since February, as seen in the cards, that Putin will end up with much less than he wants, but more than he should rightfully get, and finally comes a cropper. It will not be an easy exit for him, says the Ten of Swords. Perhaps it will be Donetsk that he gets to re-acquire, which may just possibly have a genuine majority in favour of returning to Russia. But now he risks losing what he has already seized by invasion, however ‘peaceful’.

Ukraine is now a hive of fury and is set on taking back the Crimea.

Curiously, the moon in the second week in October is a waning moon in Taurus, the zodiac sign of agriculture – Virgo is the other. Taurus is ruled by the planet Venus, all things sociable, beautiful, harmonious and luxurious. This means money.

A waning Venus-Taurus moon…this for Putin could therefore signify waning money, the erosion of the boundaries of the four annexed Oblasts, and in addition there may be some private worry or grief to do with a significant woman in his life.

This is a man whose upbringing and mother, The Empress Reversed, is a mystery. The mother, rather a touching figure in this photograph, the child withdrawn and anxious.

Week Three and Four: The King of Wands Reversed and The Fool Reversed

A man who is a’king of wands’ may leave the scene. A man of action. Is this a reference to Sergei Shoigu, who has been the Russian Minister of Defense for some years? Astrologically this card represents Leo, but the planets are Mars and Jupiter. One can see the potential for heat here, suggesting missiles used or exchanged with Ukraine. But the card is reversed, and it remains possible that the situation may be somewhat defused by this time. There is a strong feel of ‘fire and water’, this could mean explosions rather than missiles but these are traditional, so to speak, below the grade of nuclear.

The Fool is the most dangerous card here in this spread, in this context. The Fool is the wild card in the Tarot, never to be discounted. ‘Accidents’ can happen. Fools jump in. Surprises are likely, putting it mildly.

But the more Putin looks before he leaps, the less likely it looks here that he will act to unleash nuclear weapons, however much he is tempted. Why will he not? The reader looks for the cards that follow, to get clarification on The Fool. People talk about the Death card. This most numinous card represents the concept of zero and can mean death. For whom, apart from all those who will certainly lose their lives this month, on both sides, not to mention the blameless Ukrainian civilians?

That Three of Pentacles tones down the Fool, and suggests Putin decides to stay his hand on the nuclear option at least until the winter. The Three of Pentacles correlates with 1) a team of close advisors 2) second decan Capricorn, late Dec-late January.

If it was a regional nuclear wipe out, I’d be looking at the World card reversed.

Putin does want this war ended as soon as possible, and he may not care how. He has lowered his sights. He would settle for Crimea and those four annexed Oblasts -for now. He wants it done but such is the damage done to Ukraine, a ceasefire may not be a realistic prospect.

But given the risks to him of using nuclear weapons, the Three of Pentacles suggests Putin hopes a delay will work in his favour, not least because it gives him more time to produce/manufacture the resources he needs to support the now expanded military logistical demands. Another factor in his favour, from now on the cold weather will put pressure until spring 2023 on European support and UK support of Ukraine’s defense. It will now cost even more, thanks to the decision by OPEC.

Other cards

The Nine of Pentacles says Putin must be able to see a clear material gain as his justification and reward for deploying nuclear weapons. Such an action must be able to be presented as justifiable, at least, to those allies who are already maintaining a critically delicate diplomatic position. The Nine of Swords reversed shows the grief and anger of mothers in Ukraine, and now in Russia too, the mothers of the newly mobilized civilian population. Fathers too, of course, but we are working with the card language.

President Putin dare not push Russian public opinion ‘too far.’ The danger here is that these Russian mothers, however ambivalent they were before, would support the use of nuclear weapons, and likely they would, if it meant their own loved ones were sent home again safe and sound, and were not needed to fight after all. This would likely be Putin’s justification at home then.

But he needs China onside. Would this excuse wash with President Xi? Highly doubtful.

Temperance is a mighty card of restraint. This plus Putin’s OPEC ‘coup’ offer a modicum of hope that Putin will not order the use of these weapons during October. He can just wear Ukraine down and wait for the West to get fed up.

The intensity of the risk continues into late November or even Christmas, based on the connection of the Temperance card with the zodiac sign of Sagittarius, the Archer.

Ukraine’s war so far has been largely defensive. Its offensives have been counteroffensives and its civilians have been shelled in their beds by Russian long range missiles. But if we think of Temperance as the archer, then Ukraine’s increased HIMAR capability and longer range missiles, would be a significant ramping up of their own deterrent, since after all Ukraine was persuaded to forego its own nuclear capability in return for the promise of protection.

SOURCE NPR

Three decades ago, the newly independent country of Ukraine was briefly the third-largest nuclear power in the world.

Thousands of nuclear arms had been left on Ukrainian soil by Moscow after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. But in the years that followed, Ukraine made the decision to completely denuclearize.

In exchange, the U.S., the U.K. and Russia would guarantee Ukraine’s security in a 1994 agreement known as the Budapest Memorandum.

Ukraine has been asking for long range missiles, able to cover four times the distance of the HIMARS to help them level up with Russia, and has said they are wiling to have the use of these overseen by the US. Biden at this time of writing, is still reluctant to provide these to Ukraine for fear of escalating the war by crossing Putin’s declared red lines.

The Ukrainian defenders must then, either cede that seized territory, or fight to take it back. up against a superior Russian artillery capability, with one hand tied behind their back, so to speak.

But by the same token, the Temperance card suggests, should Putin proceed to deploy tactical nuclear weapons against the Ukrainians, then he is aware- and so is President Xi- the US is liable to change its mind about supplying those long range missiles.

Cartomancy Spread

Tweeted 6 October 2022

5h

#Cartomancy nuclear threat Oct 2022 5, 8,10 Hearts Water theme dominant, maritime. 10 = ocean/Poseidon. But no ace to show nuclear ‘tsunami’. 5 Hearts=Scorpio/23-25 Oct+ (eclipse?) brings a change to situation 5 Clubs. If there is an escalation however, cards suggest contained.

In Summary

Back in December 2021, in an article published in January 2022 I wrote among other things here and at AskAstrology.com that I didn’t like the Neptunian feel of things for the coming year.

Neptune is associated with all manner of desirable things; imagination, compassion- but I didn’t like its boundlessness in 2022, the lack of boundaries or the breaching of boundaries. Without boundaries, there is chaos. Where there is chaos there is distortion, madness and cruelty.

The cards for this coming month have that Neptunian feeling again, especially in the second half of the month, combined with that deep water fire of Scorpio. Both Putin and Biden have Scorpio written large in their profiles.

This, by the way, is not to suggest anything negative about this zodiac sign, or indeed any zodiac sign or its natives. Every zodiac sign has its positive and negative aspects, just the same as in every season of nature. Scorpio is also associated with great vision, drive, natural physical charisma and a gift of healing.

I am seeing correlations between the cards and the astrology in respect of this particular situation, that is all. Every zodiac sign has its positive and negative aspects.

But the ‘graph line’ of the cards does not look what I might expect to see if we were looking at a nuclear attack. I have seen a terrorist attack once before in the cards, before it actually happened. That was terrible. But this would be something far worse.

I had drawn the Chariot reversed, the Devil and The Tower in a casual ad hoc reading done around half past three UK time, a few hours before the truck attack in Nice, 14 July 2016. I did not know exactly what was coming, but I knew I did not like it, that it involved a vehicle and a collision, but with an added element in the mix, a suggestion of intent and of malice.

The key cards were:

The Chariot drawn reversed=a defeat, the zodiac sign of Cancer (14 July is Cancer) A transport accident/disaster /armour (truck, car,train- here it could be a submarine)

The Devil =desire, rage, lust for power, chaos,extremism, terrorism

The Tower, pride, fall, sudden shock, impact+explosion

That presentation has been absent in both of these card spreads today. Of course the reader must point out that this IS only a card reading, done as a demonstration exercise, for general interest, and is to be regarded as such.

None of these findings are to downplay the danger which is very real and present, not only as reported in the news but as reflected in the cards.

However, it seems to the reader, based on these cards drawn yesterday, 6 October, and on further cards which were drawn this morning 7 October, that there is no clear sign of a full on nuclear attack.

It is not evident in the cards, that Putin will deploy tactical or other nuclear weapons. It depends upon how he calculates the risks of doing so. This thing he has agree with OPEC possibly makes it less likely, more than more likely, strengthening his hand as he hopes to grind down Europe, the UK, the US and Baltic countries supporting Ukraine’s sovereignty.

It seems clear that Putin would not hesitate to use anything at his disposal if he could get what he wanted by those means. He may carry out ‘tests’ or demonstrations. That Eight of Diamonds can mean ‘performances.’ But it is a cautious card, the Eight of Diamonds, and here it’s being counterbalanced by the Eight of Hearts which is in essence, a card of balance and restitution. Possibly there will be a positive diplomatic development this month.

What seems likely to limit Putin’s scope for using nuclear weapons, apart from the delicacy of his relationship with President Xi is the problem of the ‘optics.’ How it will look to the world. That card, the Eight of Diamonds also refers to eyesight or specifically spectacles. Perhaps Putin now sometimes wears spectacles- away from the public eye.

Putin has no way of knowing what will be the full extent of the fallout of using such weapons-both literally and physically, from his own point of view-politically and militarily upon Russia, and upon himself personally.

There is a whiff of poison in these dominantly watery cards. Spite. Putin may well be considering biological or chemical weapons, or thinking how and where to do more damage to Ukraine’s water supply infrastructure.

When the Romans went stamping about invading other folk, they used to drop silver coins down the wells to disinfect them. Silver has antibacterial properties. The Maltese and the Knights of St John poisoned the wells in the south of the island, resisting the Turkish invasion during the Great Siege of Malta 18 May 1565 – 11 Sept 1565 (and for the full story I heartily recommend this astonishing book.)

Putin wants to flatten Ukraine once and for all. But the gruesome gnome, Kadyrov, and doubtless there are others of his ilk, are at this juncture, monkeys on Putin’s back. They have agendas which are nothing to do with Ukraine as such, making them as dangerous to Putin as they are to everyone else, including Russia.

Maybe he’ll poison the Kara Sea or drown an island, you know, just to show everyone and especially Biden who’s in charge.

No-one is not saying that the West is free of blame or that it has clean hands. We can all speculate, but had there been a different response to the annexation of Crimea in 2014, who knows, we might not be looking down the barrel of this nuclear threat right now.

This conflict is a polarizing beacon showing that the world order is drawing up and hardening into two global zones- broadly a face off between the model of democracy v the model of autocracy.

I don’t imagine President Putin is having a happy birthday. I don’t see him smiling, cutting the cake, all around him a vale of tears.

The Ten of Swords awaits. Ruin. That card was drawn right back at the start, the day of the invasion of 24 February. How can he avert that now, for himself? Next spring may tell us and he is pinning his hopes on the worst that the winter can do.

But the Empress is not smiling upon him.