Some screw is loose in the president’s brain. On March 6, he said he will attack until he offers his “unconditional surrender.”
Three weeks later, he put a 15-point plan on the negotiating table, rejected by the ayatollahs.
In May 1945, the Allies demanded the unconditional surrender of . Admiral Doenitz, who took over the government after Hitler’s suicide, sent emissaries to General Eisenhower to negotiate a peace on the western front.
None of them were even received.
Francisco’s surprise
There is a good book online, unfortunately in English. It’s “The Election of Pope Leo XIV: The Last Surprise of Pope Francis”, by journalists Gerard O’Connel and Elisabetta Piqué. He shows how Francisco created the framework that led to the election of the American/Peruvian Robert Prevost.
Argentine Jorge Bergoglio acted in two directions. In one, it changed the electorate, reducing the participation of European and, mainly, Italian cardinals. When he died, he had appointed 80% of the College of Cardinals. In another, he leveraged religious people, mainly the American Robert Prevost, bishop of a Peruvian diocese to whom he handed over the Dicastery of Bishops.
According to conventional wisdom, Francisco’s succession would be between the Secretary of State, the Italian Pietro Parolin, and the Hungarian conservative Péter Erdő (the most voted in the first ballot). Prevost was the second most voted and Parolin third.
Prevost and Bergoglio met in Buenos Aires, but the meeting was disastrous for the American. Prevost thought he would never become a bishop. Made pope, Francis gave him a diocese and stimulated his career as a pastor in Peru. Years later, he handed over to him the powerful Dicastery of Bishops in Rome (responsible for appointing priests).
The choice of Leo 14 preserves Francis’ legacy, but creates peace with the conservative cardinals. Francisco never gave any clues as to his preference, but O’Connel and Elisabetta Piqué, personal friends of Bergoglio, deciphered the plot.
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