BITCOIN IN WARTIME
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In countries at war, we no longer talk about bull runs or shitcoins. We no longer comment on halving fluctuations or Taproot updates. We no longer speculate on an ETF or the next rise of TAO. In countries at war, Bitcoin ceases to be a technological curiosity, a volatile asset, or an ideological bet. It becomes a lifeline. A last fuse of fire in a ruined room. In bombed Ukraine, in suffocated Nigeria, in the besieged Gaza Strip, or in abandoned Afghanistan, there have been men, women, children, entire families who have had only their seed phrase as a passport. Their memory as their only safe. Their phone, or even just their head, as their last piece of luggage. And Bitcoin, not as a bet, but as a cry. A tool for escape. A soft weapon to get through the worst violence of our century. What many call "cryptocurrency" is not virtual in a world where bombs are very real. What the West still perceives as a Californian libertarian whim becomes, elsewhere, a lifeline for refugees without banks, without papers, without a future. It's not about ideology, it's about reality.
When Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, bank transfers were halted in several areas. ATMs were stormed. ATMs were emptied. Visa and Mastercard cards stopped working. Central banks imposed capital controls. Borders, however, remained permeable. And it was those who held Bitcoin, often in a simple mobile app or cold wallet, who were able to cross the lines without losing all their resources. Hundreds of Ukrainians used Bitcoin to finance their departure, bypass restrictions, send money to their families. Massive donations poured in from around the world to support the Ukrainian resistance in BTC, ETH, USDT. No Swift transfer required, no KYC, no authorization. Just an address. Just a hash. Does the internet still work? So Bitcoin still works. And that's a harsh truth that doesn't depend on JP Morgan's analysis.
Further east, in Afghanistan, it was the arrival of the Taliban in August 2021 that exposed the obsolescence of the banking system. Bank accounts were frozen. ATMs closed. Women were no longer allowed to open accounts. Cash disappeared. Dollars fled. NGOs were cut off from their financial networks. So Afghan women, discreetly trained in Bitcoin technology in clandestine learning circles, found a way to access funds without going through banks. Journalists and activists in exile survived thanks to their Bitcoin wallets. Donations could be sent despite the financial blockade. It wasn't long before the Taliban declared Bitcoin illegal. But the code can't be bombed. The network can't be conquered. And the protocol has no leader to capture.
In Gaza, the situation is even more brutal. Under blockade for more than a decade, the strip of land is isolated from global financial circuits. The open war of October 2023 intensified the chaos. Hospitals were destroyed. The economy collapsed. Banks are nothing more than empty facades. And yet, some Palestinians have been able to send or receive money using Bitcoin, provided they have a connection and a minimum of knowledge. Rare testimonies, difficult to document given the lockdown nature of the territory, show that NGOs sometimes send funds in BTC, through third parties, to circumvent banking bans. In a zone where transactions are monitored, controlled, and sometimes punishable by death, a private key becomes more valuable than a banknote. The protocol is neutral. It is the customs that say it all. And in the shadows, it sometimes remains the only light.
In Nigeria, it wasn't a head-on war, but a gradual institutional collapse, rampant inflation, and digital repression that led millions of young people to turn to Bitcoin. In 2021, the government banned banks from dealing with exchanges. As a result, peer-to-peer exchanges exploded. Bitcoin payments became a weapon to circumvent corruption, scams, and currency control. During the protests against police brutality (#EndSARS), activists' bank accounts were blocked. That's when Bitcoin donations were received to continue the fight. A confirmed, verifiable, and documented reality. Chaos calls for resilient tools. And in this context, Bitcoin isn't a gamble; it's a given.
The great powers are looking the other way. They only see the "risk of money laundering," the "trafficking," and the "currency disruptions." They want to impose laws, restrictions, and controls. They have not yet understood that on the margins of the world, in the cracks of the established order, Bitcoin does not ask permission. It spreads like an idea whose time has come. In every war zone, there is a mother, a teenager, a schoolteacher, a refugee, a dissident, who has understood that no one will come to save them. That their bank account can be emptied, their passport confiscated, their assets seized, but that a simple 12-word wallet can become a tool for survival. That the global banking system is anything but neutral. And that neutrality, the real kind, the kind that makes no distinction between strong and weak, between friend and enemy, is the code. It is Bitcoin.
Meanwhile, the West debates. We discuss mining's energy consumption, we debate regulations, we criticize maximalists. We forget that Bitcoin was not created for New York, but for N'Djamena. Not for Goldman Sachs, but for those who have never had a bank. Bitcoin is not a trader's toy. It is a shelter for the damned. A tool for the invisible. A bridge for those cut off from the world. And the more crises accumulate, the more wars multiply, the more currencies collapse, the more Bitcoin takes on meaning. It doesn't solve everything. It doesn't replace water or peace. But it offers one thing that no one can take away from those who hold it: sovereignty.
It's easy to deny it from Paris, Berlin, or San Francisco. It's easy to say it's just a fad, a bubble. But those who fled a burning city with only their memory as a safe don't argue with price fluctuations. They know what it means to be able to cross a border with the equivalent of an entire lifetime in their heads. They know what it's worth, to be able to receive money when everything else is cut off. They know what it costs, to live in a world where property no longer exists, where law is erased, where banking becomes a tool of repression. And they know what a difference it makes to possess a private key that no one can take away from them.
Bitcoin needs no technical, economic, or philosophical justification to exist. All it needs is a man on the run, a woman in revolt, a people in ruins. It is the silent response to systemic violence. It is the weapon of the unarmed. It is the digital refuge of those rejected by the world. And in a century where war is becoming permanent, where conflicts are geopolitical, monetary, digital, and identity-based, Bitcoin is becoming a maquis. An invisible territory. A network without a leader, without borders, without apparent weakness. A breath of fresh air that resists tanks. An immutable script in chaos.
Some will say it's exaggerated. Some will say it's ideological. But those who live in the shadow of the bombs know that banks close. That currencies collapse. That states censor. That bodies flee, but the blocks remain. Dollars are printed. Systems collapse. Promises are broken. But Bitcoin continues. Block after block. It promises nothing. It guarantees nothing. It belongs to no one. But it's there. And when the world is collapsing, being there is already a lot.
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