The current strain of banking families has been lending to and corrupting governments since the Renaissance. Using the internet, you certainly can study on your own, which actually gives you much more latitude to pursue leads as you find them, or decide to change course for a while and explore a different vein of leads.
Court bankers are the “power behind the throne”, and they train their protoges to understand that part of being successful at what they do is being at the forefront of espionage and corruption, as well as keeping real power all within their own family. This is why they marry within their own families. The corruption tactics they employ would make most people sick to their stomach; for example, a man pimping out his own wife, child sex rings, etc.
They carefully cultivate their public image too, making the public think that there’s no way they would “care about” “politics” - they’re just “bankers”.
When you consider how well it works, it’s almost comical how “sheeple” will frequently very vehemently protest that the conspiracy which rules them does not exist.
There really hasn’t been a nation which kept these beasts out for centuries. The Romanov family had them really steamed throughout the 19th century; even as the Tsar had accounts in other countries with millions in deposit in their banks. That made the Tsar such a target for the bankers. None of the monies held outside Russia were ever returned to that nation; the only money available to the new government was what was in Russia. Of course, the US-based financiers financed the Bolsheviks to the tune of many millions, which is a whole topic in and of itself.