Aug. 8, 2025 (EIRNS)—The 114th consecutive weekly meeting of the International Peace Coalition took place on Aug. 8, eighty years after the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Helga Zepp-LaRouche, Schiller Institute founder, opened the session, saying, “There are many people who are acutely aware that the world has never been so close to extinction.” The bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were unnecessary because Emperor Hirohito was already negotiating for peace through the Vatican. This was a demonstration of Schrecklichkeit (terror). If the proposed Putin-Trump meeting takes place, it will be the “necessary signal” that nuclear war can be avoided. On the economic war front, Trump’s tariffs are targeting all the BRICS nations, and may inadvertently trigger the de-dollarization which Trump claims to wish to avoid.
Co-moderator Dennis Speed cited the 1946 Strategic Bombing Survey’s official opinion that Japan would have surrendered, even if there were no atomic bombs, no entry of Russia into the war, no invasion. Why do most Americans today still believe the opposite? Why is this not known now, or taught in American universities and schools, 80 years after the events?
Ray McGovern, former CIA analyst and co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS), said that the “overweening objective of the Russians” has been to restore normal relations with the U.S. The recent meeting with Witkoff was constructive, and “Witkoff is about ten times smarter, in my view, than Marco Rubio,” he said, citing Russian presidential aide for foreign policy Yury Ushakov: Trump was backed into a corner with his threat of an Aug. 8 sanctions deadline, and a summit with Putin offers him a way out.
McGovern also asserted that there is “more than an even chance that Netanyahu has Epstein-type blackmail on our President.” If Israel attacks Iran again, Iran is capable of defending itself. Would Netanyahu, in extremis, resort to nuclear weapons? This is a man who uses genocide to try to defend himself from criminal prosecution.
Anthony Aguilar, a retired U.S. Army Lt. Colonel and Green Beret, worked as a security subcontractor for the Israeli and U.S.-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), tasked with delivering aid to the besieged Palestinian enclave. Aguilar said that he doesn’t use the term “war crimes” lightly; he is referring to international agreements to which the U.S. and Israel are signatories. “We are violating those every day.” He described an “active campaign” to dehumanize the Palestinians, putting them in a position where they are “literally begging for food” and then must fight for it at distribution sites. The United States is absolutely complicit in all of this. Attempting a military defeat of Hamas is “a fool’s errand,” he said. Full occupation of Gaza will lead to “much, much more death…. If Israel continues down this path … they are only going to harm their position on the world stage…. A day of atonement, a day of judgment, a day of reckoning is coming.”
McGovern responded, “Colonel Aguilar is the epitome of what a U.S. Army officer used to be.”
Steve Starr, former director of the University of Missouri Clinical Laboratory Science program, stated that the Ukraine conflict has evolved into a hybrid form of World War III. The war would have ended in a few weeks if the U.S. (and Great Britain)had not moved in and torpedoed the talks in April of 2022. Germany is on the verge of providing Taurus missiles, which will be operated by Germans and guided by U.S. targeting data. Russian strategic sites have been targeted, and there was an attempted assassination of Putin in his helicopter, guided by U.S. targeting data. What would the U.S. do if such attacks were made on the U.S.? There are 51 new U.S. bases being established in Scandinavia, and the U.S. has abrogated almost every arms control treaty that we had. We have sent nuclear gravity bombs to the U.K. in the last month. “What does that tell Russia?” If the START treaty is not renewed, Ohio-class subs will be rapidly loaded with additional nuclear weapons.
Eduardo Siqueira, Brazilian researcher and analyst, and a professor emeritus of public health at the University of Massachusetts, Boston, warned that the U.S. is violating Brazil’s sovereignty, to punish Brazil for acting against those who attempted a coup there. A network of “the international extreme right” is operating, and it has backfired, causing “a significant unity of the Brazilian people” against the sanctions. “The United States wants to be the sole power in the world … the perception of the United States is definitely becoming much more negative.”
VIPS Members Review Their Groundbreaking Analysis
William Binney is a 32-year National Security Agency (NSA) veteran, former technical director, NSA Whistleblower, and member of VIPS. He reviewed the 2016 study by VIPS which demonstrated that the DNC emails were extracted by a “leak, not a hack,” and said that this was “provable in a court of law.” Ray McGovern added that the head of CrowdStrike, under oath, admitted in 2017 that there was no technical evidence of any exfiltration. Adam Schiff hid this for two years, and after it was released, the media refused to cover it.
Dennis Speed urged participants to read the Schiller Institute’s newly released
White Paper, “Worse Than Treason: The Actual Motive Behind Russiagate.”
Kirk Wiebe is a retired analyst and whistleblower at the National Security Agency, and VIPS member. He concurred that Putin is sending a signal to Trump that he is willing to talk, and “this is a moment to seize.” He discussed the policy of mass surveillance of Americans, initially launched by Gen. Michael Hayden: Why did they get Britain’s GCHQ involved? Because NSA can’t spy on Americans without a court order, so the British do it for them. Palantir has concluded an agreement with the government to sell personal data from all your digital devices, a combination which will be “the largest surveillance weapon ever devised by mankind.” Congressional oversight is minimal, “a wink and a shake of the hand.”
Zepp-LaRouche responded, saying that the common thread here is the dehumanization of people who are designated as “the enemy.” What is required is “an urgent, urgent change in what is called the image of man,” one that holds that “every human being on the planet is as human as we are.”
Discussion
McGovern noted that the mainstream media are refusing to report the evidence revealed by DNI Tulsi Gabbard. The New York Times claims that those who do talk about it are relying on Russian disinformation, because the emails were made public by Russia. But if one doesn’t trust the Russians, why not ask the NSA? It has all the same material. In concluding remarks, he said that we must distinguish between what Trump is trying to do in Ukraine, which is constructive, and his destructive support for Israeli genocide.
Zepp-LaRouche said that this week’s IPC discussion shows that we are in a pivotal moment, and we must get active. The world situation is complex; Trump does not know that the biggest threat of de-dollarization is cryptocurrency and stablecoins. She asked everyone to sign the petition calling for Putin, Trump, and Xi to meet in Beijing. The world’s problems are solvable if we have an attitude of cooperation, for a solution without catastrophe.
Co-moderator Dennis Small added that the intention behind Russiagate was to stop precisely the sort of meeting that Trump and Putin are about to have, and to stop the paradigm shift represented by the Ten Principles of a New International Security and Development Architecture.
