Send your questions for Mrs. Zepp-LaRouche to: questions@schillerinstitute.org
Join Helga Zepp-LaRouche tomorrow in her weekly dialogue for a discussion about building an International Peace Coalition.
#worldwar3 #newparadigm #peacemovement #decoupling #nuclearwar #russia
A two-day international conference was held July 8-9 in Strasbourg, France by the Schiller Institute, titled “On the Verge of a New World War: European Nations Must Cooperate with the Global South!” The proceedings were organized into five panels, with three on Day One July 8, featuring 22 speakers, from 14 different countries, ending with an evening concert of classical music. The second day’s two panels, which also included musical offerings, had wide-ranging discussions, involving many of the audience of more than 200 attendees. (See the full program below).This event, and the process of deliberation it represents, stands in sharp contrast to the recently convened Paris “Summit for a New Global Financial Pact,” where leaders of the Global South ridiculed the hypocrisy of their European counterparts. As opposed to the not-so-hidden Malthusian “green imperialist” depopulation agenda of the arrogant Paris Summit, the Schiller Institute colloquy is an opportunity for peoples of all continents to gather for the purpose of deliberation on how to bring about a peaceful and prosperous future for the entire human race.
The Schiller Institute conference is also a timely and necessary intervention against Global NATO’s July 11–12 Vilnius, Lithuania summit, where bloodthirsty leaders of the West’s Military-Industrial Complex will be plotting more measures which, unless stopped, will bring about the destruction of humanity through thermonuclear war.
The Schiller Institute’s panels covered a broad range of critical economic, strategic, and cultural themes. Notable was the fact that due to the Covid-19 pandemic this was the first in-person Schiller Institute conference in three years! The conference opened with the famous Adagio cantabile of Beethoven’s C minor Pathétique piano sonata, performed by Werner Hartmann, of the Schiller Institute.
MODERATOR: Harley Schlanger
• Helga Zepp-LaRouche, founder and leader of the Schiller Institute: “Let a Garden Amidst a Million Gardens Bloom!”; PREPARED REMARKS
• HE Lu Shaye, Ambassador of the People’s Republic of China in France: “China’s Role for Peace and Development”; PREPARED REMARKS
• HE Ilia Subbotin, Minister-Counselor of the Embassy of the Russian Federation in France: “What Russia Really Wants in Its Relations with Europe – Peace or War ?”; PREPARED REMARKS
• Mrutyuanjai Mishra, Author and Journalist, India: “India’s role as a Peace Mediator in These Critical Times”
• Michele Geraci, Former Undersecretary of State, Ministry of Economic Development ; Prof. of Practice in Economic Policy, Nottingham University, Ningbo; Honorary Professor Peking University, School of Economics; Adjunct Professor of Finance, New York University, Shanghai; En-ROADS Climate Ambassador—Climate Interactive/MIT, Italy
• Dr. Hans-Joachim Lemke, Colonel (A.d – retired), Editor Kompass, Magazine of the Association for the Preservation of Traditions of the National Peoples Army and GDR Border Troops (Verband zur Pflege der Traditionen der Nationalen Volksarmee und der Grenztruppen der DDR): “Thoughts on Peace from the Perspective of an East German.”
• Alain Corvez, Colonel (retired), consultant in international affairs, former advisor to the French Ministry of the Interior, France: “Following Its Military Failure against Russia in Ukraine, Will U.S. One-Upmanship Cross the Nuclear Threshold?”
Helga Zepp-LaRouche, founder and leader of the Schiller Institute, gave the conference keynote, “Let a Garden Amidst a Million Gardens Bloom!” (Full text on this website). She set the tone for the panel by contrasting the tragic consequences of the collapsing trans-Atlantic “rules based order” attempting to maintain its hegemony, with the rising nations of the Global South, freeing themselves from centuries of colonial servitude and asserting their right to economic development.
Mrs. Zepp-LaRouche asserted at the beginning of her presentation her commitment: “We will revive the best of what European culture has produced … and we will bring that into the shaping of the New Paradigm!”
The next speaker, H.E. Lu Shaye, Ambassador of the People’s Republic of China in France, delivered his presentation titled “China’s Role for Peace and Development.” He stated, “At present, changes unseen for a century are taking place at an accelerated pace, giving rise to unprecedented transformations of our world, our times and history.” He characterized the world as divided into two camps: pro-peace and pro-war. Which camp will prevail? Ambassador Lu detailed the incredible opportunities Western nations would realize were they to cooperate with China and the Global South through participation in the multitude of development initiatives China is leading, such as the Belt and Road Initiative.
‘The Multipolar World is Emerging’
H.E. Ilia Subbotin, Minister-Counselor of the Embassy of the Russian Federation in France, spoke on the topic, “What Russia Really Wants in Its Relations with Europe: Peace or War?” He recounted his own personal perspective of the history of the collapse of the Soviet Union and the subsequent tumultuous transition to the post-Soviet era.
He noted that, contrary to proclamations by President George H.W. Bush that the West had “won” the Cold War, from the Russian perspective it was President Mikhail Gorbachev who had stopped the Cold War. Most people in the former Soviet Republics looked forward to a new union with a desire to become a part of the “Western world.” But, despite countless efforts by Russian leaders over a 30-year period, particularly President Vladimir Putin, every attempt at Western integration has been sabotaged.
But Minister-Counselor Subbotin asked, will the European nations free themselves from the “shackles of U.S. control” and join with the “new centers of economic growth” of the Global South? “When and if this happens, Russia will be ready for mutually beneficial dialogue of equals, on the basis of our fundamental interests.”
Other panelists addressed the potential that exists for European nations to join with the Global South to create a New Paradigm.
MODERATOR: Elke Fimmen
• Jacques Cheminade, President Solidarite & Progres: “The Rise of the Global South against Geopolitical Blocs”; PREPARED REMARKS
• Julio Miguel de Vido, former Minister of Federal Planning, Public Investment and Services
(2003-2015) during the governments of both Nestor and Cristina Kirchner, Argentina :
“Planning for Integration, Cooperation and Growth with the BRICS: Missteps and Risks”; PREPARED REMARKS
• Dr. Doğu Perinçek, Chairman of the Vatan Party, Türkiye : « The decisive Importance of the
Alliance between Türkiye, Russia, Iran and China at the edge of Entering the Eurasian Era »
Patricia Lalonde, former MEP, associate researcher at Institut Prospective et Sécurité en Europe
(IPSE); “Syria, Reasons for Hope”
• Herve Machenaud, former Executive Director of the EDF Group (for engineering and
generation) and former Director of the Asia-Pacific branch, France: “The History of France-China
Relations, the Example of Nuclear Power”; PREPARED REMARKS
• Dora Muanda, Teacher, biologist, scientific director of the Kinshasa Science and Technology
Week, Democratic Republic of Congo, RDC: “Humanity and Africa need science”
• Dr Andrews Nkansah, Undersecretary General of the African Diaspora Congress (USA), Ghana:
“Strategic Partnership for the Rapid Development of Africa”
• Alain Gachet, water specialist, president of Radar Technologies International (RTI), inventor of
the Watex (Water Exploration) process for locating aquifer resources by satellite – Introduction by
Jacques Cheminade: “Water for Peace and Development”
Jacques Cheminade, President of the Schiller Institute co-thinker organization Solidarité et Progrès political party in France, gave the Panel 2 keynote, titled “The Rise of the Global South against Geopolitical Blocs.” He characterized the current historical period as “the battle between the Malthusian, domineering financial oligarchy that occupies our Western countries and those who believe that the human species has a right to development.” He noted that the first signs of a potential “conflagration” are everywhere evident in Europe, particularly in his own country of France.
In the midst of this gathering storm, nations of the Global South see the Russia-China alliance as reflected in their joint statement of February 4, 2022, as a “positive option and chance to escape the trans-Atlantic straightjacket”—a path to realize what President Xi Jinping calls “the common future of mankind.”
Mr. Cheminade highlighted the crucial role of the late U.S. statesman and economist Lyndon LaRouche, husband of Schiller institute founder Helga Zepp-LaRouche, in discovering the principles of physical economy critical for a New Paradigm of development. This was stated explicitly by the famous Russian economist Sergei Glazyev, Minister in charge of Integration and Macroeconomics of the Eurasian Economic Union, who said Sept. 8, 2022: “It is the principles of physical economics championed by Lyndon LaRouche that underpin the Chinese economic miracle today, and that are the basis of India’s economic development policy.”
Panelists from many other nations provided a stirring crossfire of ideas.
MODERATOR: Claudio Celani
• Harley Schlanger, Vice Chairman of the Board of directors, Schiller Institute, USA:
“Kennedy’s Vision of Peace”
• H. E. M. Donald Ramotar, former president of Guyana (2011-2015), Former Member of Parliament (1992-2011) and General Secretary of the People’s Progressive Party (PPP), trade-unionist:“The World’s People Must Make Their Voices Heard”
• Diane Sare, Candidate for US Senate, USA:“Make the US a Force for the Good”; PREPARED REMARKS
• Hussein Askary, Vice-president BRIX Instittut, Soutwest Asia Coordinator Schiller Institute,
Sweden:“The Revolutionary Changes in Southwest Asia”
• Alessia Ruggeri, Trade Unionist, Member of the International Coalition for Peace, Italy
“Italy and the War: an Important Referendum to Stop Sending Weapons to Ukraine”
• Jens Jørgen Nielsen, historian, author, former Moscow correspondent of the Danish newspaper
Politiken, representative of the Russian-Danish Dialogue, Denmark: “The Lack of Strategy by the Western Countries to avoid Nuclear War”
Harley Schlanger, the Vice Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Schiller Institute U.S.A., gave the Panel 3 keynote, opening with a video clip of the first four minutes of President John F. Kennedy’s June 10, 1963 American University “Peace Speech” Mr. Schlanger then gave a brief history of Kennedy’s Presidency, from his battle with the U.S. Senate to ratify the Nuclear Test Ban treaty with the Soviet Union, to his efforts to extricate the United States from the war in Vietnam and end the Cold War.
Although constantly having to discover ways of out flanking the war hawks within his administration—dead set on escalating the Cold War—just as big a challenge was overcoming the mass brainwashing of the American population who believed that it was “better dead than red.” His efforts were cut short on November 22, 1963, when the President was murdered in Dallas, Texas.
Mr. Schlanger then delivered a short discussion of the anti-imperialist history of the United States—from the American Founding Fathers to Franklin D. Roosevelt and Lyndon LaRouche. Exemplary of that tradition is the famous July 4, 1821 speech by then Secretary of State John Quincy Adams in which he declares: “But she [the United States] goes not abroad in search of monsters to destroy….” This anti-imperialist tradition contrasts sharply with today’s defenders of the militaristic “Rules-Based Order,” such as the hapless Sec. of State Antony J. Blinken.
Other speakers on Panel III included H.E. Donald Ramotar, former President of Guyana, and Diane Sare, Candidate for U.S. Senate from New York, both of whom have been actively collaborating with people from many nations, in the newly formed International Peace Coalition.
MODERATOR: Karel Vereycken
• Prof. Luc Reychler, (PhD Harvard, 1976), professor emeritus of international relations at the
University of Louvain and former director of the Center for Peace Research and Strategic Studies
(CPRS), Belgium: “European Humanist Values versus War Culture, What would Erasmus say
about peace in Ukraine?”; PREPARED REMARKS
• Liliana Gorini, chairwoman of Movisol, Italy; “Pacem in Terris and Civilization of Love”
• Maurizio Abbate, Italy National Institute for Cultural Activities connected to the Ministry of
Culture, Italy:“Culture, the Key to Peace”; PREPARED REMARKS
• Tatjana Zdanoka, MEP, member of the Russian Union of Latvia, Latvia
“On Demonization of Russian Culture”; PREPARED REMARKS
• Liz Augustat, President of the International Association “Peace through Culture. Europe”: “World
Peace based on common ethics and values”, Germany; PREPARED REMARKS
Dr. Luc Reychler, Professor Emeritus at Louvain University and former Director of the Center for Peace Research and Strategic Studies in Belgium, gave the Panel 4 keynote, on the provocative question, “European Humanist Values versus War Culture: What Would Erasmus Say about Peace in Ukraine?” He reviewed today’s Ukraine “proxy war”—as he termed it—against Russia, from the eyes of the great Dutch Renaissance scholar Desiderius Erasmus (1466–1536). Famous for works such as In Praise of Folly and The Complaint of Peace, Erasmus warned that those who have not experienced war are often its greatest proponents, that sentiment being well expressed in a quote from his book Against War: Dulce bellum inexpertis, or “War is sweet for the inexperienced.”
Were Erasmus here today, he “would criticize and satirize the excuses for ongoing war; for example, the misrepresentation of the war as the defense of democracy and of the democratic world” and “would also be a whistleblower and name the princes and kings, and the war profiteers who are responsible for the war.” But importantly, Erasmus would seek a process of “peace building” through promotion of economic development and education—particularly for youth.
The next speaker, Liliana Gorini, chairwoman of the Schiller Institute affiliated Movisol political party in Italy, invoked the wisdom of another great figure, Italian composer Giuseppe Verdi (1813–1901). To hear U.S. President Joe Biden and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni speak of “peace,” as they did at the G7 meeting in Hiroshima, Japan last month, Gorini said, reminds one of the way Verdi in his opera Don Carlos—inspired by Friedrich Schiller—has Don Rodrigo telling King Philip of Spain that his so-called militarist “peace” for Flanders is a “horrible, horrible peace, the peace of graves.” She called on conference attendees to take inspiration from Verdi, and from Pope John XXIII, and President John F. Kennedy, “to fight for a true peace, which only comes from respecting and developing the rest of the world.” (Ms. Gorini’s remarks were read, as she was unable to attend).
Other panelists stressed the tremendous importance of culture as a key foundation for lasting, durable peace among nations.
• Moderator: Stephan Ossenkopp, the Schiller Institute, Germany
• Christian Lévêque, Emeritus Research Director, Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD) and specialist in aquatic ecosystems; Honorary President, Académie d’agriculture de France; Member, Académie des Sciences d’Outre-mer, France: “Scientific Ecology Is Being Instrumentalized by Magical Thinking”
• Dr.-Ing. Hans-Bernd Pillkahn, engineer, CEO of PROASSORT, metallurgy, Germany: “EU Climate Policy: A Disaster for Energy-Intensive Production”
• Frank Bornschein, co-initiator of the Initiative “Peace, Freedom and Sovereignty”; City Councilor, Schwedt/Oder, Germany: “Deindustrialization—Not by Chance but by Design; The Example of the PCK Oil Refinery of Schwedt”
• Prof. Alberto Prestininzi, geologist, Sapienza University of Rome; Director, CERI Research Center, Italy: “Climate: Between Emergency and Knowledge”
• Prof. Carl-Otto Weiss, Advisor to the European Climate and Energy Institute (EIKE); Professor and Director, German Federal Institute of Metrology, Braunschweig, Germany: “How Solar Cycles Determine Earth’s Climate”
Christian Lévêque, Emeritus Research Director at the Institut de Recherche pour le Développement of France, gave the Panel 5 keynote, “Scientific Ecology Is Being Instrumentalized by Magical Thinking.” He scored the Malthusian agenda of what he termed “the wealthy urban bourgeois” and their affiliated NGOs such as the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) who have adopted “nature worship” as their religion. Their axiomatic foundation is “that God created a perfect, harmonious and balanced world”—a paradise—and that man, through development and overpopulation, is destroying that world. He denounced their “fear tactics” and how they impose their agenda.
The WWF and other environmentalist NGOs, using the UN to push their pseudo-religious dogma, are behind the infamous “30 by 30” agenda, promoted at the 2022 UN Biodiversity Conference (COP 15) in Montreal, Canada, to “protect” 30% of the Earth’s land and water by the year 2030 from the aggressions of man.
Other panelists debunked the fraud of “man-made climate change,” and called for a stop to the deindustrialization and economic destruction underway.
The first day’s proceedings were capped off by a wonderful Classical music concert, featuring Albanian pianist Dhurata Lazo and Swedish Soprano Leena Malkki. Ms. Lazo began with four compositions for solo piano including a romance by Albanian composer Tonin Harapi (1926–1992) and three pieces by Frédéric Chopin: the Muzurkas Op. 67; the Scherzo No. 2 Op. 31; and the Andante spianato et grande polonaise brillante Op. 22.
She was then accompanied Ms. Malkki on five songs: a piece from Mozart’s opera La Clemenza di Tito; Schubert’s Nacht und Trӓume Op. 43 No. 2 and Auf dem Wasser zu singen Op. 72; Verdi’s Ave Maria from Otello and Pace, pace mio Dio from La forza del destino.
by Kevin Gribbroek
July 9—A two-day international conference was held this weekend in Strasbourg, France by the Schiller Institute, titled “On the Verge of a New World War: European Nations Must Cooperate with the Global South!” The proceedings were organized into five panels, with three on Day One July 8, featuring 22 speakers, from 14 different countries, ending with an evening concert of classical music. The second day’s two panels, which also included musical offerings, had wide-ranging discussions, involving many of the audience of more than 200 attendees. (See the full program below).
This event, and the process of deliberation it represents, stands in sharp contrast to the recently convened Paris “Summit for a New Global Financial Pact,” where leaders of the Global South ridiculed the hypocrisy of their European counterparts. As opposed to the not-so-hidden Malthusian “green imperialist” depopulation agenda of the arrogant Paris Summit, the Schiller Institute colloquy is an opportunity for peoples of all continents to gather for the purpose of deliberation on how to bring about a peaceful and prosperous future for the entire human race.
The Schiller Institute conference is also a timely and necessary intervention against Global NATO’s July 11–12 Vilnius, Lithuania summit, where bloodthirsty leaders of the West’s Military-Industrial Complex will be plotting more measures which, unless stopped, will bring about the destruction of humanity through thermonuclear war.
The Schiller Institute’s panels covered a broad range of critical economic, strategic, and cultural themes. Notable was the fact that due to the Covid-19 pandemic this was the first in-person Schiller Institute conference in three years! The conference opened with the famous Adagio cantabile of Beethoven’s C minor Pathétique piano sonata, performed by Werner Hartmann, of the Schiller Institute.
Panel I: Peace in the World Through a New Security and Development Architecture for Each and Every Country: The Indispensable Strategic Autonomy of European Countries
Helga Zepp-LaRouche, founder and leader of the Schiller Institute, gave the conference keynote, “Let a Garden Amidst a Million Gardens Bloom!” (Full text on this website). She set the tone for the panel by contrasting the tragic consequences of the collapsing trans-Atlantic “rules based order” attempting to maintain its hegemony, with the rising nations of the Global South, freeing themselves from centuries of colonial servitude and asserting their right to economic development.
Mrs. Zepp-LaRouche asserted at the beginning of her presentation her commitment: “We will revive the best of what European culture has produced … and we will bring that into the shaping of the New Paradigm!” (Her full presentation is below.)
The next speaker, H.E. Lu Shaye, Ambassador of the People’s Republic of China in France, delivered his presentation titled “China’s Role for Peace and Development.” He stated, “At present, changes unseen for a century are taking place at an accelerated pace, giving rise to unprecedented transformations of our world, our times and history.” He characterized the world as divided into two camps: pro-peace and pro-war. Which camp will prevail? Ambassador Lu detailed the incredible opportunities Western nations would realize were they to cooperate with China and the Global South through participation in the multitude of development initiatives China is leading, such as the Belt and Road Initiative. (His full presentation is below.)
‘The Multipolar World is Emerging’
H.E. Ilia Subbotin, Minister-Counselor of the Embassy of the Russian Federation in France, spoke on the topic, “What Russia Really Wants in Its Relations with Europe: Peace or War?” He recounted his own personal perspective of the history of the collapse of the Soviet Union and the subsequent tumultuous transition to the post-Soviet era.
He noted that, contrary to proclamations by President George H.W. Bush that the West had “won” the Cold War, from the Russian perspective it was President Mikhail Gorbachev who had stopped the Cold War. Most people in the former Soviet Republics looked forward to a new union with a desire to become a part of the “Western world.” But, despite countless efforts by Russian leaders over a 30-year period, particularly President Vladimir Putin, every attempt at Western integration has been sabotaged.
But Minister-Counselor Subbotin asked, will the European nations free themselves from the “shackles of U.S. control” and join with the “new centers of economic growth” of the Global South? “When and if this happens, Russia will be ready for mutually beneficial dialogue of equals, on the basis of our fundamental interests.” (His full presentation is below.)
Other panelists addressed the potential that exists for European nations to join with the Global South to create a New Paradigm.
Panel II: Why It Is in the Strategic Interest of European Nations to Cooperate with the Global South
Jacques Cheminade, President of the Schiller Institute co-thinker organization Solidarité et Progrès political party in France, gave the Panel 2 keynote, titled “The Rise of the Global South against Geopolitical Blocs.” He characterized the current historical period as “the battle between the Malthusian, domineering financial oligarchy that occupies our Western countries and those who believe that the human species has a right to development.” He noted that the first signs of a potential “conflagration” are everywhere evident in Europe, particularly in his own country of France.
In the midst of this gathering storm, nations of the Global South see the Russia-China alliance as reflected in their [[joint statement]] [[http://en.kremlin.ru/supplement/5770]] of February 4, 2022, as a “positive option and chance to escape the trans-Atlantic straightjacket”—a path to realize what President Xi Jinping calls “the common future of mankind.”
Mr. Cheminade highlighted the crucial role of the late U.S. statesman and economist Lyndon LaRouche, husband of Schiller institute founder Helga Zepp-LaRouche, in discovering the principles of physical economy critical for a New Paradigm of development. This was stated explicitly by the famous Russian economist Sergei Glazyev, Minister in charge of Integration and Macroeconomics of the Eurasian Economic Union, who said Sept. 8, 2022: “It is the principles of physical economics championed by Lyndon LaRouche that underpin the Chinese economic miracle today, and that are the basis of India’s economic development policy.” (His full presentation is below.)
Panelists from many other nations provided a stirring crossfire of ideas.
Panel III: The Peace Movement Worldwide Above Party Lines: The Special Case of the United States; The Role of the Vatican and the Global South
Harley Schlanger, the Vice Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Schiller Institute U.S.A., gave the Panel 3 keynote, opening with a video clip of the first four minutes of President John F. Kennedy’s June 10, 1963 American University “[[Peace Speech]]” [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fA_kjj2c0Qc]] Mr. Schlanger then gave a brief history of Kennedy’s Presidency, from his battle with the U.S. Senate to ratify the Nuclear Test Ban treaty with the Soviet Union, to his efforts to extricate the United States from the war in Vietnam and end the Cold War.
Although constantly having to discover ways of out flanking the war hawks within his administration—dead set on escalating the Cold War—just as big a challenge was overcoming the mass brainwashing of the American population who believed that it was “better dead than red.” His efforts were cut short on November 22, 1963, when the President was murdered in Dallas, Texas.
Mr. Schlanger then delivered a short discussion of the anti-imperialist history of the United States—from the American Founding Fathers to Franklin D. Roosevelt and Lyndon LaRouche. Exemplary of that tradition is the famous July 4, 1821 speech by then Secretary of State John Quincy Adams in which he declares: “But she [the United States] goes not abroad in search of monsters to destroy….” This anti-imperialist tradition contrasts sharply with today’s defenders of the militaristic “Rules-Based Order,” such as the hapless Sec. of State Antony J. Blinken.
Other speakers on Panel III included H.E. Donald Ramotar, former President of Guyana, and Diane Sare, Candidate for U.S. Senate from New York, both of whom have been actively collaborating with people from many nations, in the newly formed International Peace Coalition. (See Editorial.)
Panel IV: A Culture to Emancipate and Expand the Creative Capacities of Every Human Being—A Dialogue Among Cultures and Civilizations
Dr. Luc Reychler, Professor Emeritus at Louvain University and former Director of the Center for Peace Research and Strategic Studies in Belgium, gave the Panel 4 keynote, on the provocative question, “European Humanist Values versus War Culture: What Would Erasmus Say about Peace in Ukraine?” He reviewed today’s Ukraine “proxy war”—as he termed it—against Russia, from the eyes of the great Dutch Renaissance scholar Desiderius Erasmus (1466–1536). Famous for works such as In Praise of Folly and The Complaint of Peace, Erasmus warned that those who have not experienced war are often its greatest proponents, that sentiment being well expressed in a quote from his book Against War: Dulce bellum inexpertis, or “War is sweet for the inexperienced.”
Were Erasmus here today, he “would criticize and satirize the excuses for ongoing war; for example, the misrepresentation of the war as the defense of democracy and of the democratic world” and “would also be a whistleblower and name the princes and kings, and the war profiteers who are responsible for the war.” But importantly, Erasmus would seek a process of “peace building” through promotion of economic development and education—particularly for youth.
The next speaker, Liliana Gorini, chairwoman of the Schiller Institute affiliated Movisol political party in Italy, invoked the wisdom of another great figure, Italian composer Giuseppe Verdi (1813–1901). To hear U.S. President Joe Biden and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni speak of “peace,” as they did at the G7 meeting in Hiroshima, Japan last month, Gorini said, reminds one of the way Verdi in his opera Don Carlos—inspired by Friedrich Schiller—has Don Rodrigo telling King Philip of Spain that his so-called militarist “peace” for Flanders is a “horrible, horrible peace, the peace of graves.” She called on conference attendees to take inspiration from Verdi, and from Pope John XXIII, and President John F. Kennedy, “to fight for a true peace, which only comes from respecting and developing the rest of the world.” (Ms. Gorini’s remarks were read, as she was unable to attend).
Other panelists stressed the tremendous importance of culture as a key foundation for lasting, durable peace among nations.
Panel V: Scientific Ecology and Assessing the Climate Challenge: Eradicating Poverty and Hunger in the World is the Priority
Christian Lévêque, Emeritus Research Director at the Institut de Recherche pour le Développement of France, gave the Panel 5 keynote, “Scientific Ecology Is Being Instrumentalized by Magical Thinking.” He scored the Malthusian agenda of what he termed “the wealthy urban bourgeois” and their affiliated NGOs such as the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) who have adopted “nature worship” as their religion. Their axiomatic foundation is “that God created a perfect, harmonious and balanced world”—a paradise—and that man, through development and overpopulation, is destroying that world. He denounced their “fear tactics” and how they impose their agenda.
The WWF and other environmentalist NGOs, using the UN to push their pseudo-religious dogma, are behind the infamous “30 by 30” agenda, promoted at the 2022 UN Biodiversity Conference (COP 15) in Montreal, Canada, to “protect” 30% of the Earth’s land and water by the year 2030 from the aggressions of man.
Other panelists debunked the fraud of “man-made climate change,” and called for a stop to the deindustrialization and economic destruction underway.
Classical Beauty
The first day’s proceedings were capped off by a wonderful Classical music concert, featuring Albanian pianist Dhurata Lazo and Swedish Soprano Leena Malkki. Ms. Lazo began with four compositions for solo piano including a romance by Albanian composer Tonin Harapi (1926–1992) and three pieces by Frédéric Chopin: the Muzurkas Op. 67; the Scherzo No. 2 Op. 31; and the Andante spianato et grande polonaise brillante Op. 22.
She was then accompanied Ms. Malkki on five songs: a piece from Mozart’s opera La Clemenza di Tito; Schubert’s Nacht und Trӓume Op. 43 No. 2 and Auf dem Wasser zu singen Op. 72; Verdi’s Ave Maria from Otello and Pace, pace mio Dio from La forza del destino.
Robert Hux contributed to this article.
If you are interested in working with the International Peace Coalition, please contact questions@schillerinstitute.org
On Friday June 30, the International Peace Coalition (IPC) held its fourth meeting with approximately 60 organizers from Argentina, Germany, Guinea, Nicaragua, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the UK, the United States, and other nations participating in the proceedings. The meeting could be best characterized as a strategy session on how to expand the IPC through various means of direct action such as street organizing, social media, political interventions, and classes with the goal of not only preventing the immediate threat of global thermonuclear war but laying the foundation for a durable peace—a New Paradigm.
Moderated by Anastasia Battle of the Schiller Institute, the meeting began with a very concise strategic overview by Helga Zepp-LaRouche, founder and leader of the Schiller Institute and initiator of the IPC, outlining the heightened danger of war between Russia and NATO in the wake of the mutiny by Yevgeny Prigozhin and his Wagner mercenaries against the Kremlin. Apparently Western Intelligence agencies had advanced knowledge of the event, an event which could have led potentially to chaos in the largest nuclear power, but made no effort to alert the Russian leadership. Mrs. Zepp-LaRouche contrasted this to the support President Putin had offered to the Bush administration after the 9/11 attack. Would it really be preferable to have the strongest nuclear power fall into chaos with potentially catastrophic consequences?
She also pointed out that there are now voices in Russia such as Prof. Sergey Karaganov, head of the Russian Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, who are calling for the use of tactical nuclear weapons. Karaganov’s colleague, Prof. Dmitri Trenin, at the same time is warning that Western elites have lost the fear of nuclear weapons, and with that the sense of the consequences of their policies. Zepp-LaRouche then laid out the root cause of the conflict—a geopolitical showdown between two systems: one system—the unipolar system—which clearly has gone under, and the rise of a new system represented by the nations of the Global South asserting in a very legitimate way their right for economic development.
This was demonstrated recently at the June 22–23 Summit for a New Global Financing Pact hosted by President Emmanuel Macron in France, where President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa asserted that if the West is serious about helping the nations of Africa, it should finance the Inga Dam project in the Democratic Republic of Congo, which would bring electricity to 12– 15 countries. Africa currently has 600 million people without electricity. She ended her opening remarks by emphasizing the urgent necessity of a New Security and Development Architecture which allows the development of all countries on the planet as the only means to address the current disarray.
Much of the ensuing discussion centered on IPC plans for a peace rally at the United Nations scheduled for August 6, the 78th anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. A flier will be produced for the event as well as a unique website listing all of the participating groups. Plans are also in the works for sister events everywhere possible both leading up to and on the day of the event. A suggestion was made that the IPC should strive to get at least one person from every country in the world to make a video in support of the peace rally, which could be posted on the website. Several participants highlighted the importance of bringing more young people into the peace process through campus organizing and other means. There were also many useful suggestions of various social media platforms that could be used for expanded outreach, and suggestions of numerous peace groups that should be contacted for networking purposes. Generally participants were very enthusiastic about the opportunity to strategize with like-minded people on concrete actions necessary to bring about a lasting peace.
Dr. Rev. Terri Strong proposed that the IPC draft a policy paper—to be presented to world leaders — detailing the detrimental effects of massive spending on military ventures, thereby draining money and other resources away from social programs which would benefit their own populations. The example of Germany was mentioned, where, because of budget cuts, the healthcare system is in a state of collapse. Were a fraction of the money being spent on military expenditures used instead for healthcare this problem could be resolved. It was decided that a social policy paper be drafted specific to the needs of each country in the form of a petition to be presented to the leaders of these various nations.
Mrs. Zepp-LaRouche ended the discussion answering a question posed to her about gun violence in the United States. She made the point that violence in the small and violence in the large are interconnected. The U.S. currently experiences a mass shooting every fourteen hours, which is insane. But where does this come from? She then went through the history of how the U.S. military used various methods to break down the natural resistance humans have to using weapons to kill other humans, ultimately resulting in point-and-shoot video games which were subsequently marketed to the general public — including children who are now being turned into mass killing machines.
Her solution—totally coherent with the goals of the IPC—is to launch a campaign among schools, churches, teachers, parents, etc. to start a mass movement centered on the idea that the basis of humanity is love. JFK’s 1963 “peace speech” should be used as a pedagogical device along with aesthetical education to help people discover the true nature of what it means to be human. This is necessary to move civilization to a New Paradigm of international relations, without which we will not succeed in keeping humanity alive.
Helga Zepp-LaRouche (Germany), founder and leader, Schiller Institute
“I think we have reached the point in the history of mankind where we absolutely have to make the jump beyond geopolitics because geopolitics was the cause of two world wars in the 20th century and if we do not get over the idea that there are legitimate interests of a nation or a block of nations against another block of nations then the seeds of World War III will remain there no matter what happens now in the short term. So I think the idea of the One Humanity—I have been suggesting to look at it from the standpoint of Nicolas of Cusa’s Coincidence of Opposites … which is a method of thinking that you can at any moment—no matter what problem you are dealing with—always can conceptualize the One which has a higher power than the Many. And in respect to mankind the One Humanity for sure has a higher power than the many nations or groups of nations. And I think we have to teach people to think in terms of the One Humanity; the interest of human civilization and the joint future of mankind.”
Dennis Speed (US), Schiller Institute, New Jersey
“The dropping of the atomic bomb was a great crime. And the dropping of any atomic bomb at any time is a great crime. There has to be a way—and there was a way at the time in 1945—for humanity to come up with a different solution…. We need to bear witness to that and we need to think about doing that where people all over the world … can participate….”
Colonel Richard Black (US, ret), former head of the Pentagon Criminal Law Division, former Virginia State Senator
“I think it’s important—and also to realize—that what is happening on the battlefield is very important to what’s happening with the peace movement. Because despite the media hype and rhetoric the fact is that the Ukrainian counter-offensive launched several weeks ago has run into a Russian wall-of-steel. It is an absolute Slaughter and a disaster…. [A]t some point this cannot continue; it just won’t. And when that becomes more obvious, whatever your movement is doing with the rallies and so forth I think will gain enormous strength as it becomes more obvious what a disaster this is on the battlefield.”
Jimmy Gerum (Germany), Lighthouse Media
“I want to stress again about the importance of the media. You know the hypocrisy of the worldwide media has increased to a really high level and [with] our initiative in Germany we are looking for international contact to journalists because we think we have a special situation in Germany—also in Middle Europe—that we have a very strong public broadcasting system; and this public broadcasting system joins the hypocrisy, and we have a duty to change this…. And I want to ask everybody who knows and has contact with independent journalists: let’s have a media strategy because peace starts with honest media.”
Ron Bettag (US), Schiller Institute, Texas
“Every activity done between now and then [Aug. 6]—and I know there’s a longer arc we can look at to the 21st of September which is UN day; a day of peace. It’s also Kennedy’s speech at the UN. So there’s a dynamic here that we definitely could all just put our sights on and continue to organize everybody to do as Dennis [Speed] said: even these smaller events will have a real effect.”
Nick Brana (US), chairman of the People’s Party, Rage Against the War Machine Organizer
“I want to just confirm that Rage Against the War Machine is totally on board. I’m totally on board; the People’s Party is totally on board with the August 6th action. And so kudos and credit to everybody who has really worked hard to put it together…. The People’s Party, you can count us in and we’re looking forward to it…. Also very happy to see this Coalition growing and excited to be taking part in it and help out however we can for August 6th and beyond.”
Karen Ball (US), Pax Christi, San Antonio
“Pax Christi arose out of the French and the Germans coming together as Catholics and saying: this is insane that we’re killing one another when we have the same belief system…. Catholic social teaching talks in terms of how we should be working towards peace. So I’m going to reach out to leaders at this particular [Catholic university] to see whether this might be something that—an event that we can plan on campus.”
Dr. Bolivar Tellez (Nicaragua), professor, Central University of Nicaragua
“NATO has given all it could give to Ukraine. All that is left for them to do is to deploy military units on top of the so-called advisors; so they have destroyed Europe and are destroying the United States. That is my comment and I’m at your disposal for any cooperation that I can offer from Nicaragua. Greetings and thank you.”
Ruben Dario Guzzetti (Argentina), Argentine Institute of Geopolitical Studies (IADEG)
“There was a international seminar sponsored by the Chinese Academy of Science in which some 25 people including myself participated. The topic wasn’t specifically the issue of peace but was also included among the many presentations…. No specific initiatives were brought forward on this specific topic [peace] and we have another meeting this afternoon. We have great hopes, for it is a meeting in which multiple organizations will participate… together to generate a joint initiative. I will present the proposal of doing something for August 6th and we will strive to build awareness of this issue.”
Bernie Holland (UK), No2NATO
“Regarding these 6th of August events: I’ve heard all the plans from your side of the Atlantic. It’s in the UK we need to get [events]. This is why I was hoping here’d be more people from No2NATO on this call. So I’m going to make a point of this at the next No2NATO meeting; that I’ve been on this call with you today and that this initiative is very important…. It’s not just in the US; … it’s a global existential issue we’re talking about. So I’m going to try my best to mobilize other organizations I’m involved with here in the UK as well to take very seriously the idea of events to correspond with [those in the U.S.].”
Dennis Small (US), Schiller Institute, Virginia
“I think if we make a special effort and a focus to quickly pull … together for example an international meeting like a couple of the others that were talked about here but within a week or so—to pull together handfuls of youth from these different countries with this focus of the One Humanity and organizing jointly for peace, I think this is the kind of thing that could be a spark plug for the broadest possible mobilization.”
Rev. Dr. Terri L. Strong (US), AME minister from Memphis, TN; Chair of the Actions and Global Concern Committee of the Church Women United
“I just finished writing a social policy for the Church Women United for the committee that I chair and it’s a social policy on war and peace.… [A]nd I had the idea to get a lot of signatures for that social policy and present it to … the presidents and leaders—those who are actively in war as well as those who support the war such as the United States being one of the main contributors to the Russia- Ukraine War, so far as all kinds of resources and finances as well as weapons. And so I was wondering if this group would do the same thing: write a social policy [paper], get a million signatures and present them to the heads of state of all of the countries that are in war?”
Juan Carrero (Spain), President, S’Olivar Foundation
“I’m thinking particularly of the young people…. As Dennis [Small] said they are the future. Our means of reaching out to them—a hundred thousand may not be such an easy task. But perhaps ten thousand may commit … to support only parties that agree with leaving NATO. We have always had better success when we commit to specific tasks…. At this time the power of the media is crushing—they [youth] are completely captured. But perhaps this direct contact with the youth would make it possible to get ten thousand young people from all of these countries who will commit to only voting for parties that support leaving NATO.”
Darrell Nichols (US), former president, Northwest Ohio NAACP, Southern Leadership Conference, UAW member
“I’m kind of plugged into several places [social media platforms] that have a very large listening audience. And it would be kind of off topic, but I do know some people that are hungry for a different type of content and there’s probably nothing more urgent right now. It [peace] just needs to be a conversation that people are aware of. So we’ve got a few resources and if I can help in any of that regard—I’m even thinking—you know we’re for Chrysler. We’ve got 7,000 people working in my plant and maybe if there’s a way that somebody could help me we could approach the UAW membership and get that spread throughout the United States.”
Mamadou Dathe Diallo, Guinean American League of Friends for Freedom
“I’m very excited. It’s my first time to be here, and some of my colleagues are here, and we are representing an organization called GALFF: Guinean and American League of Friends for Freedom. We are originally from West Africa and now here in the United States. And we are very, very excited and glad to be part of this because we have lived to see war in West Africa: Liberia; some of you guys might know Sierra Leone; Ivory Coast and places like that. We have seen what wars can do to humans—innocent people: women, disabled people. So we decided to form this organization in Indianapolis to make sure whatever we can do to stop wars—to stand against wars—whatever can bring destruction to humanity that we are against it and we will … fight to stop it.”
Abdoulaye Balde (US), Guinean and American League of Friends for Freedom
“I am a medical doctor from West Africa and I am from this organization called GALFF. Thank you very much for organizing this coalition. This organization is better than the United Nations; better than any organization I can think about. I am going to ask the Almighty—the owner of the heaven and the earth and everything between—to give you victory….”
Jason Banyer (Switzerland), Büezer und KMU Partei
“I am from Switzerland and I’m the chairman of that party of the Büezer Partei. And we organize and educate young people especially through social media. We make a lot of videos which are provocative and make people think and sometimes even change people’s minds on the question for instance—mainstream media how they portrayed this war as a war for democracy even though it’s clear that it is an imperialist war being waged by the West. We are for workers rights and especially for neutrality. Because here in Switzerland we see neutrality as the best way of being anti-imperialist because there are certain left-wing people or left-wing groups, and the greens and social Democrats and so on, which want to push for sanctions; which want to push for war; even which think that somehow it is progressive to support a war. And we push against this imperialist propaganda and we try to expose these warmongers.”
Jose Vega, (U.S.) Interventionist, Organizer Schiller Institute
“I’m here in the United States. I’m known for doing interventions—I know in the UK they call it door-stepping. It’s where you go to the politician’s event or something and then you—well you step on their door; you interrupt them while they’re speaking for bringing attention to something like the possibility of nuclear war. And I want to emphasize also the power of street action too and actually being out in the street with a table and some signs…. I have 76,000 people who follow me on Twitter now and I find that my followers are most responsive when I post something of an action. So the other day I posted a video of me being out in the street with Diane Sare with a sign that said “No Joe” and then there’s a picture of a nuclear bomb behind it. That got a couple thousand likes. You know people really seem to resonate with action rather than just online content. They really like to see people out on the street and I think this would be true for any country that is on this [IPC] call right now. You know if people were just out in the street with signs that just said something like “No to NATO” or “Prevent Nuclear War,” that would be very powerful and that’s exactly what people on social media are starving for.”
In Attendance:
Angela Mc Ardle, Libertarian Party Chairwoman, Rage Against the War Machine Organizer
Irene Mavrakakis (US), Liberty Speaks, Rage Against the War Machine organizer
Martin Schotz, (US) author, “History Will Not Absolve Us: Orwellian Control, Public Denial, and the Murder of President Kennedy”
Bernard Allen-Bey (US)
Robert Cushing, Association of US Catholic Priests (AUSCP), Pax Christi GA, former priest
Dr. Jur. Wolfgang Bittner (Germany), Jurist, Author: “We Are in War Mode”
Wolfgang Lieberknecht (Germany)
Liz Augustat (Germany), Peace Through Culture
Christine Bierre (France), Solidarité et Progrès
Dr. Balkrishna Kurvey (India) President of the Indian Institute for Peace, Disarmament and Environmental Protection
Juan Carrero (Spain), President, S’Olivar Foundation
Fredrick Weiss (US)
Juan Gomez (Chile), World Without Wars and Violence
Donald Ramotar (Guyana), former President of Guyana
Martha Rollins (US), Int’l Peace Delegations: Ibero America, Columbia, Cuba and Palestine
Ulf Sandmark (Sweden), President Schiller Institute, Sweden
Joyce Hall (U.S.), Pax Christi Texas
Klaus Fimmen (Germany), Bueso Party
Diane Sare, (U.S.) Senate Candidate, New York
Anastasia Battle (U.S.) Organizer, Interventionist and Editor-in-Chief, Leonore Magazine
**Affiliation for identification purposes
For international release June 28, 2023
If you are interested in working with the International Peace Coalition, please contact questions@schillerinstitute.org
The International Peace Coalition (IPC), initiated by Helga Zepp-LaRouche, founder and leader of the Schiller Institute, held its third meeting on Friday, June 23. More than 40 representatives from ten different peace organizations from around the world participated in the 2.5-hour discussion, addressing the increasingly urgent need to bring together diverse international peace organizations to stop the presently escalating danger of the current conflict between NATO and Russia expanding into nuclear war.
The meeting was opened by Mrs. Zepp-LaRouche, who indicated that there were significant positive developments over the past week, including the fact that several new people had joined this event since the launching of the organization on June 2 and the second meeting on June 16. But, she warned, the war danger is increasing daily, as the British and the U.S. are expanding their military and financial aid to Ukraine, ignoring the bloody failure of the so-called “counter offensive” by the Ukraine military, which has been a “suicide mission” that has left another 13,000 young Ukrainian citizens dead or dying, destroyed about one-third of the western armaments, and resulted in no significant territory regained by Ukraine.
Most importantly, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s speech on June 20 in New Hampshire, she said, is a “breath of fresh air,” to hear an establishment candidate telling the truth.” Kennedy, Mrs. Zepp-LaRouche said, quoted from the historic “peace speech” delivered by his uncle President John Kennedy on June 10, 1963, which directly addressed the devastating impact of a nuclear war. RFK, Jr. strongly denounced the U.S. and NATO war policy in Ukraine, insisting that we must “put ourselves in the shoes of our adversaries.” He praised Russia for the sacrifices it made in defeating the Nazis in World War II, attacked the military industrial complex for the current “forever wars,” and insisted that the U.S. must not act like an “empire.” The speech has “renewed hope” that the JFK legacy can be restored, Mr. Zepp-LaRouche said.
She noted that the nations of the “Global South” are now taking international responsibility, insisting that they will not allow the continuation of the colonial system, and are working with the BRICS nations to create a new world financial system independent of the “weaponized” U.S. dollar.
The old order is collapsing, she said, warning that such a time in history is, however, fraught with the greatest danger. She called for the IPC to expand internationally, noting that the nations of the South at the 1955 Bandung Conference, the first major meeting of the former colonies without the presence of their former colonial masters, had taken note of the fact that a nuclear war would be launched by the major powers of the North, but the nations of the South would be destroyed as well by such a war, and thus had to act to prevent it.
The other speakers described their activities including meetings of the No2NATO organization in the UK, other meetings in Argentina, Australia, India, Minneapolis, New York, Toledo Ohio, Spain, Scotland, and Texas. Proposals were made regarding major future events, with general agreement that August 6, the anniversary of the nuclear annihilation of Hiroshima, should be an International Day of Action, with conferences and demonstrations. Many spoke in praise of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s courageous stand against the war policies, while others noted that Donald Trump has also strongly denounced the war policy, insisting he would end the war in Ukraine immediately if he were elected. Thus, leading candidates in both parties are speaking out against the war policy, marking a potential phase shift in the population.
Other proposals were offered, while a communication platform has been established for the participants to share reports on their activities and proposals for other members of the IPC.
Following are excerpts from some of the participants in the discussion:
Helga Zepp-LaRouche (Germany) founder and leader Schiller Institute
“The solution cannot be the division of the world into blocks. I agree with Dr. Mahathir from Malaysia, who said that if the world would be separated into two complete blocks that would also escalate the danger of a World War. So we have to create a new paradigm… The new security and development architecture, which we have been organizing for over a year now, has that idea of the Peace of Westphalia — that we must find a solution which takes into account the interest of every single country on the planet…It’s very good that our coalition is growing. That we are finding more and more people who are willing to join it… Let’s really go into an all out organizing offensive and contact every single peace group on the planet to really go for a demonstration of the will of the People!”
Jurgen Wolf (Scotland), No2NATO UK, Workers Party BG
“We had a No2NATO British meeting and discussed this important date of August 6, and are planning a major demonstration…”
Bernie Holland (UK), No2NATO
“I’ll be attending the demonstration as well with another group called the International Ukraine Anti-Fascist Solidarity and we are campaigning to have an inquiry of the Odessa massacre. I’ll be doing a presentation based on a number of slides that have been sent to me by a journalist who now is in exile…I would just encourage you all to support this petition to essentially quarantine Victoria Nuland that has been put out by Code Pink.”
Oliver Boyd-Barrett (U.S.), Professor Emeritus, Bowling Green State University, Ohio
“My point is we’re talking about peace. We’re talking about searching for peace in a multi-polar context. It can’t all be white men and women… So we have a few more Asian faces. And where are the Russians?…Hiroshima. August six. Absolutely. Anything of that kind, of course, to my mind, is to be welcomed. My own preference, I think, is more towards BRICS, August 22nd and August the 24th. And my saying that, that’s surely where we want to go. We want to get away from U.S. hegemony and the most convincing international movement to date that is pushing the world in that direction is surely BRICS.”
Arthur Dawes (US), Pax Christi
“First of all, I believe in reflecting on what is being said today. I truly believe this is part of the process of peace that we are peacemakers. And in this meeting and other meetings like, I believe we are bringing about peace. And Pax Christi Texas, … will have a public forum next week reflecting on the speech of John Kennedy. And we invite members and friends.”
Atul Anega (India), Journalist
“One of the largest provinces of the South-East Asian region and you have these large tracts of land where a lot of conflict is taking place and which is threatening nearby stable territories. So we really have to when we talk about the peace process and when we talk about global peace, please remember the center, the Indo-Pacific region, some you may call it Asia-Pacific if you like, but then please remember that there are a lot of communities that are actually getting affected. A lot of old violence and all conflicts are being revived even as we speak today.”
Darrell Nichols (U.S.), Bishop, Toledo OH
“To move toward a peace, a peaceful resolution in amongst a population that steals a whole lot like Rip Van Winkle. They’re still asleep under the trees, sleeping through a revolution, and they don’t know it. So if there’s anything that I could contribute at all, my voice, I am in the process now, putting my studio back together. I have been working with, here, the last few months to try and organize and we wanted get my first episode out.”
Dr. Balkrishna Kurvey (India) President of the Indian Institute for Peace, Disarmament and Environmental Protection
“In my institute we established the no more Hiroshima/no more Nagasaki peace museum in India. And we educate the students, the next generation because they are the future political leaders. Anyone who sees the photos of the Nagasaki and Hiroshima bombing, then they would never say that we should have a nuclear war. We take these photos all over India…”
Juan Carrero (Spain)
“I remember that our agenda of no violence is of Gandhi and Martin Luther King. They have always been a superior inspiration for us. And from that reflection we got here and in prayer.”
Donald Ramotar, former President Guyana “The question of the Hiroshima anniversary is very, very important. We must not miss that opportunity because it directly relates to what is happening today. But I also want to add, apart from what others have been saying, I don’t know how much we could do, but if we can involve the labor movement, particularly in the United States, Canada and other places that celebrate their labor, liberty and on September 14th, just try to get the workers more directly involved and let them sit up and be interested in what is taking place, because this is also a working class issue.”
Alessia Ruggeri (Italy) Trade Unionist
“This danger of two blocks developing is very advanced. I read recently that there will be olympic games of friendship that many nations of the BRICS will be part of. There is incorrect thinking in canceling all Russian athletes in Italy, which is something that should not be considered… I think we should do a single action representing all the states to physically go there as a message of friendship. I think we should create press releases to send to the press agencies to inform them of this initiative, especially on August 6, during these demonstrations that we are organizing.”
David MacIlwain, Australia
“I feel an extraordinary disconnect with NATO and the Western Media in the minds of the people who can’t wake up to it. I agree we need to contact peace groups. The groups I’m in contact with in Australia don’t have a sufficient focus on the this reality and I think maybe we need to go further in contacting politicians…”
Ruben Dario Guzzetti (Argentina): international affairs analyst, Argentine Institute of Geopolitical Studies (IADEG)
“We have a meeting. So in our geo geopolitical studies and our movement for solidarity and peace, and we agreed that we are going to have a meeting in the next days, in the first days of July, with all the people who can participate in this topic of peace in the fight for peace…We have to continue fighting for peace, not only against nuclear weapons, but also for peace… I think it would be interesting for the August 6th to say never again. Hiroshima and Nagasaki.”
Ray McGovern (U.S.), former senior analyst, U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA); founding member, Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)
“As I mentioned before, I’m a current intelligence analyst. I look forward and look toward the next several weeks. The election, as I said before, is 16 months away. If we survive until then, what are we to expect? … We have been warned by Zelensky himself and the head of the military in Kiev that the Russians have mined the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, and they’re going to blow it. Now, does that smell like a false flag attack to you guys? It sure does to me. Is Nuland capable of authorizing that kind of thing? Given the debacle that was just just described or the counteroffensive, I would not rule it out.
August 6. Well, that is a long ways away in my horizon. But if we make it to August 6, that is the anniversary of Hiroshima. Let’s make it our purpose to educate people in the West and the East and everywhere that the atomic bomb was not necessary to end the war…”
Rev. Dr. Terri L. Strong (U.S.), AME minister from Memphis, TN Chair of the Actions and Global Concern Committee of the Church Women United
“One of the main things that I have seen the mainstream media do so well. Is used a strategy of suppress the truth and promote deception. So one of the suggestions I have for this in the independent media is to do just the opposite, suppress the deception and promote the truth, and a lot of times that is kind of hard to, ‘reprogram people’. But that needs to be a constant. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is one who has been very diligent in trying to do just that, suppress the lies and promote the truth. He has been consistent in all of his ways of doing that, and I would suggest that all media outlets do that.”
Jimmy Gerum (Germany), Lighthouse Media
“It’s very important that we come together and we find ways of learning from each other. It’s great every week. And I want to add today a specific call of action, because it’s always good to know what we all can do for peace. Some of you will already know that I’m working for the peace initiative Lighthouse Germany and we analyzed that the weakest spot of the international powers of war. It is the public opinion.”
Diane Sare (U.S.), U.S. independent Senate Candidate, New York
“What’s been bothering me is you have people like Jimmy Dore, who has a million plus followers on line. Scott Ritter has a huge following of people who listen to every podcast that he is involved in. But at the Rage Against the War Machine rally, we had 3500 people, which on one hand is very good. It is indeed the largest anti-war demonstrations since the Iraq war, I guess, began in 2003. But on the other hand, you would say, well, how do you translate all of these people listening to this into actions? And I do think it’s the case. You see, we have both the Trump candidacy as an anti-war candidacy and the Robert Kennedy candidacy, which is also anti-war, which I think indicates that the majority of the American people are really fed up with this and they don’t want this war. What I think in part is missing and it’s two parts is one. The knowledge in your gut of how deadly this is, how dangerous it is, and how close we are to the brink, which is why I chose the guests that I did for tonight, because my intention with this program is to scare the living daylights out of people about why they cannot go on with business as usual and why it’s not sufficient to be a spectator but to be active. I think the challenge to everyone psychologically, emotionally, to hold in yourself the kind of tension of what it means that the entire human species could be annihilated is extremely difficult. That’s why music, art, poetry, Friedrich Schiller is so important, but also the vision of the new paradigm.”
Anastasia Battle (U.S.) Organizer, Interventionist and Editor-in-Chief, Leonore Magazine, USA
“I mean, the idea was that we have all of our all of our peace groups spread across the world, and people are not very coordinated, and they feel very isolated. If we unify all of our different skills, strengths, talents, to actually take this on to stop nuclear war, then this could actually be accomplished. This group is functioning like a steering committee of different initiatives and ideas. People here are very experienced. They’re interventionists. They’re presidents of organizations or representing different groups or religious groups as well or here. So we’re coming together to bring our forces in order to accomplish this goal of stopping thermonuclear war. At the rate it’s going, it’s most likely going to happen. And we can’t, we can’t let that happen and just have to accept that that’s on our shoulders right now.”
Dennis Small (U.S.), Executive Intelligence Review Magazine
“The the point of this dialog back and forth between the Global South and what we are doing in the United States and and Europe, a dialog to reach a higher level concept which unites the common interest, which Helga was talking about from the very beginning, applies both to the peace question, the struggle for a new paradigm in the peace movement in our countries, but also on the economic issues. And I think that everything that we do building towards this August 6th event will be very important in that regard. It’s notable, just in conclusion, that the Pope, Lula, many of the voices that are playing a leading role in Organizing for Peace have a total focus on the urgency of economic development as the best way to build actual peace. I think that combined approach is exactly what’s called for. So youth, let’s get more youth in this meeting and build towards that assurance that we’ll be having a youth cadre school in next couple of weeks. We intend to use that as a kind of jumping off point or whatever you want to call it, a trampoline to build further support for what’s planned for August 6th. And then combining our efforts around the 6th with what’s going on around the BRICS activities globally.”
Maurizio Abbate (Italy), Chairman of ENAC, Ente Nazionale Attività Culturali, Italy
“We need to move in a very in a more decisive way where we should create a synergy between different groups at the planetary level just in order to bring this information to alternative channels. We know that mass media is directed by those who now have an interest in this corrupted communication.”
Fr. Harry Bury (U.S.), Archdiocese of Saint Paul in Minneapolis, MN
“So because people do evil things doesn’t mean they’re evil. It means that they don’t know any better. And so the objective is not to use violence and punish them, but rather to use love, if you will, and seek justice in helping them to see that what they’re doing is not in their own self-interest and the self-interest of the world. So this is what we’ve been focusing on this verse as a means to bring people together, to realize that the best together we can make a difference and to encourage us and not to lose faith in the possibility of having peace in the world.”
In Attendance:
Jose Vega (U.S.), Interventionist, Organizer Schiller Institute
Sam Pitroda (India/U.S.), Telecom and IT Innovator
Frank Kartheiser (U.S.), Catholic Workers
Joyce Hall (U.S.), Pax Christi
Karen Ball (U.S.), Pax Christi
Chris Fogarty (U.S./Ireland), Irish American Leader
Jack Gilroy (U.S.), Organizer, Pax Christi, NY State/Pax Christi International; Board Member, New York Veterans for Peace
Mari Correggio (Italy), No2Nato Italy
Robert Cushing (U.S.), Chairman of the Non-violence Committee / Working Group for the Association of United States Catholic Priests (AUSCP)
Martha Rollins (Costa RIca)
Ulf Sandmark (Sweden), President Schiller Institute
Wolfgang Effinberger (Germany)
Prof. Enzo Pennetta (Italy)
Fredrick Weiss (U.S.)
Kallol Bhattacherjee (India), Journalist
Christine Bierre (France), Solidarité et progrès
Amidst “escalating” peace efforts around the world, Helga Zepp-LaRouche has been interviewed by both Chinese and Russian media.
In an interview with the Chinese Global Times on June 19 (“‘De-risking’ with China is manipulative, illustrating West’s geopolitical move to contain China: Schiller Institute founder”), Helga Zepp-LaRouche emphasized that the old unipolar world order is currently collapsing, while the Chinese offer for development by collaborating on the Belt and Road Initiative would allow humanity to transcend geopolitics and replace it with a system of cooperation between sovereign nations benefiting all of humanity.
In an interview with the Russian news agency TASS, also published on June 19, under the headline “Ukraine peace initiatives indicate defeat of Western warmongers, expert says,” Zepp-LaRouche asserts that in light of the peace initiatives recently launched by China, Brazil, several African nations and Pope Francis, “It is more urgent than ever to put a new international security architecture on the agenda, which takes care of the security interest of every single country on the planet.”
Against the background of these peace initiatives and the efforts to win western countries over to the New Paradigm, the second meeting of the peace coalition initiated by Helga Zepp-LaRouche took place last week. The two-and-a-half-hour discussion generated enthusiastic support for the idea of uniting the growing sentiment of the people across the world against the war policy now dominating the Western governments.
The crucial question now is: How can the strategic situation be changed “from the top”? How can various forces come together at a higher level with the capability of establishing a new system taking into account the common goals of humanity?
The best way to do this would be to make Helga Zepp-LaRouche’s 10 Principles for a New Security and Development Architecture, as expressed in John F. Kennedy’s 1963 peace speech at American University, the number one issue discussed globally.
Join Helga Zepp-LaRouche tomorrow in her weekly dialogue for a discussion about building an International Peace Coalition.
On June 10, 1963, eight months after the October 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, and peering into the abyss of thermonuclear self-destruction, President John F. Kennedy gave a world-historical speech at American University. He said: “Total war makes no sense in an age when great powers can maintain large and relatively invulnerable nuclear forces and refuse to surrender without resort to those forces. It makes no sense in an age when the deadly poisons produced by a nuclear exchange would be carried by wind and water and soil and seed to the far corners of the globe and to generations yet unborn.”
Nearly 60 years later, the Russian Ambassador to the United States, Anatoly Antonov said, “Whereas the consequence of the Cuban Missile Crisis was the recognition of the possibility of peaceful co-existence of two great powers, now, over the past decades, Washington has set out to subvert Russia, bring it to its knees, or even better—to dismember it into several separate principalities.” Further, China and other nations’ Ukraine peace proposals have been rejected by London and Washington. Worse, China/Taiwan is to be the next theater in which world war is to be provoked.
In the last month, mad drone attacks have been launched directly into Russia, including on the Kremlin itself. These attacks are coming, either from an unhinged Zelensky regime, or from NATO special forces masquerading as “anti-Putin freedom fighters” who are being “passively supported” by the London-Washington military-intelligence establishment. Whatever their origin, they are criminally insane, and must be stopped.
No nation has the right to bring the world to the brink of annihilation; every citizen of the world has not only the right, but the obligation to act against such madness. This cannot be done through war. As Martin Luther King in his opposition to the Vietnam War put it, “The choice is no longer between violence and non-violence. The choice is between non-violence and non-existence.”
Helga Zepp-LaRouche wrote an “Urgent Appeal by Citizens and Institutions from all over the world, including the U.S., to the (next) President of the United States!” which says: “Today we are faced with a strategic situation which is much more dangerous than that at the height of the Cuban missile crisis; offensive NATO weapon systems are much closer to the border of Russia than Cuba was to the U.S., the destructive power of the weapons even greater, the warning time before their launch shorter, and the trust between the leaders of the big nuclear powers much below that between Kennedy and Khrushchev. The doomsday clock is set by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists at 90 seconds before midnight, and that may be overly optimistic.”
The Schiller Institute therefore calls upon all sane forces either already proposing pathways to immediate peace, or inclined to do so, to convene on June 10, the 60th anniversary of the JFK American University “Peace Speech,” an international assembly of the people of the world to deliberate on what Zepp-LaRouche has called “Ten Principles for a New Security and Development Architecture” and what we must each and all do, to bring that about. As JFK said at American University: “Our problems are man made—therefore, they can be solved by man. And man can be as big as he wants. No problem of human destiny is beyond human beings. Man’s reason and spirit have often solved the seemingly unsolvable—and we believe they can do it again.”
If you are interested in working with the International Peace Coalition, please contact questions@schillerinstitute.org
June 7, 2023 (EIRNS) — A zoom meeting with over 25 representatives of peace organizations from about a dozen nations was held on June 2, with the aim of bringing the diverse peace movements around the world together to counter the rapidly escalating threat of a U.S.-NATO full-scale war with Russia and potentially also China. Schiller Institute founder Helga Zepp-LaRouche opened the meeting, noting the extreme danger of the NATO escalation toward war: Defender 23 now ongoing, the largest multinational air operations exercise in NATO’s history; the drone attacks on Moscow; and the virulent proposals for dismantling the Russian Federation. She said there were significant peace rallies in the U.S. and Europe in February and in March, but since that time the war escalation has rapidly increased, and the peace movement clearly needs to increase much more. So it is urgent to launch a much more integrated form of organization to unify and expand the world’s peace movements to end the march to war, before it is too late.
The discussion included the urgent need for the diversion of military spending to development, contrasting the cost of a single F-16 (in the tens of millions of dollars each) to the massive need for development financing in most parts of the world.
The challenge of mobilizing large numbers of Americans to become a voice for peace is one priority, and joining with the Global South, which is experiencing a renaissance of the Non-Aligned Movement to finally overcome all forms of colonialism, another. The voice of the majority of the human species must be heard, since the existence of all of us is at stake.
Over 25 “world citizens” from a dozen nations — France, Guyana, Germany, Italy, Kenya, Malaysia, Mexico, Spain, Sweden, Trinidad and Tobago, the UK and the U.S .— participated in the two-and-a-half hour meeting, discussing proposals for achieving these goals.
Following are excerpts from some of the participants in the discussion:
Helga Zepp-LaRouche, Schiller Institute founder, Germany:
“The large demonstrations in February in Washington, D.C. and in Germany, Berlin having 50,000 people and many other local rallies since, do not match the masses in the streets which protested the Pershing II SS-20 Middle Range missile crisis in the 1980’s, with hundreds of thousands of people in the street, who were aware that we were close to WWIII then. … I think that we really have to make an effort; and I would wish that this discussion today leads to a new form of organization where we would use this group of people as a kernel to try to unify the Peace movement internationally, across five continents.”
Donald Ramotar, Former President of Guyana:
“We have to pull our minds together, and I hope this meeting will help to make a contribution in that way, to break out of this information blockade that most people in developing countries are facing.”
Richard Black, Former Virginia State Senator, USA:
“We are in a great deal of danger, and I think it makes a great deal of sense to bring all those groups together, especially those who don’t agree on many things, but where we intersect, where we overlap, this is where we need to act and join forces.”
Ray McGovern, Veterans for Peace, VIPS, and Pax Christi, USA:
“It doesn’t matter if Ray McGovern believes that Putin is right on this, what matters is that Putin thinks this is the case! What we need is whistle blowers, like my former friends in the CIA — What we need is a mass mobilization to say ‘Look, stop this Defender 23’, it can come to what the Chinese call a ‘no good end.'”
Jack Gilroy, Veterans for Peace and Pax Christi, USA:
“There is a huge education needed in the United States to teach the American people, through writings and videos and various pronouncements by people in the existing Peace communities, that people must understand that Americans did provoke Russia to act.”
Martin Schotz, author, History Will Not Absolve Us: Orwellian Control, Public Denial, and the Murder of President Kennedy, Massachusetts, USA:
“My work is primarily trying to get President Kennedy’s American University speech distributed as widely as possible. The reason for that is that Kennedy has outlined in great detail and sophistication, what the peace process is all about and the various aspects of it. If one looks at U.S. foreign policy of the last 30 years, from my point of view, the U.S. is 180 degrees from that speech. The exact opposite process, it’s been following, and that is a war process.”
Chandra Muzaffar, President of International Movement for a Just World, Malaysia
“Number 1, I think that it is extremely important to create a strong Peace movement in the United States of America…
“Number 2, I think it is also very important to encourage groups at the grassroots level in different parts of the world. I come from the Global South, and I think it is quite possible to do this, not through Peace groups, since there are not many in the Global South, but there are other types of civil society movements, they should be enthused to act…
And the third, we have to try to get some voices within the corridors of power to act.”
Angela McArdle, Chair, Libertarian Party and Rage Against the War Machine Organizer, USA:
“What I hope is what we do is really laser focus on the anti war movement. What can we do to advance an agenda of Peace and how can we do it that makes room for as many people as possible? I don’t believe that the bloods of monsters of the war machine, like Mitch McConnell or the McCain/Cheney types will have any interest in what we’re doing, but I would hope that people who are regular ‘low-information’ voters on the right and left will see what we are doing, be inspired by it and want to join with us.”
Nick Brana, Chair, Peoples Party and Rage Against the War Machine Organizer, USA:
“I have a format that I think would be really good for the next meeting, that I think would really help us work [on] this enormous challenge we face, and work backwards from our goal to end the war… to what are the possible solutions? There have been Peace negotiation proposals by the Vatican, by Brazil, by China. There have been mass demonstrations to stop the war in the U.S., mass demonstrations to stop the war in Germany… and then we can identify a number of different possible win conditions for us as an international Peace movement, that these are the routes by which the war can be ended. And then work backwards from those.”
Alessia Ruggeri, Trade Unionist, Italy:
“I remember very well our mobilization with the Schiller Institute to unblock Afghan funds being frozen by the Federal Reserve, funds which were needed to feed starving children. And I share Helga’s view; peace means also economic development, as the BRICS countries are demanding right now. It is very important that all peace movements come under a single cap, a single direction, thanks to this initiative of the Schiller Institute. This way we can be stronger”.
Maurizio Abbate, Chairman of ENAC, Ente Nazionale Attività Culturali, Italy:
“I’ve heard a lot of reports of large demonstrations: 300,000 people or so in important cities. But this reaches only people who know the problem, who are committed. But the great majority of people who listen to the mainstream media will not understand… So it’s important to reach the people who do not know and do cultural work… One should start from culture: Schools and universities.”
“No2NATO” Representative, UK:
“It’s clear that the mainstream media narrative across the West is the same. People listen to their television. They are hearing the same narrative day in and day out. We need to try to change that narrative… George Galloway and Chris Williamson send their apologies for not being able to attend the meeting, saying, ‘We do hope to attend any future events that you do.’ ”
Bernie Holland, SGI-UK National Culture Centre, UK:
“I am very touched by your sincerity regarding these problems. Now this word sincerity is important here in the context of statecraft and diplomacy. I’m putting emphasis on this because for many years, we have seen the great lengths that President Putin and Secretary Lavrov have gone to build an ‘entente cordiale’ with Western partners, only to be met with dissent and deceit.”
Ulf Sandmark, President, Schiller Institute, Sweden:
“What I want to bring up is the NordStream issue. Because the Swedish prosecutor is sitting on the proof, taking the material from the bottom of the sea. They are saying that all traces on those materials are from explosives. They are not releasing the proof at all, but they are actually doing a cover up of the crime scene. We in Sweden don’t have the power to force the prosecutor to release these things. So we need international pressure.”
Johan Nordquist, publisher, Truth Guardian, Sweden
“The ignorance is monumental amongst ordinary people. And I think we have to overcome that. One way to do that, which has inspired me, is Scott Ritter’s effort to counter Russophobia. In Sweden, it is very difficult to speak because of the widespread Russophobia… One very simple message to reach people who are not aware, or are still in the mainstream media bubble — and that would be to ban nuclear weapons.”
Diane Sare, U.S. Senate Candidate, New York, USA:
“I was just thinking about this challenge ‘why aren’t people in the streets, why don’t we have millions of people in the streets?’ I think there are two reasons. One is that Americans had believed that you change things through the electoral process. But many Americans, from both sides, have lost faith in their electoral system, with good reason. So they are at a loss. The other is a despair… If things get really bad, and worse, or that people realize they are worse, will this cause them to go out in the streets? I don’t think so. I don’t think it’s going to work that way.”
Jacques Cheminade, former Presidential Candidate France:
“What we have here (France) at this point is the highest form of social demonstrations, I think probably in the developed sector. These demonstrations are against the pensions reform, the counter reform of the French government. So as such, if it’s limited against pensions, it becomes a single issue and it doesn’t work. And what we have to do, is to transform this social ferment into a mobilization for Peace.”
Steve Starr, Professor at the University of Missouri, former Director of the UM Clinical Laboratory Science program, USA
“The hallmark of the Biden regime is irrationality. I think we have to find a way to get these people out of power. We can’t wait for elections and whether the elections would be rigged or not would be another question. There is a man named Francis Boyle, who wrote up articles of presidential impeachment; and I think it would be worthwhile to get someone to bring those up to the House of Representatives. Because the neo-cons running foreign policy, are entirely corrupt and delusional. I think some of them think they can get Russia to back down and I think some think they can win a nuclear war.”
In attendance were also:
Former Mexican Congresswoman María de los Ángeles Huerta
Chris Fogarty, Irish-American leader
Marinella Correggia, Eco-peace activist, journalist, Italy
Christer Lundgren, Sweden
Kirk Meighoo, former Senator in Trinidad and Tobago
Juan Carrero, Fundación S’Olivar, Spain
Jose Vega, Activist, Interventionist and Schiller Institute organizer, USA
Anastasia Battle, Activist, Interventionist and Editor-in-Chief, Leonore Magazine, USA
TRANSCRIPT
HARLEY SCHLANGER: This is someone who is circulating the statement for signatures. She asks: “Can you say what you hope to accomplish with the statement the Schiller Institute issued, ‘Urgent Appeal by Citizens and Institutions from All Over the World to the (Next) President of the United States!’ What is the intent of circulating that?”
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Well, on the 10th of June is 60th anniversary of the famous speech by John F. Kennedy at the American University, which is generally called the “Peace Speech.” And if you haven’t don’t that yet, you should read that speech, or even listen to him on YouTube, because it is a beautiful speech, where Kennedy says that the world needs peace, coming from America, but not a Pax Americana, where the United States would enforce with weapons to subject all others and that way have a “peace of grave.” But to have a peace where each country can flourish and work together.
And it’s a very beautiful, poetical speech. And it is so important that people listen to that speech—there are also other, incredible speeches by Kennedy, for example, one where he talks about the importance of art and culture, which I can only underwrite every word he is saying there, that it is the culture of a country which is what makes it human and what makes it beautiful.
First of all, many young people have no real idea who Kennedy was, because they were born long, long after he had been assassinated, and therefore they don’t have a vivid idea any more that he represented a completely different paradigm of American politics. And this is very important, because what I want to accomplish with that statement is, as I mentioned before: We are in an unbelievable historic transformation right now, of which people in the West are hardly aware. The Global South is shifting—first of all, they have a completely new self-assurance; they have the economic ties, especially with China, but also among each other, Brazil, India, Indonesia—these are all major countries that are now rising. And the danger would be that the West remains arrogant, and basically says, “who are these people from the South? They should be submitting to the unipolar world,” because they will not.
And it would be very dangerous if you would have a complete separation into two blocs, a Western bloc, and a bloc of Russia, China, and the Global South, because you can’t solve the problems of the world by this separation. And if the dynamic would continue, that it would all turn anti-America, which is clearly a tendency, because the United States—there was just a report by Brown University; and they made a study and they said the interventionist wars in which the United States was involved after 9/11, resulted in 4.5 million deaths! Now, that is an unbelievable figure! And naturally, there are many people in the Global South also, who are not exactly friendly to the United States, and that’s probably the understatement of the year. And it would be very devastating if that would remain like that. Because I think if that is the tendency, World War III is unfortunately very likely down the road, or sooner or later.
So, since Kennedy represents a completely different paradigm of American politics, more like it was meant to be with the Founding Fathers, the American Revolution, the War of Independence against the British Empire, John Quincy Adams’ conception of foreign policy; Lincoln, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and then Kennedy, who, after all, defused the Cuban Missile Crisis, together with Khrushchev, and who had a very optimistic idea about the ability of man to solve any problems through science and technology.
So, it’s a different paradigm. And by making this appeal, by saying, that what the whole world wishes, is that the United States would go back to that kind of a paradigm, which Kennedy represented. I think that first of all, it will help to educate people around the world to look at the United States in a more differentiated way, and hopefully, inside the United States also causes Americans to review their own history. Because, as my late husband, Lyndon LaRouche, emphatically always said, that things went wrong with America after the assassination of Kennedy, and especially the cover-up through the Warrant Commission. Because, if you assassinate the President of a country, which, obviously, the “lone assassin” theory does not hold for one minute, and then you have a cover-up and the institutions of that country are not able to remedy that, or find out the truth and find justice, this is an extremely—this was a break in the history of the United States. And the last 50, now 60 years, that is something one has to work through and find back to the kinds of values that existed with Franklin Roosevelt, with Kennedy, and I think that that’s the purpose.
And I always think one should relate to the best tradition of the other, and not the worst. When I founded the Schiller Institute in 1984, the main purpose was to contribute to a just, new world economic order, and the idea that this is only possible if one has a renaissance of Classical culture and a dialogue of the best traditions of all cultures, with the idea that peace is really possible when you relate to the best of the other person, or the other country, or the other tradition, and vice versa. Because, when you bring forth what is good in the other, then that is the basis for peace.
So I hope with that, and the memory comes back, that America should become, again, a force for good in the world, and then the whole world would be peaceful, and happy.
On June 10, 1963, eight months after the October 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, and peering into the abyss of thermonuclear self-destruction, President John F. Kennedy gave a world-historical speech at American University. He said: “Total war makes no sense in an age when great powers can maintain large and relatively invulnerable nuclear forces and refuse to surrender without resort to those forces. It makes no sense in an age when the deadly poisons produced by a nuclear exchange would be carried by wind and water and soil and seed to the far corners of the globe and to generations yet unborn.”
Nearly 60 years later, the Russian Ambassador to the United States, Anatoly Antonov said, “Whereas the consequence of the Cuban Missile Crisis was the recognition of the possibility of peaceful co-existence of two great powers, now, over the past decades, Washington has set out to subvert Russia, bring it to its knees, or even better—to dismember it into several separate principalities.” Further, China and other nations’ Ukraine peace proposals have been rejected by London and Washington. Worse, China/Taiwan is to be the next theater in which world war is to be provoked.
In the last month, mad drone attacks have been launched directly into Russia, including on the Kremlin itself. These attacks are coming, either from an unhinged Zelensky regime, or from NATO special forces masquerading as “anti-Putin freedom fighters” who are being “passively supported” by the London-Washington military-intelligence establishment. Whatever their origin, they are criminally insane, and must be stopped.
No nation has the right to bring the world to the brink of annihilation; every citizen of the world has not only the right, but the obligation to act against such madness. This cannot be done through war. As Martin Luther King in his opposition to the Vietnam War put it, “The choice is no longer between violence and non-violence. The choice is between non-violence and non-existence.”
Helga Zepp-LaRouche wrote an “Urgent Appeal by Citizens and Institutions from all over the world, including the U.S., to the (next) President of the United States!” which says: “Today we are faced with a strategic situation which is much more dangerous than that at the height of the Cuban missile crisis; offensive NATO weapon systems are much closer to the border of Russia than Cuba was to the U.S., the destructive power of the weapons even greater, the warning time before their launch shorter, and the trust between the leaders of the big nuclear powers much below that between Kennedy and Khrushchev. The doomsday clock is set by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists at 90 seconds before midnight, and that may be overly optimistic.”
The Schiller Institute therefore calls upon all sane forces either already proposing pathways to immediate peace, or inclined to do so, to convene on June 10, the 60th anniversary of the JFK American University “Peace Speech,” an international assembly of the people of the world to deliberate on what Zepp-LaRouche has called “Ten Principles for a New Security and Development Architecture” and what we must each and all do, to bring that about. As JFK said at American University: “Our problems are man made—therefore, they can be solved by man. And man can be as big as he wants. No problem of human destiny is beyond human beings. Man’s reason and spirit have often solved the seemingly unsolvable—and we believe they can do it again.”