Join Helga Zepp-LaRouche in her live dialogue and discuss the issues and solutions that move the world and its people. Send your questions & comments to questions@schillerinstitute.org or post them in the next live stream.
The follow-on continues to the Jan. 3 U.S. attack on Venezuela and abduction of its President Nicolas Maduro and his wife from Caracas. The two were arraigned today on 12 counts before a Federal judge in New York City, each declaring their innocence; the next court action is March 17. Maduro’s Vice President Delcy Rodriguez was sworn in today as Acting President, and has made mild statements about “cooperation” in the context of terror in her nation and the Caribbean. The death count from the U.S.’s Jan. 3 airstrikes and action in Venezuela is reported as 80, with 32 of them being deceased Cuban nationals.
Drilling and conveyance of oil in the nation is now near standstill, because the tank farms, and tankers at anchor, have reached their limit to be able to store any more, given the U.S. blockade of shipping. Later this week, the White House intends to host U.S. oil executives in Miami, Florida, to take over in the name of “rebuilding” in Venezuela.
President Donald Trump indicated last night that Colombia and Mexico are in line for U.S. intervention if Washington so decides, along with the takedown of Cuba. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the same. This evening Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy Stephen Miller likewise declared on CNN that, “The United States should have Greenland.”
Trump said that Colombia “is run by a sick man who likes making cocaine and selling it to the United States. And he’s not going to be doing it very long, let me tell you.” He said of Mexico, that “in every single call I have offered troops” to President Claudia Sheinbaum.
This whole situation shows, as described on Jan. 5 by Helga Zepp-LaRouche, Schiller Institute leader, that the world is in a new, “different phase” of breakdown. She also referred to the continued horror imposed on Gaza, the suppression of free speech in Europe, the operations against Iran, and more, as well as the U.S. being on a rampage in the Western Hemisphere.
On the particular looming danger of the United States placing nuclear-capable, long-range missiles in Germany this year, the International Peace Coalition, initiated by Zepp-LaRouche, released a statement on Jan. 5 for wide circulation and endorsement. Headlined, “International Peace Coalition Statement: Appeal to the American People, To President Trump, and To Congress!” the full text is below.
As of the time of preparation of this bulletin, a classified briefing on U.S. actions in Venezuela is being given, for the first time, by the Trump Administration to the Eight-Plus Congressional leaders of their two chambers, in particular, Armed Services and Intelligence. Many lawmakers are highly critical of Trump’s intervention, but unfortunately, only because Congress wasn’t briefed in advance, nor had it given authorization to the U.S. military buildup, and not because the lawmakers oppose the takeover of Venezuela and other nations.
In dramatic distinction, Diane Sare, twice former U.S. Senate candidate from New York, is providing briefings this week, in the course of organizing for her Jan. 10 kick-off campaign event in New York City for running for President of the United States as a LaRouche Independent.
On the Garland Nixon podcast today, Sare said that the U.S. attack on Venezuela “is an affront to the judgment of the world,” and explained why, and what are the responsibilities of the world to roll back the danger. She said, “I can’t believe you have Congressmen, such as my former Congressman Mike Lawler, saying, ‘This was absolutely required, and of course the President should not have told the Congress.’ That is so far from our Constitution, I find that absolutely astounding.”
The United States plans to station intermediate-range missiles (such as the SM-6, the Tomahawk, and hypersonic weapons such as Dark Eagle) in Germany as of 2026. These systems are to be deployed by the 56th U.S. Artillery Command, which was reactivated in November 2021 in Wiesbaden. The SM-6 has a range of 370 to 500 km; the Tomahawk cruise missile is capable of penetrating enemy territory at low altitude, and taking out command centers, bunkers and radar installations; while Dark Eagle is a hypersonic weapon with a range of up to 2,700 km, that flies at up to 17 times the speed of sound and is maneuverable as it approaches target. These systems are nuclear-capable and can be launched from Germany against strategic targets deep inside Russian territory, to hit Russian command centers, among other targets.
The decision to install these systems in Germany is a “cuckoo’s egg,” foisted upon then-Chancellor Olaf Scholz on July 10, 2024, at the NATO summit in Washington by President Joe Biden, and then put in President Donald Trump’s nest. Now, it threatens, at the very least, to sabotage the diplomatic solution to the war in Ukraine and it could, in the worst case, lead to war in Europe.
Russia’s President Vladimir Putin warned at the time, in July 2024, that Russia would take “mirror-image” steps and deploy its own intermediate-range weapons. This could create a situation even more dangerous than what existed in the early 1980s during the medium-range missile crisis, when both Pershing II and SS-20 missiles were permanently put on “launch on warning,” and the warning time from launch to target was reduced to only 4-10 minutes. At that time, hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets in Germany, because they recognized the threat that, with such extremely short warning times, a Third World War, this time a nuclear war, could wipe out the entire human race “by accident.”
Today, the situation is even more dangerous because the communication channels that were in place even during the Cuban Missile Crisis have been reduced to a handful of people. The deployment of these systems will make Germany a prime target for a first strike in any escalation. In that case, Germany will be wiped off the map.
The stationing of such U.S. weapons systems would represent a danger all the greater, as the so-called “Coalition of the Willing” (United Kingdom, France, and Germany), as well as the EU Commission, are on a sweeping militarization drive, ostensibly because Russia is preparing an attack on NATO member states. This assertion is in total contradiction with the statement of U.S. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, who said that U.S. intelligence assesses that Russia seeks to avoid a larger war with NATO, which would trigger implementation of NATO’s collective defense clause, under Article 5. She further wrote on X that U.S. intelligence also assesses that Russia’s battlefield performance shows that it “does not currently have the capability to conquer and occupy all of Ukraine, let alone Europe.”
Therefore, the stationing the U.S. weapons systems would have the effect of destroying the chances for a successful outcome of the negotiations between the Trump administration and the Russian government on normalization of relations.
Given the current rapid escalation of the disintegration of the international legal order—in which the principle of “might makes right” has replaced international law, where a genocide identified by the International Court of Justice is committed before the eyes of the world, and drone attacks are occurring, while censorship threatens freedom of expression, civil rights are suspended, and a state of overall lawlessness threatens—this deployment could be the last straw of strategic destabilization.
America is celebrating this year, in 2026, the 250th anniversary of the American Declaration of Independence, which sealed its victory in the first anti-colonial war against the British Empire. The Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution represent a historic watershed that established the general welfare for the American people and the right to a government committed to that general welfare. In one of the most famous speeches ever given in America, then-Secretary of State John Quincy Adams declared on July 4, 1821:
“Wherever the standard of freedom and Independence, has been or shall be unfurled, there will her heart, her benedictions and her prayers be. But she goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own. She will recommend the general cause by the countenance of her voice, and the benignant sympathy of her example.”
America not only established, with its Revolution of 1776, the model of a sovereign republic, but also created, with Alexander Hamilton’s “American System of economics,” an economic model that serves the general welfare and has been applied in all countries that have successfully carried out an industrial revolution. Not least, the German economist Friedrich List took up in his writings the fundamental difference between the “American system” and the “British system,” which is solely based on profits for speculators and the financial oligarchy. The history of America since its founding has been marked by the British Empire’s attempts to reverse the success of the American Revolution. After the War of 1812 and the Civil War, in which Great Britain was allied with the Confederate states, proved that this was impossible by military means, British imperial circles repeatedly attempted to persuade the American establishment to adopt the model of the British Empire and establish a unipolar world order based on the special Anglo-American relationship.
The proud occasion of the 250th anniversary of the Republic of the United States should be taken as the occasion to revive the ideals in the tradition of the American Revolution, and in the tradition of John Quincy Adams, to support a partnership of sovereign republics around the world.
We, the undersigned, as German citizens and citizens of other nations, appeal to the sovereign power of the United States of America, the American people, as well as to President Trump and the U.S. Congress, to reverse the Biden administration’s highly dangerous decision, and to not install any new weapons systems on German soil!
Let us revive the German-American friendship in the tradition of Baron von Steuben, Friedrich List, and John F. Kennedy, which applies to all nations on this planet:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
Report on the 135th meeting of the International Peace Coalition
The 135th consecutive meeting of the International Peace Coalition on Friday, Jan. 2, 2026, began with remarks by its initiator, Helga Zepp-LaRouche, who forecast that “2026 will be a year of even more dramatic changes.” The “all-dominating new development,” she said, was the Ukrainian attack with 91 drones on the residence of Russian President Putin. If Putin had been killed, the situation could have spiraled toward World War III. The Ukrainian government denied responsibility, and the CIA supported their claim, but then on Jan. 1, Russia presented evidence in the form of well-preserved navigation systems from drones which had been shot down in the course of the attack. These systems revealed the Ukrainian origins of the attack.
The killing in Gaza and the West Bank continues, she reported, as Netanyahu is feted at Mar-a-Lago. The attack on Venezuela could lead to a continent-wide destabilization. The China-Taiwan situation is worsening. Japan and Germany, two of the Axis powers, are re-arming. All of these developments underline the urgent need for a new Security and Development Architecture.
Flirting with Nuclear War
Wolfgang Effenberger is a German journalist and author of Pax Americana (2004) and The Underestimated Power (2022). He warned that the U.S. has upgraded its military command structure in Germany, which heightens the threat to peace. Despite initial assurances from the U.S. that no missile systems will be stationed there, the German government has announced that such systems are, in fact, on the agenda, including the hypersonic missiles known as “Dark Eagle,” if the U.S. manages to develop them in a deployable form. This poses a threat to Russia, not one of deterrence, but of a potential first strike. He described the short flight time of nuclear missiles from Germany to Russia as “a knife to the throat.” If the INF treaty were still in place, these missiles would have been prohibited, but U.S. President Donald Trump walked away from the treaty. At the end of February we will see the end of the last strategic arms limitation treaty, the START. He cited Theodore Postol’s warnings against backing Russia into a corner with nuclear weapons.
Beto Almeida, a Brazilian co-founder of TeleSUR, and a member of the advisory board for the Brazilian Press Association, reviewed the world’s hot spots, with an initial emphasis on the China-Taiwan tensions and the U.S. assault on Venezuela. He then went on to review the history of how NATO promised Russia that it would not expand Eastward, and then promptly broke that promise. He recalled that State Department functionary and neocon icon Victoria Nuland publicly admitted U.S. involvement with the Maidan coup in Ukraine, and German Chancellor Angela Merkel publicly admitted the West’s fraudulent involvement in the Minsk Accords. He decried the cynicism of Ukraine’s denial of involvement in the drone attack on Putin’s residence, calling it terrorism. The narrative in the West is framed in such a way as to make it appear that the threat is coming from Russia, he said, when the reality is that Russia is under attack. Almeida echoed Trump’s reported remarks in a phone call with Putin, “Thank God we didn’t give them Tomahawks.”
Zepp-LaRouche thanked them for their remarks, underscoring the danger of the current brinksmanship, such as the threats by NATO commanders, including General Christopher Donahue, of an attack on Kaliningrad.
IPC co-moderator Dennis Small observed that the attack on Putin’s residence meets the criterion for a nuclear response under Russian strategic doctrine. The attack could not have occurred without U.S. technical support, and Russian commentators are also increasingly pointing to the British role. The Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) doctrine of deterrence depended upon a “modicum of sanity,” which is no longer present. NATO leaders have stated explicitly that they think they can win a nuclear exchange.
Almeida described it as significant that Russia, which no longer identifies as a socialist nation, has a working partnership with China that is closer than at any time in the past. The Western nations could also change their paradigm to work with new institutions like the BRICS, rather than clinging to “the unipolar position of destroying everything.”
Proposed Initiatives
Zepp-LaRouche proposed that we should use this session of the IPC to launch several initiatives. She suggested that IPC participants should send a letter to Trump, asking him to “discontinue the policies of the Biden administration” and halt the deployment of strategic weapons in Europe. She also proposed a combined endorsement of Xi Jinping’s Global Government Initiative and Pope Leo’s recommendation of Nicholas of Cusa’s method of the coincidence of opposites, using these two kindred conceptions to raise the level of the discussion globally. Almeida suggested that letters be sent not only to Trump, but also to other leaders from around the planet. During the discussion, this sentiment was echoed by other participants. Dennis Small suggested that anyone who does not precisely agree with the wording of the IPC letter should write their own letter.
Many Germans participated in the discussion. Zepp-LaRouche expressed her disappointment in the failure of the German peace movement to mobilize in sufficient numbers to make a difference. She attributed this failure to factional squabbling, and said that we must redefine the debate from a higher vantage point, which is why she proposes a combined endorsement of Xi’s Global Government Initiative and Pope Leo’s recommendation of Nicholas of Cusa’s method of the coincidence of opposites, to free people from the axiomatic trap of geopolitical dogma.
Economic Issues
Questions came in on economic issues, including one about the exposés of corruption in Ukraine and aid monies going to Ukrainian and U.S. officials as kickbacks, and one about the corruption in the war machine economy. Dennis Small responded by saying, “The biggest corruption in the military budget is the military budget itself.” The military industries in the U.S. are owned by the financial speculators. “You’ve got these categories of pure speculation, which is what is destroying the system.”
Contrasting today’s economy with the highly successful period following the passage of the Glass-Steagall Act, Small said that today we have the inverse of Glass-Steagall: Instead of low interest rates to incentivize production and higher rates to discourage speculation, in today’s economy, we reward speculation and suffocate production.
Almeida added that China’s production-oriented economy is a stabilizing influence globally, while U.S. has promoted a destabilizing orgy of speculation.
In her concluding remarks, Zepp-LaRouche said that she had often asked herself, why was the Age of Reason not implemented at the time of Schiller and Humboldt, when it was so widely discussed? She came to the conclusion that science and technology had not advanced to the point where poverty could be eradicated. The average person must have economic security in order to live a life of reason. Today it is eminently feasible to eliminate poverty; the time is ripe for a New Paradigm. We need “this beautiful vision” and we need to “move with power and energy to implement it.”
Join Helga Zepp-LaRouche in her live dialogue and discuss the issues and solutions that move the world and its people. Send your questions & comments to questions@schillerinstitute.org or post them in the next live stream.
The world, as Helga Zepp-LaRouche warned, is “hanging between hope and disaster,” and the outcome depends on whether action replaces inertia.
There are openings. The continued dialogue between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, described by both sides as productive, marks a meaningful path forward toward ending the conflict playing out in Ukraine.
Alongside diplomatic movement forward in this one respect, there are countervailing forces pushing the world toward wider war: U.S. arms transfers to Taiwan, China’s encirclement of the island in response, Europe’s rearmament drive, and preparations to station long-range missiles in Germany that would again place the continent on the nuclear front line. Ukraine’s drone attack on Putin’s residence—made not long after the Trump-Zelenskyy meeting on Dec. 28, was denounced by a self-described “very angry” Trump, as an action that leads away from peace.
Trump’s total support for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, including backing up Israel “100%” when it comes to the Gaza peace plan whose implementation it is stalling, is setting Trump up for being convinced to order further strikes on Iran.
Where diplomacy appears, Anglo-NATO forces invested in confrontation move to overwhelm it.
These are not separate crises. Ukraine, Taiwan, and Gaza are symptoms of a single failure—the refusal to replace geopolitics with a security order grounded in development. Without that shift, every ceasefire remains fragile, every negotiation exposed to provocation, every peace merely a reprieve.
Equally decisive is the internal front. The suppression of dissent across Europe and North America takes the form of sanctions on journalists, criminalization of protest, and expanding surveillance. Societies preparing for war silence the very voices needed to change course.
Yet an alternative is visible. Türkiye’s rapid construction of 455,000 homes after the 2023 earthquake demonstrates what is possible when state power is mobilized for life rather than destruction.
What could the hundreds of billions spent on weapons have done, if spent instead on rebuilding cities, expanding infrastructure, and removing the roots of conflict?
Acting to change history’s trajectory now means insisting on a new security and development architecture—making economic reconstruction the measure of security. The door leading to that future is still open. For now.
Dec. 26, 2025 (EIRNS)—The 134th consecutive meeting of the International Peace Coalition opened with comments by Helga Zepp-LaRouche, Schiller Institute founder and initiator of the IPC. She emphasized that we are not experiencing a multitude of discrete crises, but rather an “absolute epochal change” as the 500-year era of colonialism comes to an end.
Reviewing the situation in Europe, she said that the neocon narrative that the Russian invasion of Ukraine came out of the blue in 2022, unprovoked and with no prehistory, is no longer viable. The recently declassified conversations between Presidents Putin and George W. Bush simply underscore the fact that this war was entirely preventable. The West obviously knew that the stationing of nuclear- capable missiles along Russia’s borders was crossing a “red line.” The idea that rearmament of Europe is the solution to Europe’s economic collapse is “economic stupidity.” Free speech and free thought in Europe are under attack; the sanctioning of Jacques Baud, a respected and moderate analyst, exemplifies this. Elsewhere in the world, there are big warnings in the Israeli press of renewed aggression against Israel’s neighbors after the Dec. 29th visit of Netanyahu to the U.S., where he hopes to get the green light to attack. She concluded by saying, “We have to convince the Western governments to give up their arrogant idea” that they must dominate the world. We must move from confrontation to cooperation. 2026 will be a year of decision. Rachel Clark, interpreter, consultant, and international coordinator between Japan and the United States, is a longtime activist for Veterans for Peace. She reminded the participants that the Ukraine war began at the latest in 2014, with the attack on eastern Ukraine by the Kiev regime which killed 14,000 Ukrainians. Keeping this fact in mind, she reported that the remilitarization of Japan, carried out despite that nation’s postwar constitution, was instigated by pressure from the U.S. during the wars in Korea and Vietnam. The U.S. military is effectively an occupation force in that nation. Article 9 of the Japanese constitution, which formally renounces war as a sovereign right of the nation and prohibits the use of force to settle international disputes, has been overridden, despite protests by the Japanese populace. The power of the U.S.-Japan Joint Committee makes Japan’s elected legislature, the Diet, into a Kabuki Theater. Japan, which has a land area equivalent to California, has 350 military installations. Japan may be used as a sacrificial pawn in a proxy war, much like Ukraine. Japan has become the “poster child of Operation Mockingbird,” referring to the CIA project of planting propaganda in corporate media news reports; the media do not report on U.S. provocations toward China, but cover China’s responses as if they were unprovoked. A video was presented with highlights from the Dec. 14 youth conference of the Schiller Institute, featuring remarks from Helga Zepp-LaRouche, former South African Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Naledi Pandor, South African Ambassador to Mexico Beryl Sisulu, former Chief of Staff of the Senegalese Air Force Alain Charlemagne Pereira, and youth from a broad spectrum of African nations, Southwest Asia, and Japan. Larry Johnson, former CIA intelligence official and a member of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) asserted that there will be no agreement on Ukraine; the demands of the Ukrainians and Europeans are at odds with Russia’s conditions for peace negotiations, which are that the West recognize the territories formerly in Eastern Ukraine as part of the Russian Federation, and that there be no NATO presence in Ukraine. Demilitarization and Denazification, the original stated goals of the Special Military Operation, are still in place and non-negotiable. The Ukraine war will be settled on the battlefield, Johnson insisted, and Europe is irrelevant. Europe is no longer the world’s center of science and industrial production—there is nothing that they can offer that other countries need. The Russians are sitting on the sofa with a big bag of popcorn, watching the U.S. and Europe quarrel.
Regarding Venezuela, he pointed out that it is three times the size of Vietnam; the U.S. does not have the military capability to invade and control it. “I have no idea why we have chosen Venezuela to be the so-called hill to die on.” The U.S. is not in a position to achieve its goals through the use of military force.
Dialogue
Zepp-LaRouche thanked Rachel Clark and insisted that we must somehow ensure that the true history of World War II is communicated to young people. Larry Johnson reminded the participants that Japan and Germany, which are now re-arming, were the axis powers in World War II. Our governments try to depict Russia and China as imperialist aggressor nations, but it is the West which has blood on its hands from innumerable conflicts it has initiated. Trump is boasting about his plan for “Trump-class” naval vessels, but he apparently hasn’t heard about hypersonic missiles. The U.S. Navy could not stand up to the Houthis—how can they challenge China?
Zepp-LaRouche said that she cannot accept the prospect that Germany will go down in history as a nation which “just couldn’t make it, like the Incas or the Mayans.” Larry Johnson said he had never seen such a disconnect between the wishes of the populace in Europe and the U.S., and what their leaders are doing.
Congressional candidate Jose Vega presented the video of his Dec. 23 intervention on Ritchie Torres, which has been seen by roughly 2 million people on assorted platforms. “These people are not authorities, they are clowns and should be addressed as such,” he said. Open Discussion
Frequent IPC participant John Steinbach recalled his long-working relationship with Rachel Clark, and observed that Japan has one of the world’s largest stockpiles of plutonium and an “off the shelf” capability of building nuclear weapons in a relatively short interval of time. Clark proposed that port cities around the world collaborate to ban military vessels from their harbors if they are carrying nuclear weapons.
A question came in from an online viewer: “How do you end poverty under capitalism?” Zepp-LaRouche said that there is no poverty eradication program in either Europe or the U.S., as opposed to China, where it has been successful: In fact, China is responsible for 60% of poverty eradication worldwide. Later, co-moderator Dennis Small stressed that it is important to define what we mean by “capitalism.” Do we mean financier speculation, or do we mean the American System approach typified by Alexander Hamilton, which is very similar to what China is doing today?
Rachel Clark said that we should stigmatize those corporations that profit from war, and pressure companies like Raytheon or Lockheed Martin to retool for civilian production. Part of the enormous U.S. military budget should be diverted to enable high school students to visit the world outside the U.S., an invaluable educational experience.
Clark said this meeting gave her optimism and we must inspire younger generations to lead the fight for peace. Zepp-LaRouche recounted how she was shocked during her first visit to the U.S. at the way Germans were depicted in shows like “Hogan’s Heroes.” She proposed that we encourage a major project for young people to visit actual historical archives, rather than relying on the narrative factory in the popular media. We must persuade the citizens of our nations that they are responsible for changing the policies of their nations: “It is possible to defeat even the strongest arm of the tyrant, if they unite for a good plan.”
Dec. 19, 2025 (EIRNS)—The 133rd consecutive weekly Friday meeting of the International Peace Coalition took place on Dec. 19. Helga Zepp-LaRouche started the event detailing the tumultuous nature of the period. She noted that the European Union has failed in its plans for financing the Ukraine war against Russia. The best that the EU could accomplish is to borrow €90 billion at taxpayer expense, in order to lend this to Ukraine, for Ukraine to turn around and pay back the €45 billion that it already owes to the EU. This is one giant Ponzi scheme which will not advance the war effort since Ukraine has no more soldiers left to fight. This is destroying any remaining unity of the EU with countries such as Austria, the Czech Republic, Hungary and others resisting this insanity.
Threats to steal the Russian frozen assets puts the entire financial system at risk of collapse. The 16-hour EU meeting was a scene of great desperation where representatives were not allowed to leave until a plan was agreed upon. As confirmed by media reports, the Ukraine war could have been prevented in 2020 if Ukraine would have simply agreed to no membership in NATO. Zepp-LaRouche spoke of the danger of war in Venezuela, saying that it would be a disaster. This insanity is splitting the MAGA base since Trump had campaigned against more foreign wars. She spoke of the EU sanctions against Swiss author Jacques Baud for the “crime” of refusing to repeat the official narrative. This violation of free speech is contrary to the Charter of the UN, EU, and the First Amendment in the U.S. Constitution. Zepp-LaRouche warned that the EU may try to impose sanctions against Pope Leo for having spoken against war. She warned of the dangerous comments by Italian Admiral Giuseppe Cavo Dragone, the chairman of the NATO Military Committee, who argued for a “pre-emptive strike” by NATO against Russia, or other NATO messaging that the nature of man is war. Zepp-LaRouche rejected these claims completely and called on everyone to build support for her call to dissolve NATO. She called upon the world’s youth to join together to end war and build a new paradigm of development. She said that the establishment has no right to take away the future of mankind.
Jack Gilroy spoke next about his theology of resistance. Gilroy has been active with Veterans for Peace and Pax Christi for years. He gave a quick history of geopolitics starting with his experience in 1955 as part of NATO troops on the border of Czechoslovakia, where he and his fellow soldiers knew that they were “sacrificial lambs” if any fighting erupted. In October 1962 war was prevented during the Cuban Missile Crisis due to the negotiating between Kennedy and Khrushchev, with help from Pope John XXIII. In June 1963, and again in June 1963 President Kennedy spoke of disarmament at American University and in September at the UN. JFK also said that he wanted to shatter the CIA into a thousand pieces. When the Berlin Wall came down in 1989, many spoke of the potential for industrial conversion for peaceful purposes, but the “merchants of death” needed to keep Russia as an enemy. In 2014 the CIA overthrew the elected government in Ukraine to help create the war against Russia. Stocks soared for the merchants of death when Russia invaded Ukraine. NATO put the entire world in a new Cuban Missile Crisis in 2024 by delivering long-range missiles in Ukraine. It is time that we move away from the lie that militarism gives us security. The only true security comes from development and justice. Gilroy said that the future will see the true heroes of this period are JFK, Pope John XXIII, and Lyndon LaRouche. In the question period Gilroy also spoke of the Raising Together Theater which addresses issues of peace and justice.
Dennis Small spoke of the fight inside the White House over going to war with Venezuela. The war faction is led by the evil Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff for policy and homeland security, and the very ambitious Secretary of State Marco Rubio. These two are pushing Trump into a trap. Small then compared the imperial wars and colonial looting represented in the recently issued National Security Strategy document, compared to the economic development and cooperation in China’s recent statement on Latin America and the Caribbean. The NSS document states that the U.S. must dominate the world and its security depends upon not allowing any nation or group of nations to become strong enough to represent a threat. However, China speaks of “universal security,” common goals, and cooperation. In particular China uses the term, “trilateral development” in which China invites the U.S. to join in in developing Latin America. The NSS document rejects this offer and insists that the U.S. has sole access to the region’s resources and all other countries be pushed out of the area. Small listed the major projects in South and Central America that China has completed or were sabotaged by the U.S.
Professor Eduardo Siqueira of UMass-Boston said that there is too much focus on war instead of peace. He said that the recent NSS document put on paper what many leaders in Ibero America already knew, that the U.S. intends to use “gunboat diplomacy.” The U.S. will force countries to act against their own interests. This has been the U.S. policy in Venezuela since Hugo Chávez took power. In order to remove Chávez and his followers from power, the U.S. attempted a coup, it bribed Venezuelan military leaders to overthrow the government, it used mercenaries in Colombia, and it created artificial candidates such as Juan Guaidó and María Machado. While the U.S. threatens to attack Nicolás Maduro for alleged drug ties, the U.S. pardoned former Honduran President Juan Hernández. Siqueira said that the U.S. is using the CIA and the National Endowment for Democracy to create puppet regimes, but the big target is Brazil. Stephen Miller changes the narrative every day with new lies, but the plan remains to stop the influence of China and the BRICS nations. Siqueira said that whenever an empire is in decline, it becomes desperate. Jack Gilroy said that he had visited Venezuela several times and was impressed with the Cuban doctors who would go to the poorest neighborhoods to care for the forgotten people.
There were several young speakers who attended the November Schiller youth conference in Paris and the International Youth Conference on Dec. 14. Tim from Uganda spoke calling on all the youth of the world to unite for development to stop wars. Tim said that when Africa is free, then the world will be free. Estevao from Brazil spoke of the urgency to use the principles of the 1648 Treaty of Westphalia to take into account the interests of the other in achieving peace. Estevao went through the Dec. 14 Schiller youth conference with 150 youth from 37 countries, where issues such as the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act could be used to put credit into production instead of speculation. Carla from the Bronx spoke of her organizing student groups around the great projects such as the Bering Straits project and the Oasis Plan, which could bring peace through development, by which she generated an exciting response.
The question period was more of a dialogue. Several people suggested that everyone pick a reading list for the holiday period, but Dennis Small pointed out that several suggested books failed to address the higher principle of the “one humanity.” Small said that people should master the works of Lyndon LaRouche to maximize their impact as organizers. Clearly we all need to act morally, but Small said that only if we educate ourselves can we be effective. When asked about how to change the U.S., Zepp-LaRouche said that Americans need to know their “pre-history,” going back to at least to Paolo Toscanelli. There is a more universal history and she was most concerned about any shift to a chauvinist outlook. American elites have adopted a British colonialist policy as shown by H.G. Wells’ “Open Conspiracy.” Zepp-LaRouche concluded with her call for building support for her statement to “Withdraw from NATO” and reading LaRouche’s works, namely “On the Historical Individual” and “Secrets Known Only To the Inner Elite.”
Diplomatic seminar speech #2: H.E. Prof. Dr. Manuel Hassassian, Palestinian Ambassador to Denmark, held this speech at the Schiller Institute’s successful diplomatic seminar in Copenhagen on December 11, 2025: Prospects and obstacles for peace and Palestinian independence, and support for the Schiller Institute’s Oasis Plan for peace through economic development.
H.E. Prof. Dr. Manuel Hassassian, who has just retired from his post in Denmark, presented his parting evaluation about the prospects and obstacles for peace and Palestinian independence, and his support for the Schiller Institute’s Oasis Plan for peace through development. A transcript will be available later.
Zepp-LaRouche, Schiller Institute’s founder and international president, held this speech at the successful diplomatic seminar in Copenhagen on December 11, 2025.
The diplomatic seminar was attended by 14 diplomats from 10 countries, with guest speakers H.E. Ambassador Prof. Dr. Manuel Hassassian and Helga Zepp-LaRouche, who travelled to Copenhagen from Germany. The title was “Can There Finally Be Peace Through Development Between an Independent Palestine, Israel and the Region? Build the Oasis Plan Now!”
The countries in attendance comprised six from Southwest Asia, one from Western Europe, one from Eastern Europe, one from Africa, and one from Asia. Five other countries had registered but were unable to attend. A few Schiller Institute supporters were also in attendance.
Ambassador Hassassian delivered a one-hour speech with his insightful analysis of the obstacles and prospects for peace, and a wonderful conceptual description of the Oasis Plan, which he fully supports. He answered two questions from Helga Zepp-LaRouche, the first about the new U.S. national security report implications for the conflict in Southwest Asia, and the second, in which she thanked the Ambassador for his support for the Oasis Plan, and said that the next step should be for a government to sponsor a conference to elaborate the plan, including students making AI animations to visualize it. Ambassador Hassassian also answered questions from two diplomats.
Zepp-LaRouche denounced the ongoing genocide in Palestine and described the Oasis Plan in more detail, in connection with the World Land-Bridge. She then gave a briefing based on her new document, “Withdraw from NATO! New National Security Strategy Requires New Security Architecture,” calling for a Westphalian peace process. She answered two questions from a Schiller Institute organizer, about the need for a new cultural renaissance, and about using Nicholas of Cusa’s method of conflict resolution in our time.
Speakers: H.E. Prof. Dr. Manuel Hassassian, the Palestinian Authority’s ambassador to Denmark, who is shortly retiring from his post in Denmark, will present his parting evaluation about the prospects and obstacles for peace and Palestinian independence. He is a supporter of the Schiller Institute’s Oasis Plan for peace through development. H.E. Prof. Dr. Manuel Hassassian has “a PhD in comparative politics and has over 25 years of academic experience, including as executive vice president at Bethlehem University. Prior to his current role, he served as the Palestinian Ambassador to the United Kingdom from 2005 to 2018. Professor Hassassian is a dedicated advocate for Palestinian rights and has been actively involved in international dialogues promoting peace in the Middle East.
Helga Zepp-LaRouche, founder and international president of the Schiller Institute and editor-in-chief of Executive Intelligence Review (via live video). Helga Zepp-LaRouche founded the Schiller Institute in 1984. She was married to Lyndon LaRouche (1922-2019) who, in 1975, proposed an Oasis Plan for peace through development between Israel and Palestine and the region. Since November 2022, she has been promoting the establishment of a New International Security and Development Architecture, and she initiated the International Peace Coalition in 2023.
Excerpt from the invitation:
The peace plan signed on October 9, 2025 was an inflection point in the long conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, and the Southwest Asia region as a whole. The living Israeli hostages and hundreds of Palestinian prisoners were released from captivity. A cease-fire was agreed upon, yet the killing in Gaza continues, albeit at a lower level. The demolition of structures continues. Humanitarian aid is constricted. Israeli settler violence escalates on the West Bank. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu continues to say that he will not allow an independent Palestinian state to be established. Many parts of the peace plan are undefined or disputed. The question is, how can the international community act to ensure that a genuine peace is achieved? One thing is to increase support for the independence of Palestine. But another crucial element is the need to promote the idea of “peace through development.” In 1975, Lyndon LaRouche (1922-2019), the American economist and statesman proposed an Oasis Plan – an ambitious infrastructure project to produce massive amounts of fresh water in the region, to increase economic productivity and to provide a vision of win-win cooperation between Israel and Palestine, and the region – to pave a pathway to peace. As LaRouche emphasized after the Oslo Accords were signed in 1993, the shovels have to hit the ground. That time, it did not happen. Can it happen now?
Join Helga Zepp-LaRouche in her live dialogue and discuss the issues and solutions that move the world and its people. Send your questions, comments, and reports to questions@schillerinstitute.org or post them in the next live stream.
Dec. 15, 2025 (EIRNS)—“NATO has definitely outlived its legitimacy. We must urgently replace it with a new security and development architecture which this time must take into account the security and development interests of every single country on the planet,” Helga Zepp-LaRouche told an international gathering of youth on Sunday, Dec. 14. “I think that is absolutely the only way out of this crisis.”
The tension between two simultaneous and opposite trajectories in the world serves to underscore those wise words: On the one hand, we see a world of the Global Majority that is moving to consolidate relationships of cooperation, mutual respect, and win-win agreements for development; and on the other, a completely hysterical freakout from an increasingly irrelevant, yet nuclear-armed, elite class that would do anything to prevent peace in Ukraine—or to stir up a new conflict somewhere else on the globe.
Take the recent flurry of diplomatic activity on the part of the BRICS nations. Within the past week alone, leaders from China, India, Russia, Brazil, Iran, U.A.E., Saudi Arabia, and Jordan have met in various constellations to discuss bolstering bilateral relations, economic development perspectives, and how to strengthen the role of the BRICS and SCO in shaping a stable and prosperous world system.
Contrast that with the E3 Coalition of the Killing leaders, Starmer, Merz, and Macron, who are determined to sabotage efforts to bring peace in Ukraine—no matter the cost. Those three dwarfs convened in Berlin on Dec. 15, joining U.S. and Ukrainian delegations who had just concluded two days of discussions on a possible peace deal, in order to figure out how to, in the words of Russian Senator Vladimir Dzhabarov, “make every effort to stall and torpedo the peace plan,” despite the fact that strategic defeat of Russia—the largest nuclear power on the planet—is impossible.
But even if one conflict is brought to a resolution, as we may be nearing in the case of Ukraine, the crumbling system of geopolitics has still not been abolished, and as Helga Zepp-LaRouche has repeatedly warned, as one crisis is brought toward resolution, expect that other crises will break out. In Iran, fear is mounting that the psychotic Netanyahu government in Israel will use the recent tragic mass murder of Jews in Australia as the pretext for launching new strikes in Iran.
In the Western Hemisphere, which the recent “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine declared to be the U.S. zone of influence, the situation in the Caribbean remains extremely tense: On Friday, Dec. 12 a midair collision just 40 miles from the Venezuelan coast was narrowly avoided by an astute commercial airline pilot who spotted a U.S. Air Force refueling plane flying towards Venezuela without its transponder on, in just enough time to avoid disaster. Elsewhere in Ibero-America, leaders of nations are being installed—through elections or otherwise, and much to the delight of “Narco” Rubio—which promise to weaken or renounce their relationships with China’s Belt and Road Initiative and step into line with the Western financial interests. The Dec. 14 election of Pinochet admirer and ultra-monetarist José Antonio Kast in Chile, along with promises of Bolivia’s Foreign Minister to replace Chinese mining companies in his country with American ones, are recent examples.
But, thankfully, there is no solution other than to change the entire system.
“If you have a world which is in such disarray, you cannot try to solve these problems one by one,” Zepp-LaRouche said in her address to the youth. “Even if they have their historical and factual specificity—each crisis has its own reasons and dynamic—they are all part of this overall development where you have the end of the system of 500 years of colonialism, and the emergence of a new system whereby the countries the Global Majority are trying to create a new, more just system. That conflict is the deeper reason behind all these regional expressions of conflict. Therefore, you have to try to resolve this in totality.”
Dec. 13, 2025 (EIRNS)—The International Peace Coalition (IPC) met online on Friday Dec. 12 for its 132nd consecutive weekly meeting, featuring a dramatic discussion on the turning point in history caused by the release of the National Security Strategy (NSS) by the Trump Administration, dated November 2025, which, as Dennis Small put it, has “kicked over the chessboard.” The opening speakers were Helga Zepp-LaRouche, Schiller Institute leader and initiator of the IPC; Alastair Crooke, diplomat and nearly 30 years in MI6; Graham Fuller, 20 years in the CIA and former vice-chairman of the CIA’s National Intelligence Council; former President of Guyana Donald Ramotar; and Dennis Small, Ibero-American Intelligence Director of Executive Intelligence Review. Crooke and Fuller had been collaborators through their work in the Arab world.
Alastair Crooke noted that the NSS marks a U.S. turn, away from the focus on China and the war in Ukraine, and openly attacks policies of the European leaders and NATO. He said what was needed was for the United States to acknowledge that its sanctions policies had utterly failed in their intent to drive China and Russia out of their leadership role in world affairs.
U.S. Tariffs Are a ‘Shakedown’
In regard to Trump’s use of tariffs, he said that this was claiming to be based on Alexander Hamilton’s promotion of tariffs for the new United States, but that Trump was using them as a “shakedown,” intended to coerce nations to invest in the United States or buy the U.S. debt. This will not work, he said, because of the massive growth of the debt bubble in the U.S.
On the Ukraine war, Crooke is concerned that Trump’s envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner do not represent the Congress nor any other institutions, but that one is a real estate fiend, and the other is a personal family member of Trump. This is part of the fact that Trump is looking at the relations with Russia and Ukraine in terms of money, over “who gets the money, be it BlackRock or the EU,” as demonstrated by the insane European seizure of the Russian reserves. The Europeans have become “psychotic,” he said, in their wildly false contention that they could “defeat Russia.”
On Venezuela, Crooke noted that President Nicolás Maduro had offered to allow the U.S. oil and mining companies to essentially take over the natural wealth of the country, but Trump said “No.” Why would he turn this down, Crooke asked? It must be seen in the context of China’s counteroffer during the Shanghai Expo in November, to implement a zero-tariff trade policy and invest in the Venezuela oil and mining sector itself, without the conditionalities demanded by the U.S., insisting on being an “ally” and maintaining dollar hegemony. The U.S. now wants to establish something like a blockade, keeping China (and others) out. Crooke doubts that China will simply accept this.
Graham Fuller said that he was “shocked” by the NSS as the biggest shift in world affairs since the fall of the U.S.S.R., and yet, he said, there had been no warning that this was in the works, not from the press nor from the pundits. He also was amazed that Europe appears to have lost its sense of history and is ignoring the dramatic shift in Asia. He asked for Crooke’s view.
‘Davos Values’ Took Over NATO
Crooke responded that it began with the NATO bombing of Belgrade in 1999, without any approval from the United Nations. That led to the transformation of NATO as a force for military defense into an offensive force based on political criteria, which Crooke called “liberal values, the Davos values.” That became universal, with the leaders of NATO and Western nations all coming from the same clique. This was reinforced when U.S. President Joe Biden gave his “Manichean” speech in the UN, followed by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen giving an almost verbatim speech. Thus, the mention of “good vs evil,” “light vs. darkness,” “autocracy vs. freedom” became the standard replacement for serious intelligence and diplomacy, a “lever” for a conflict with Russia—“irrational, and dangerous.” The irony is that Europe now has no democracy at all. Even the EU European Commission leadership is unelected.
Crooke reported that he had been in both Russia and China over the past weeks, and they know this about the West. The Russians, in particular, know that Europe has no money, no weapons nor manpower to fight a war with Russia, yet they promote war all the time. Crooke says he believes they can’t fight such a war, “but they can provoke a war,” and even small countries like Estonia can do so. The intention is similar to Winston Churchill’s use of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor to bring the U.S. into a war against Germany. The population in Europe is not ready for war—“they are more interested in holidays and designer shoes.” The preconditions for a solution have been taken down. They are the autocracy they complain about.
Zepp-LaRouche expressed agreement with both Crooke and Fuller. Europe suffers from the neoliberal system, which is getting worse. There are attacks on the Classics, against truth and beauty, and instead, attention is paid to minor things that are “interesting.” The West has become “more and more insane, pornographic.” She referenced Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s comment that the West has turned against the morals of their grandparents, adopting a “post-Christian ideology.” The great poets and scientists are gone. Our friends in the Global South “can’t understand why the West is destroying itself.” We must be more like Asia, which is reaching back to its best (Confucian) traditions for a new cultural era: “We must look back to the Italian Renaissance, the German high culture, to rediscover our earlier contributions to the human species.”
Danger of the U.S. in the Caribbean
Former Guyana President Donald Ramotar then spoke, posing the great danger inherent in the NSS concept of America throwing out international law and threatening to take over South America and the Caribbean. He said that the leaders in the region are terrified, afraid to speak out for fear of American economic or military attacks. “The silence is deafening,” he said. The effort is to push China out, even though it is China that is “building the infrastructure which we have been denied for so long.” It appears that the oil and mining companies are running policy in Washington. Trump’s approach to Russia is admirable, but he doubts that any future President will sustain it. He appreciates the migration problem, “but they must understand that they created this themselves.”
EIR’s Dennis Small pointed out that the virtue of the NSS is that it is “kicking over the chessboard,” putting a hold on the rush to nuclear war. But it lacks any idea of “how to put it together again.” He pointed to Crooke’s emphasis on the debt crisis. He reviewed his work on the massive debt of the U.S. and worldwide, in addition to the $2 quadrillion in derivative debt, demonstrating that the Western financial system is bankrupt. Either this is put through bankruptcy reorganization or there will be collapse and war. That is the story behind the attack on Venezuela: The real target in South America is Brazil and the BRICS.
Crooke noted that China and others are trying to find a way to work with the West to deal with this debt crisis, but they can’t find the means for discussion. If the U.S. bubble bursts, it will cause political and economic crises around the world. Russia and China, in the meantime, must consider means of defending themselves from this threat. “I saw in China that they could easily expand their successful development system to the rest of Eurasia, to everyone’s benefit, while the West simply replies that should they move to do that,”they are attacking the dollar.” Given that Trump changes his mind every day makes it difficult to work with him.
In the Q&A session, Zepp-LaRouche answered questions on Nicholas of Cusa, and another on the Tenth Principle of her Ten Principles.
She stressed in conclusion that the Peace of Westphalia followed 150 years of war and general chaos, until the belligerents recognized it must stop or there would be no one left. That is more real today, in the nuclear age. “Putin’s patience will eventually come to an end.” If the West would get together with Russia and China “all the problems of the world could be solved.” She proposed a global Glass-Steagall based on FDR’s policies.
