Schiller Institute founder Helga Zepp-LaRouche discusses her recent trip to China where she participated in the Conference on Dialogue of Asian Civilizations, May 15-16 in Beijing, keynoted by Chinese President Xi Jinping. Zepp-LaRouche and host Bill Jones discuss what’s actually at stake in the so-called US-China trade war, and how it’s possible to be resolved in a win-win manner for both nations. She warns that there is no benefit for the West to try to contain a nation like China, who has made so many contributions to human civilization. The only path forward that will be mutually beneficial for both countries, and their populations, is one of cooperation and overcoming the “Clash of Civilization” strategy of the western neo-cons.
Under the title: “U.S.-China Ties Key to WorldEconomy Growth,” UrduPoint in Pakistan on May 24 covered HelgaZepp-LaRouche’s interview with Sputnik. The interview was alsocovered in a Pakistani community newspaper, the Jago Timesbased in northwest Texas, May 25th.
“The state of relations between Washington and Beijing willdetermine the path of the global economic output in the nextdecade,” Helga Zepp-LaRouche, the leader of the GermanBürgerrechtsbewegung Solidarität, or Civil Rights MovementSolidarity party, told Sputnik. “The key to the future of theworld economy is the relation between the U.S. and China, whichalready has more than 300 million middle class consumers, anumber that will double in a decade,” Zepp-LaRouche said.
The upward trend of Chinese imports presents a chance forthe United States to reduce trade deficit between the twonations.
“China will import $40 trillion worth of imports in the nextfew years. All of this will offer excellent opportunities for theU.S. to reduce the trade deficit with China by exporting intothat growing market and will very likely be subject of a dealbetween Trump and Xi Jinping,” the politician added.
Schiller Institute founder Helga Zepp-LaRouche has just returned from a 10-day visit to China, including public presentations and private meetings, which she stated went exceptionally well.
The trip began with her participation in the Conference on Dialogue of Asian Civilizations, held May 15-16 in Beijing, where President Xi Jinping delivered the keynote. Zepp-LaRouche presented a paper and a 10-minute speech, with the title “The Highest Ideal of Mankind Is the Potential of the Future,” which has already been published as part of the Conference proceedings. We feature it immediately below.
She also had daily, high-level meetings with representatives of many top institutions that she has been in touch with since the 1990s. She reported that these occurred at a moment of very grave tensions between China and the U.S.—because of the collapse of the trade talks, the Huawei affair, and other issues—which made her presence all the more important. Many people look to the LaRouche movement for solutions to these problems, she reported.
Zepp-LaRouche also delivered a speech at the Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies of Renmin University in Beijing, and granted a number of press and TV interviews.
In addition to Beijing, Zepp-LaRouche visited Nanjing where she met with the publisher of the Chinese-language edition of the first volume of “The New Silk Road Becomes the World Land-Bridge” special report, where she learned that the publisher had just published a second printing of that report, because they consider it one of the most important books of their publishing house. They also will be publishing a translation of the new report, “The New Silk Road Becomes the World Land-Bridge, Vol. II.”
The Highest Ideal of Mankind is the Potential of the Future
By Helga Zepp-LaRouche
It is the characteristic of turning points in history that the majority of people have no concept of what is occurring. Only those visionaries who have a clear idea of the positive potential of the future are able to intervene in the process at moments of decision, to avert potential catastrophes, and instead usher in a new epoch of humanity. We find ourselves in such a phase change: the old world order, as it developed after World War II and especially after the disintegration of the Soviet Union, is in a process of dissolution, but what the new order will look like is by no means decided yet. We are in a period when even international law seems to be overridden, as at the moment neither the UN nor any other institution seems to be able to enforce it.
But it is undeniable that the pendulum that favored Western civilization over recent centuries—though for thousands of years Asia had occupied an outstanding and even leading place in universal history—has long been swinging back. This is clearly supported by the demographic development of Asia, completely new strategic interventions such as the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), and clear objectives, such as the concept “Made in China 2025” or the outlook that President Xi Jinping has set for China by 2050.
Tremendous opportunities for Asia arise from this, and perhaps along with them a completely new form of responsibility, which should ignite the inspiration to work out concepts about how to advance humanity as a whole. President Xi Jinping obviously has this very approach in mind when he speaks of the “Community of a Shared Future of Mankind.” We are now experiencing a precious moment, for never before in history has the conscious design of a new epoch, with the idea of a unified humanity as a higher idea, been so clearly defined as a task. If we want to create a more human order, it must be built on the best concepts that have been produced by various cultures. Those concepts must, so to speak, have an ontological character, because nothing in them can be accidental or of merely contemporary character, if they are to determine the Dharma—the moral codex—which the spiritual leaders, and with them Asian societies, are to follow in this new chapter of universal history.
It is also obvious that the impetus for defining this “righteous way” must come from the ancient traditions of Asia, such as Confucianism, Buddhism or Jainism, which are clearly linked to a commitment to lifelong self-cultivation and moral refinement of mankind. Though the West had the same claim in its Classical and Renaissance periods of humanism, the idea of the ethical improvement of man as a purpose in life is almost the opposite of the Western liberal model, where any priority of moral requirements or the superiority of one philosophy over another are emphatically rejected.
How then must the principles be designed, so that the new paradigm of a coming Community of Mankind is on such secure foundations that the requirements of modern natural science as well as those of a new system of international relations can be satisfied?
This question must be answered on different levels. A good starting point is The Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, or Panchsheel, as laid down for the first time in a formal way in the Trade and Transport Agreement between the Tibetan Region of China and India on April 29, 1954. The preamble states that the two governments have agreed on the following principles: 1. Mutual respect for each other’s territorial integrity and sovereignty, 2. Mutual non-aggression, 3. Mutual non-interference, 4. Equality and mutual benefit, and 5. Peaceful co-existence.
The first conference of independent Asian and African states in Bandung in 1955, led by Chinese Prime Minister Zhou Enlai and Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, expanded the Five Principles into the Ten Principles of Bandung. The same principles were underlined as a core element of international law at the 1961 Non-Aligned Conference in Belgrade. With the BRI, China has defined for the first time the concept of this relationship between nations as the basis of a global reorganization which is open to all nations. President Xi emphasized in his keynote speech at the first Belt and Road Forum in May 2017,
“We are ready to share the experience of development with other countries. We have no intention to interfere in other countries’ internal affairs, export our own social system or model of development, or impose our will on others.”
These principles of peaceful coexistence have deep roots in several Asian cultures. Some of these concepts are philosophical in nature, others are part of theological considerations. This article is about the identification of the approaches that have advanced humanity and are relevant to the future understanding among peoples. This is also the approach adopted by President Xi on his overseas visits, as he emphasized in a speech in New Delhi to the Indian elite in 2014:
“Even in ancient times, people in China came to the realization that a belligerent state, great as it may be, ultimately fails. Peace is paramount. Harmony without uniformity, and universal peace must be achieved. The Chinese concepts of ‘universal peace’ and ‘universal love’ are very similar to the Indian concepts of ‘Vasudhaiva Kutumbakum’ (the world as a family) and ‘ahimsa’ (do not inflict injury).”
Thus, in the ancient scriptures of India, the Vedic texts, the Upanishads, and the classical Sanskrit literature, there are many important concepts that have both a religious and a practical political significance. This includes, for example, the principle of ahimsa mentioned by Xi, the respect for all other creatures—not only the renunciation of any physical violence, but also of hurting the other in any way, either verbally or spiritually. Ahimsa is also a method of war prevention and conflict resolution, even for complex challenges in the real world.
The collections of the Rigveda are the oldest surviving complete literary work, and have been handed down orally for centuries with the help of sophisticated mnemonics. In the Rigveda there are fundamental thoughts on the cosmic order, which ultimately also provide the guideline for human action on earth.
In the Upanishads there are five principles that reflect the same basic orientation. The most basic concept is that of the all-embracing Brahman. “Ishawaram idam sarvam jagat kincha jagatvam jagat”—Everything that exists, wherever it exists, is permeated by the same divine power. This idea is found in a similar form in Gottfried Leibniz’s idea of the Monad, where within every Monad the entire lawfulness of the universe is contained.
The second principle is that the Brahman, the creative principle whose expression is the entire realized world, is in every individual consciousness, the Atman. Atman is the reflection of this all-embracing Brahman. It is the individual consciousness, but it is not fundamentally separate from Brahman. “Ishwara sarvabhutanam idise tishtati”—the Lord dwells in the heart of every individual. The relationship between Atman and Brahman is the core around which the whole Vedic doctrine revolves. In the philosophy of Nicholas of Cusa, this corresponds to the affinity of the macrocosm and the microcosm, which makes it possible for an intangible force—an idea created by creative reason—to bring about a further development of the physical universe.
A third Vedic principles is that because of their common spirituality all people are members of a single family. The Upanishads speak of humanity as amritashya putra, “Children of Immortality.”
The fourth concept the Upanishads present is the idea of the consubstantiality of all religions, all spiritual paths. “Ekoham svat virpra bahuda vadanti”—“The truth is one, the sage calls it by many names.” This idea corresponds to the “Sanatana Dharma,” the single religion which stands above all religions, an idea also expressed by Nicholas of Cusa in his Platonic dialogue “De Pace Fidei,” which he wrote immediately following the fall of Constantinople in 1453 and the associated bloody conflicts. In this dialogue, representatives of various religions and nations turn to God for help, because all of them are fighting wars against and killing each other in His name. God instructs them that they are all also philosophers in their respective nations and religions—beyond all religious traditions and teachings of the different prophets—and therefore can understand that above religion there is one God, and above different traditions, one truth. Incidentally, the Hindu Monk Swami Vivekenada cited the same argument in his famous speech before the World Parliament of Religions in Chicago on September 11, 1893: The followers of different religions have argued and fought each other purely because their point of view is too narrow, and they don’t grasp that the highest Being is infinite.
A fifth Vedic concept is that of the welfare of all creatures. “Bahujana shukhaya bahujana hitaya cha”—the Hindu philosophy seeks “the good of all people and all forms of life on this planet.” The affinity to the Confucian ideas of harmonious development of all is evident, as Confucius says explicitly: “They who have success should help others to succeed.” Naturally, this is the idea at the basis of the BRI and the conception of “win-win cooperation” between various nations. The Confucian philosophy also gives a name to the new era which was to begin with the prospective Japanese Emperor Naruhito: “Reiwa,” which literally means “pursuing harmony.” Japanese commentators emphasize that this term reaches back to the famous classical poetry anthology, “The Poem of Manyoshu,” though as the scholar Wang Peng points out, the term ling-he was used by the ancient Chinese emperors as the name for their reign, just as in present day China there are best wishes for peace and harmony.
The idea of a harmonious development of all as the basis for a world peace order is thus laid out in several Asian cultures, and stands in direct contradiction to the idea that relationships among nations constitute a zero-sum game. However, its realization in practice obviously requires a new stage of development in the evolution of mankind, the Age of the Spiritual Man, as Sri Aurobindo has expressed it; or the increasing dominance of the Noösphere over the Biosphere, in which Vladimir Vernadsky saw a trajectory laid out by the natural law of the universe.
The universe has an inherent lawfulness which advances it to higher stages of development. Vernadsky saw the creative reason of mankind as an essential component of that universe, as a geological power, which has been qualitatively advancing this higher development since the existence of human evolution. In the science of physical economy, Lyndon LaRouche delivered the proof of the absolute efficiency of human creativity, which distinguishes man from all known living creatures, with his concept of Potential Relative Population Density.
Yet this anti-entropic higher development is neither linear, nor the automatic result of objective processes—as in the variations found in historical or dialectical materialism, for instance—as, along with the objective effect of newly discovered physical principles in production processes, now a substantial component of this process has become the subjective intellectual and moral higher development of man.
In meeting the task of consciously shaping a new paradigm for humanity stated at the beginning of this article, it is certainly an enormous advantage for Chinese and other Asian cultures that, thanks to the philosophy of Confucius, the development of a moral character has been the most important goal of education in broad areas of Asia. Despite the considerable hype about the digitalization of the economy and the roll of artificial intelligence in future economic platforms, it will always be a question of the moral qualities of human beings which will determine whether the new technologies are deployed for the benefit of mankind, or for evil purposes. Thus, of first-rank strategic importance is the letter written several months ago by Xi Jinping to eight professors of the Chinese Academy of Fine Arts, where he emphasized the extraordinary importance of aesthetic education for the mental development of the youth of China. Aesthetic education plays a definitive role in the development of a beautiful soul, filling the students with love and promoting the creation of great works of art.
Thanks to the continual influence of Confucianism—only broken by the ten years of the Cultural Revolution—there is a continuing tradition going back thousands of years in which the development of a moral character represents the highest goal of education. It is thus taken for granted in China that attention to public morals and combating bad characteristics in the population constitute the precondition for a highly developed society. For example, the Court Report on Educational Goals of the Academic Ministry of the Qing government in 1906 required, above all course content, the teaching of public morals (gongde) and Confucian teachings on virtue, in order that “each has concern for others as he does for himself, and loves the state as one loves his own family.”
A key to understanding the special significance of aesthetic education in China today, however, lies not only in the teachings of Confucius—who assigned a crucial role in the development of a moral character to the occupation with poetry and good music—but in the scholar who has influenced China’s modern education system more than anyone else: the first Minister of Education of the Provisional Republic of China, Cai Yuanpei. Cai acquired the academic title of xiucai at the age of 15, due to his extraordinary intelligence and diligence, the highest title jingshi at age 24, becoming a bianxiu in 1894—and at the age of 26 had reached the highest level of academic career in the Qing dynasty. He had excellent knowledge of the classical script and was famous for his beautiful classical style.
During this time, Cai, along with the entire Chinese elite, was shocked that China was defeated in the war against Japan, and had generally lost out in every invasion since the Opium Wars, paying high reparations and ceding rights to the invaders. Among intellectuals, it was discussed how Japan—which for centuries was considered backward—had become so strong through the Meiji Restoration, and they sought to learn the lesson of this transformation.
The corruption of the Qing dynasty was also blamed for these disgraceful defeats. Cai was convinced that the state would only survive if there was a change in the consciousness of the people, and that this improvement could only be achieved by improving the content of education. Cai first began to investigate the Japanese and then the European educational systems. Finally, he traveled to France and Germany, where he studied civilizational and cultural history of the West in Leipzig from 1907 to 1911, before he was appointed as Minister of Education by Sun Yat-sen in 1912.
Cai undertook in-depth studies of the aesthetic writings of Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten, Immanuel Kant and Friedrich Schiller, as well as the concept of education of Wilhelm von Humboldt. Inspired by the excellent studies on the history of philosophy of Wilhelm Windelband, and by direct study of Kant, Schiller and von Humboldt, he realized very quickly that Schiller’s conception of aesthetic education was not only in complete affinity with Confucian morality—Schiller’s concept of “the beautiful soul” completely corresponded with the Confucian idea of the junzi—but Schiller spoke about these questions with greater clarity and from a higher point of view than any earlier or contemporary philosophers. “The comprehensive theory of Friedrich Schiller and the idea of aesthetic education brought great clarity to everyone,” writes Cai. “Since that time, the European idea of aesthetic education can supply us with a great deal from which we can draw for developing our own understanding of the subject.” Cai Jianguo further quotes Cai Yuanpei: “In Germany, aesthetic education impressed me greatly. I want to use all my powers to promote them.” Cai created the Chinese term meiju, which had not previously existed in that language.
Schiller wrote the “Aesthetic Letters” in response to the failure of the French Revolution, and argued that from then on, any improvement in the political realm can only come from the ennoblement of the individual. Only if man rises above the transient happiness of the world of the senses, and engages his efforts not only for himself, but the community; not only for the present, but the future; not for physical pleasure, but spiritual creativity; only then could the state prosper. In the “Letters” and in further pioneering writings on aesthetics, Schiller developed why this ennoblement of character can be achieved by immersion in great classical art.
Cai Yuanpei recognized the striking coincidence between the teachings of Confucius and the aesthetics of Schiller. The immersion in poetry, music, and painting during one’s leisure hours awakens in the beholder an aesthetic pleasure in which lies neither a desire for nor a rejection of the sensible world. Rather, the taste is formed and the emotions are ennobled. Aesthetic sensibility embraces beauty and sublimity, thus forming a bridge between the sensual world and reason. Every human being has a mind, but not everyone is capable of producing great and noble deeds. Therefore this mind must become stronger as a driving force, by ennobling it.
In 1912, Cai wrote the “Theses on New Education” and the “Textbook on Moral and Personal Development for the Secondary School,” in which he characterized human conscience as the essential guide to behavior. In an essay of May 10, 1919, he wrote: “I believe that the root of our country’s problems is in the shortsightedness of so many people who want quick success or quick money without any higher moral thinking. The only medicine is aesthetic education.”
Of course, it should not go unmentioned that Cai, as president of the University of Beijing, led this institution to internationally recognized scientific renown, taking up many suggestions from Wilhelm von Humboldt, who established the unity of research and teaching, and the beauty of character as an educational goal at the University of Berlin. Because of Cai’s prestige, the University in Beijing soon became a magnet for many young Chinese scholars returning from overseas, just as he became the inspiration for many other art colleges and academies.
In my view, Cai Yuanpei’s conception of the state as a larger family in which the interests of the state must take precedence over the interests of individual families, is also of paramount importance for understanding the policies of President Xi Jinping and his idea of the “Community for the Future of Mankind,” because for him the prosperity of the state was the prerequisite for the happiness of the citizens. However, the interests of the world as the home of all living beings was also set before the interests of the individual state. Cai wrote: “Until the ‘great community’ of the world is realized, the interests of society cannot be identical with those of the world.” He also emphasized that in fulfilling the duty to the state, one must be careful not to contradict the duty of the world. He dreamed of a “great community” of the entire world, (datong shijie), which would be peaceful and harmonious, without class distinctions and state boundaries, without armies and war. All humans would understand each other in this world community and help one another. Cai saw the “Dialogue of Cultures” as the pathway to this goal: “I have often thought that a nation must necessarily absorb the culture of other peoples. This is like the body of a human being who cannot grow without breathing the air of the outside world, without eating and drinking.” Yes, he saw in this meeting of cultures the absolute prerequisite of higher development: “If one takes a look at the development of the world history, one sees that the confrontation of different cultures always leads to the emergence of a new one.”
The realization of this vision is absolutely identifiable through the dynamism and the “Spirit of the New Silk Road.” The principles that must determine the “righteous path” for the new paradigm are not static axioms, but consist of the prospects arising from the aesthetic education of, eventually, all human beings. In a world where economics is not based on the principles of profit maximization and the greatest possible satisfaction of individual greed, but on the best possible promotion of human creativity as the motor of an anti-entropic developing universe; if, so to speak, the “cosmic order” inspires political, economic and cultural life, then the dreams of Confucius, Schiller, Cai Yuanpei, Xi Jinping and Lyndon LaRouche are the political legislators of humanity. As Tagore expressed it in his famous dialogue with Einstein: “When our universe is in harmony with people, we feel the eternal that we know as truth, as beauty.”
[Transcript included] Helga Zepp-LaRouche gave an excellent 42-minute video interviewto GBTimes’ Senior Editor Asa Butcher on May 10. GBTimes is aChinese multimedia site based in Finland, and established toenhance a dialogue between China and Europe.
Transcript
GBTimes: We’ll begin. I’m going to focus on the Belt andRoad Initiative today, following on from the Forum in Beijinglast week. If you could describe your feelings on the outcome ofthe Forum that concluded last week in Beijing.
HELGA ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Oh, I think it was very a reallyimportant progress as compared to the first Belt and Road Forum.The first Belt and Road Forum was filled with optimism and theknowledge of all the participants that we were experiencing thebirth of a new system of international relations — that wasalready extremely important. But I think the Second Belt andRoad Forum saw a consolidation of that, so you have actually anew system of international relations which is overcominggeopolitics, and I think this is one of the most importantoutcomes, apart from, naturally, the enormous economicdevelopment which was presented. But I think the idea that youhave a system which has a win-win possibility for everybody tocooperate, is the way to overcome geopolitics, and that is theremaining danger, which after all, caused two world wars in thelast century. So this is a real breakthrough for humanity.
GBTimes: There’s been a growing criticism and backlashagainst the BRI. Do you think this is misunderstanding,suspicion toward this new system? What are your thoughts onthat?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: It’s actually a temporary phenomenon,because the funny thing was, here you had the largestinfrastructure program in history, ever, with enormous changesfor Africa, for Latin America, for Asia, even for Europeancountries, and the Western media and think-tanks pretended it didnot exist for almost four years! And then, all of a sudden, theyrealized, “Oh, this is really growing so rapidly; it is includingmore than 100 countries.” So they started what I think was acoordinated attack, slandering the Belt and Road Initiative, witharguments which I think can all individually can be proven to bea lie. It comes from the old geopolitical effort to control theworld by manipulating countries against each other, and with theBelt and Road Initiative, I think that possibility is vanishing,and that’s why they’re so angry and hysterical.
GBTimes: What could China do to reduce this demonization ofthe BRI?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: I think China is already doing a lot. Forexample, even Handelsblatt, which was very negative towards theBelt and Road Initiative in the past, they had to bring anarticle which brought out the fact that the whole argument thatChina is putting the countries of the third world into a “debttrap” is not holding. For example, the IMF just released figuresthat there are 17 African countries which may not be able to paytheir debt, but China is only engaged in 3 of them, and all ofthe others have huge debts to the Paris Club and to other bigWestern banks — so, who’s putting whom into a debt trap?
All of these arguments will be very easy to counter-argue,and the more China makes known its beautiful culture, people willbe won over. Because the beauty of Chinese painting, ofClassical music, it will win over the hearts. And the mostpeople understand what China is actually doing, the less theseattacks will be possible to maintain.
GBTimes: The attacks are more on China than on the Belt andRoad Initiative, you say?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Well, yes. They’re on China because Chinais the major motor behind it. And some of the attacks were thatChina is supposedly an autocratical dictatorship, andsurveillance state and all of these things. But first of all,concerning surveillance, I think the NSA and the GCHQ haveoutdone anybody already. And naturally China has a system whichuplifts the morality of the people: This is based on theConfucian tradition, and for some of the very liberal people inthe West, that is already too much, because it disturbs theiridea that everything goes, everything is allowed, and from thatstandpoint, any kind of emphasis on morality is too much forthese people.
GBTimes: Isn’t sometimes criticism of new ideas andinitiatives healthy? It’s what we understand here in the West, wedon’t openly unquestionably accept new things. We do question,and we are a little bit cynical sometimes.
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: It’s superfluous. It’s a waste of energyand it distracts people from accomplishing what needs to beaccomplished: Namely, to overcome poverty in Africa, in LatinAmerica, even in Europe. You know, Europe has 90 million poorpeople, and I have not seen a plan by the European Union toovercome poverty by 2010, which China intends to do with its ownpoor people.
So I think it’s a waste of energy, and it comes from what Icall, when people put on geopolitical spectacles and haveneocolonial headphones, then they see and hear the world quitedifferently from what it is, namely, they only project their ownviews.
GBTimes: Having been writing about China for the last 5-7years, it has made a dramatic entrance onto the world stage, whenI started writing about it many years ago. And the speed of itsarrival, the size of the investments, it can scare a lot ofcountries — just family and friends who don’t know much aboutChina, they want to know about my job where I’m introducing Chinato the West, as this bridge. There’s a lot of amisunderstandings. Do you think some of it comes from thisignorance? And how could that be changed?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: I have the feeling that everybody who was inChina, either as a tourist or as a business person, investing ortrading, they all come back and they have a very, very positiveview. People are impressed about what they see, the reallyincredible fast train system. Then, if you go in the region ofShenzhen, Zhuhai, Guangdong, Macao, Hong Kong, this is thepowerhouse of the world economy, not just the Belt and RoadInitiative.
Compare that with the decrepit infrastructure in the UnitedStates or many parts of Western Europe, for example. Less thantwo years ago, I was in Zhuhai at a conference, and we visitedthis bridge between Hong Kong and Zhuhai and Macao, linking thisentire triangular: And this bridge was built, I think, in sixyears or eight years, including planning! Now, in Germany, wehave a famous bridge between Mainz and Wiesbaden, which has beenin repair for almost six to eight years, and it’s still notready!
So, I think if people go to China, they come back and theyare completely impressed, because they see that in China, peoplehave now virtues, like industriousness, ingenuity, creativity —these are all values we used to have in the West, like when theGermany economic miracle was made in the postwar reconstruction,these values and virtues were German. But now, no longer. Now,we have all kinds of other crazy ideas, and therefore China istaking the lead.
So the people who go to China come back with a positiveimage, and those who have not been, naturally, they’re scared bythe negative reports in the media. So the more people canactually go and form their own image, the better.
GBTimes: I have myself, I’ve seen a disconnect betweenChina and Chinese society, and then the role of the Chinesegovernment, the more negative side that gets covered about in theWestern media. Do you think, for instance, with the BRI is justa way to legitimize the Chinese leadership in the world, and toraise it up to the same level that is given to the othercountries? Do you think that’s acceptable?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Well, it is a challenge. Some of the Westerninstitutions talked about that there is now a competition of thesystems, meaning the Chinese state model and the Western freemarket model. And in one sense, it is true; the only problem isthat if you have the neo-liberal system, especially after thecrisis of 2008, only favoring monetarist interests — the banks,the speculators — and the gap between the rich and the poorbecomes ever wider, naturally, then, if you have a country wherethat is not the case, namely, China having a policy which isoriented toward the common good, an increasing well-to-do middleclass of 300 million people, which in 5-10 years will be 600million people, and obviously the vector of development isupward, naturally that is regarded as a threat by the neo-liberalestablishment, which only takes care of its own privileges.
So in a certain sense, the challenge does exist, but I thinkthere is the possibility of a learning process, so one can behopeful that even some elements of the Western elites willrecognize that China is doing something right.
GBTimes: What do you think China could learn from theWestern mode? And vice versa, what do you think the two couldlearn from one another?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: I think China can learn a lot from the West,but I’m afraid to say, not from the present, contemporaries, or,there is very little to learn. Naturally, ESA cooperating withthe Chinese space agency, there is a lot of exchange possible.But in terms of general, cultural outlook, I think China has togo back about 200 years to find positive things in Europe, or theUnited States, for that matter. You know, European Classicalculture can be an enormous enrichment for China, but these arecomposers who are Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann, orgreat poets. But these are all things which, unfortunately arenot dominating the cultural outlook of most Europeans andAmericans today. So there has to be a dialogue across thecenturies, and then both sides can profit from each other.
GBTimes: In a sense, you’re very pessimistic about theWestern stands at the moment. Do you think China is the onlyoption available to the West at the moment?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: No, I’m not pessimistic, I’m just sayingthat you see that some of the elites, or so-called elites, arehardened in their view. You have others who are absolutelyrecognizing that the whole mankind needs to cooperate together innew ways, for example, Switzerland. You know the President ofSwitzerland, who participated in the Belt and Road Forum justsigned a memorandum of understanding, not only for Switzerland,but for a whole group of Central and Eastern European countries,which Switzerland is representing in the internationalorganizations.
So there is a big motion. You have Italy signing amemorandum of understanding with China, on the development ofAfrica. Greece wants to be the gateway between trade from Asia,through the Suez Canal all the way into Europe. Portugal andSpain want to be the hub for the Portuguese- and Spanish-speakingpeople around the world.
So there is a lot of dynamics and motions, I’m justreferring to some of the monetarist views and those people whotalk about the “rules-based order” all the time, but what theyreally mean is austerity.
So, I’m not talking about the West in general. I think theWest — I’m an optimist about the potential of all human beings— I’m only talking about certain parts of the establishment inthe West.
GBTimes: You mentioned Italy and Switzerland. Howsignificant is it that they signed up to the BRI now?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: I think this is extremely important. Firstof all, Italy, as you know, is the third largest economy inEurope. The north of Italy is highly industrialized and has alot of industrial capability; many hidden champions actually arein northern Italy. So, if such a country is now, as the first G7country, officially joining with a memorandum of understanding,this can become the model for all of Europe. And Prime MinisterGiuseppe Conte who just participated in the Belt and Road Forumcame back and said exactly that: That Italy plans to be theleader in bringing about a better relation between China andEurope. So I think this is extremely important.
And Switzerland, even if it may be a small country, they areindependent; they are sovereign, they are not part of theEuropean Union. And President Maurer just declared, or hisspokesman, that they do not need advice from the European Unionbecause they can make their own policy. So, I think this is alla new, healthy spirit of self-consciousness and self-assertion,which is very good, and can be indeed a sign of hope foreverybody else.
GBTimes: How do you see it impacting Europe, theirparticipation in the BRI, in the short term, and perhaps in thelonger term?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Well, there are different learning curves:Some are quicker, others are slower. For example, the so-calledfour big countries — that does not include Italy — that didnot send heads of state or government, but only ministers, Spain,France, Germany, and I think Great Britain, by not sending theirheads of state sort of expressed their reservation. But theneven the German Economic Minister Altmaier, who on the first dayof the Belt and Road Forum basically said, “we have to havetransparency and rules,” with the usual kind of arguments, butthe next day, he said something much more positive. He said: Oh,this was much better than I expected, the Chinese are actuallytrying to solve problems, and I will come back in June with alarge delegation of businessmen. So, I actually find this quitegood. It shows that eventually, I think, I hope, reason willprevail.
GBTimes: I think some of the obstacles for Westerncountries, is like Turkey refusing to participate because of theUighur problem; that there are other issues that aren’t relatedto the Belt and Road, that China has to overcome first.
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: All of these problems will eventually besolved, because I think the key to solving of any regional,ethnic, historical cultural problem is development. If peopleactually see the advantage of turning non-developed countries orareas into prosperous ones, into having more youth exchange,young people understanding each other, people-to-people exchange,dialogue of cultures, bringing forth the best tradition of eachculture; plus, naturally, real improvement of living standards,longevity, I think that even if not all develop with the samespeed, we are at a tremendous change of an epoch of humancivilization. The idea of these local and regional conflictswill eventually not be there any more.
If I just can point to the fact that now the eightradio-telescopes working together, being able to make, for thefirst time, images of the black hole in a galaxy which is 55million light-years away, proving that Einstein’s theory ofgeneral relativity was actually correct — now, that, for me isthe sign of the future: Because this image could not have beenmade by one country alone. It needed telescopes sited in Chile,in Spain, in the United States, in the Antarctic, and you neededthe whole world actually working together to make such atechnological breakthrough possible.
I think that that will be the kind of relationship peoplewill have to each other in the future, and I think this is whatXi Jinping really is the kind of thing he means when he says, “ashared community for the one future of humanity.” Because thecommon interest will eventually come first, and then everythingelse will fall into place.
GBTimes: Another one of the criticisms was currently “allroads lead back to Beijing” rather than a multilateral approachto BRI, where it’s between other country, it always leads back toChina at the moment. Do you think that is a problem?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: I don’t know. First of all, I think Russiahas a big influence, I think the African countries are becomingmuch more knowledgeable and confident about their own role. Thereare many Africans who speak that, in the future, Africa will bethe new China with African characteristics. So, I think it’s allchanging very quickly, and those people who complain that thereis too much Chinese influence, well, then they should bring intheir active, creative contribution, and define what the newplatform of humanity should be.
And I think China has said many times, and I have absolutelyevery confidence that that is the case, that they’re not tryingto export their social model, but that they’re just offering theexperience of the incredible success of the last 40 years of theform in opening-up, and basically tell developing countries,“Here, if you want to have our help in accomplishing the samething, we are willing to provide it.” And naturally, thecountries of the developing sector, which had been neglected, oreven treated negatively by colonialism, by the IMFconditionalities, when they now have the absolute, concrete offerto overcome poverty and underdevelopment, why should they nottake it?
So, I think all these criticisms are really badly coveredefforts to hide their own motives. I really think China is doingthe best thing which has happened to humanity for a very longtime, and I think the Belt and Road Initiative is the onlylong-term plan for how to transform the world into a peacefulplace. And I think that should be applauded and people shouldhave a cooperative approach.
GBTimes: My next question was going to be, how confidentare you that the BRI will pay off for China, but I get the sensethat you’re very confident.
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Oh, I think it already paying off! First ofall, it makes it more easy for China to develop its own westernand internal regions, because they are now sort of integratedinto the Belt and Road transport routes to Europe, to CentralAsia, integrating the Belt and Road Initiative with the EurasianEconomic Union, and hopefully eventually also the European Union.So I think it is already bringing benefits to China.
And from an economic standpoint, the more a country exportshigh technology goods and technologies, the more than becomes amotor to develop one’s own industry even to high levels. So it’slike a self-inspiration, so to speak, and that is already payingoff. That’s what any country should do.
GBTimes: You mentioned technology: It’s also the digitalSilk Road, Digital Belt and Road. Of course, China has a lot ofcontrol over its internet, on the Great Firewall: How much of abarrier do you think that will be for countries to buildrelationships via the Belt and Road Initiative?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: You mean the G5 question and Huawei?
GBTimes: Well, partly that, too, but also the control ofthe internet inside of China, which is difficult for Westerncompanies to do business, to establish themselves, as there are alot of controls there. Do you think that could be a barrier, aspart of the digital Belt and Road, that’s also being discussed.
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Well, I think there can be ways of makingarrangements which are satisfying to everybody. This wholequestion of “digital control” and so forth, is highlyexaggerated, because, if you look at who is controlling theinternet, you have the big firms, Apple, Google, Facebook, andthey are very linked with the Western government’s. You know, ina certain sense, after the scandal of the NSA listening intoeverybody’s discussions, which erupted a couple of years ago andwhich was never changed or remedied or anything, we are living ina world where that already happening. And I think China is notdoing anything more than the NSA or the already mentioned GCHQdoing that in the West.
So I think the fact that China has a competitive system, tothis Western system is what causes all of this debate. Becausethe people who had the control of the internet first, they shouldlike to keep it that way, and they regard China as a competitor,which they don’t like, but that’s a fact of reality now.
GBTimes: One question I have is why do you think the Beltand Road Initiative is needed, when there’s the AsianInfrastructure Investment Bank, now? Do you think the two aremutually exclusive, or do they work together?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: No, I think the Belt and Road Initiative hasmany financing mechanisms. You have the AIIB, you have the NewSilk Road Fund, you have a lot of the Chinese banks themselveswhich are doing the investment. I have been advocating for avery long time, that the West should modify its own creditinstitutions to work on a similar principle. Now, that would beactually very possible, because the American System of economy asit was developed by Alexander Hamilton, who created the firstNational Bank as an institution for issuing credit, that isactually very close to what China is doing. As a matter of fact,I would even go so far as to say, that the Chinese economic modelis much closer to the American System, as it was developed byAlexander Hamilton, and then revived by Lincoln, by Henry C.Carey, by Franklin D. Roosevelt; so if the United States wouldsay, we create our own national bank; and Germany, for example,would say, we go back to the Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau, theCredit Institution for Reconstruction, which was used for thereconstruction of Germany in the postwar period, which was also astate bank, — or it still is a state bank — then you could havea new credit system, whereby each country would have their ownnational bank; you would have clearing houses in between them tocompensate for duration of investment, or the differences betweensmall and large countries with lots of raw materials, or not somuch — you need these clearinghouses. But you could create anew credit system, a New Bretton Woods system with fixed exchangerates, having a stability in the system which the Western systempresently does not have.
So, I think that the more countries go to these kinds ofcredit financing of projects the more stable this new system willbecome.
GBTimes: Do you think the United States will ever becomepart of the Belt and Road Initiative, under the Presidency ofDonald Trump, or perhaps whoever is voted in next
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: That’s actually the big question, you know:Will the rise of China be answered by the United States, eitherwith a war, the Thucydides trap which some people have mentionedas a danger? There were in history twelve cases where a risingpower overtook the dominant power up to that point, and it led towar; and there were four cases where it happened in a peacefulway. Now, China, first of all, has offered that neither of thesetwo options should occur, but they have offered a special greatpower special relationship model, based on the acceptance of theother social model’s sovereignty, non-interference. And I thinkTrump with his America, First policy is more inclined to respondto such a model than the previous administrations of Obama andBush, who had these interventionist wars in the Middle East andeverywhere else for exporting their system of so-called“democracy” and human rights.
So I think President Trump has said very clearly that hewants to have a good relationship with China. He calls PresidentXi Jinping his friend all the time. And I think the presenttrade negotiations actually, in my view, demonstrate that theUnited States would suffer tremendously, if they would try todecouple from the Chinese economy. They probably would suffermore than China, because China is much more capable, in my view,to compensate for the loss of the relationship with the UnitedStates.
But I think that the hopefully reasonable way would be tosay, “OK, let’s use the foreign exchange reserves of China whichthey have in terms of U.S. Treasuries; let’s invest them throughan infrastructure bank in the United States, to help to modernizeAmerican infrastructure.” And that would be an urgent need,because if you look at the U.S. infrastructure, it’s really in aterrible condition, and President Trump, who is talking today, Ithink, with the leading Democrats Pelosi and Schumer on a newinfrastructure legislation; the sums which are discussed here,from what I have heard so far, are so small! First of all, theRepublicans don’t want to have Federal spending; the Democratsare talking only about “repair,” and small issues.
So, what is lacking in these discussions is a grand design,where you would take the approach China has taken for themodernization of its infrastructure: To have fast train systemsamong all the major cities, to have slow-speed maglev trains forintra-urban transport. Now, you could take that same approachand modernize the entire infrastructure of the United States. Andif China would, in turn, off that U.S. companies would integratemore into the projects of the Belt and Road around the world, itwould be beneficial for both. Some American companies are alreadydoing that, like Caterpillar, General Electric, Honeywell, butthat could be a real incentive for the United States to go in tisdirection.
Hopefully it will happen that way, because if not, I think aclash between the two largest economies would be a catastrophefor the whole world: So, let’s hope that the forces of good willall work together to get to this positive end.
GBTimes: Let’s talk about the Schiller Institute itself asa think tank. What is your day-to-day role in the promotion ofthe Belt and Road Initiative? How do you work to support it?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Oh, you know, this all goes back to thelife’s work of my husband, who died recently: Mr. LyndonLaRouche; who spent, actually, the last 50 years, to work on veryconcrete development projects. The first such project wepresented in ’76 in Paris. This was a comprehensive plan for theinfrastructure development of all of Africa. Then we workedtogether with the President of Mexico José López Portillo on aLatin American development plan — this was ’82. We worked withIndira Gandhi on a 40-year development plan, and also in thebeginning of the ’80s, we developed a 50-year development planfor the Pacific Basin. And then, when the Berlin Wall came down,and the Soviet Union disintegrated, we proposed to connect theEuropean and Asian population and industrial centers throughdevelopment corridors, and we called that the EurasianLand-Bridge.
So we have been engaged in these kinds of big projects forthe transformation of the world economy for the last decades, andnaturally, we proposed it to China in the beginning of the ’90s.I attended a big conference in ’96 in Beijing, which had thetitle, “The Development of the Regions along the EurasianLand-Bridge.” And China, at that time, declared the building ofthe Eurasian Land-Bridge the long-term strategic aim of China by2010. Then, naturally, came the Asia crisis in ’97, so the wholething go interrupted.
We were very happy when Xi Jinping announced the New SilkRoad in 2013, because, in the meantime, we had kept working forthis. We had many conferences, actually hundreds ofconferences and seminars all over the world. So this is has beenone major point of what the Schiller Institute has been doing forthe last decades. So naturally, we are very happy that now, whatwas only planning on our side is now being realized by the secondlargest economy in the world, and therefore, it becomes reality:And that makes quite happy.
GBTimes: Is there anything else you’d like to add? I’veasked my questions and a lot more. Is there anything we haven’ttouched upon, you’d like to talk about?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: We could talk a little bit more about theculture of the New Silk Road.
GBTimes: Please — in what way?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Well, I think that the New Silk Road, or theBelt and Road Initiative, it’s not just about economics andinfrastructure. But I think equally important, if not moreimportant, in my view, is the cultural side of it: That it couldlead and will hopefully lead to an exchange of the besttraditions of all cultures of this world. And by reviving thebest traditions, like Confucianism in China, Beethoven inGermany, and Schiller; Verdi in Italy, and so forth and so on, itwill ennoble the souls of the people, and I think that that isthe most important question right now, because I agree withFriedrich Schiller, according to whom this institute is named:That any improvement in the political realm can only come fromthe moral improvement of the people. And therefore, I think it’salso very interesting to me that President Xi Jinping hasemphasized the aesthetical education as extremely important,because the goal of this is the beautiful mind of the pupil, ofthe student.
Now, that is exactly what Friedrich Schiller said, who inthe response to the Jacobin Terror in the French Revolution,wrote his Aesthetical Letters in which he develops hisaesthetical theory, which I find is in great cohesion with whatXi Jinping is saying; and that has also to do with the fact thatthe first education minister of the Chinese Republic studied inGermany, and he studied Schiller and Humboldt; his name was CaiYuanpei — I’m probably pronouncing it wrong again — but hewas the first president of the Beijing University, and I thinkthere is a great affinity, a much greater affinity between thethinking of the aesthetical education as it is discussed by XiJinping and as it does exist in the Schiller-Humboldt traditionin Germany, in particular. I would just hope that that kind of adialogue could be intensified, because then I think a lot of theprejudices and insecurities about the other culture woulddisappear, and you would bring back and bring forth the best ofall sides.
GBTimes: How could this be accomplished, do you think? Whatsort of forms?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: You can organize conferences, you can moreconsciously make the poetry known — I think poetry is very, veryimportant, which is naturally not so easy, because as Schillersaid, you have to be a poet in two languages to do justice to thepoetry of one language. You could have more conscious theaterperformances, not just as an entertainment but involvingstudents, children, adults, and make more exhibitions, make moredeep-level understanding of the other culture.
I think China is doing an enormous amount of that, but Iwould have still some suggestions to make it more thanentertainment, because many people go to these things, and theydon’t quite “get it” what it’s all about; and then, it was nice,but the deeper philosophical, poetical, musical meaning could bemade more pedagogically intelligible, and I think that would be away of opening the hearts of more people, because they wouldrecognize what treasures are there to be discovered.
GBTimes: Do you have any closing words on the Belt and Roadyou’d like to share with our readers?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: I think we are probably the generation onwhom later generations will look back to, and say, “Oh! This wasreally a fascinating time, because it was a change from an epochto another one.” And I have an image of that, which is, thischange that we are experiencing right now, is probably going tobe bigger than the change in Europe between the Middle Ages andmodern times. In the Middle Ages you had people believing in awhole bunch of axioms, the scholastics, Aristotelianism,witchcraft — all kinds of strange beliefs — and then, becauseof the influx of such thinkers as Nicholas of Cusa, or theItalian Renaissance, the modern image of man, of science andtechnology, of the sovereign nation-state, all these changeshappened, and they created a completely different view of theimage of man and of nature, and the universe, and everything wecall “modern society” was the result of this change.
Now, I think we are in front, or the middle of such anepochal change, where the next era of mankind will be much, muchmore creative than the present one, and that’s something to lookforward to, because we can actually shape it, and we can bringour own creative input into it. And there are not many periodsin history when that is the case: So we are actually lucky.
This article was written by Mrs. Helga Zepp LaRouche, Founder of the International Schiller Institute and president of the Schiller Institute in Germany, for publication in the May 2012 German language magazine “Ibykus.”
What has become of our world? Top bankers are warning about the “apocalypse”—which doesn’t prevent them at the same time from stuffing seven-figure bonuses into their pockets—as if burial shrouds had pockets! Politicians are willing to sell their own grandmothers in order to calm down “the markets,” while the General Welfare which they have sworn to protect, has been erased from their vocabulary. Heads of government who have just finished expunging democracy and constitutional rule from their own countries, are now prepared, under the pretext of concern for democracy and human rights, to march from a “humanitarian intervention” into a neighboring land, straight into a thermonuclear apocalypse.
Hundreds of millions of human beings are under dire threat of starvation, disease, and lack of clean water; but meanwhile at church councils, the use of bio-fuels is defended, and the popes of environmentalism get decorated with the Medal of Honor for stopping agricultural production and water management, causing millions of human lives to be lost. For decades, “society” has been tolerating the tearing down of one bastion of civilized behavior after another; and so is it any wonder now, that twelve-year-olds are downloading pornographic videos onto their smart phones and showing them around on the school playground; or that it’s considered almost normal that individuals riding the subway or walking on side-streets are “ripped off,” and have to relinquish all their valuables in order to forestall something far worse? Might we not, then, say that a society in which teenagers are the most menacing social grouping, can be considered a failed society?
This list of social evils could be expanded in many directions. It’s certainly true that the root of many of the problems lies in the false axiomatics of economic, military, and social policy. Yet perhaps the most important area where development has gone completely awry, is the shift in cultural paradigm in the western world over recent decades.
Even if during the decades of Germany’s post-war reconstruction everything wasn’t perfect, nonetheless the vector of development was positive: There was an enormous desire to rebuild, and secondary virtues such as diligence and honesty—virtues later denigrated—fostered the General Welfare and promoted social cohesion. Our schools were still governed by the Humboldt educational ideal, namely that developing beauty of character within each student was at least one aspect of the goals of education. Classical culture in music, poetry, and the fine arts played an important role in all grades, but especially in our Gymnasia.
The fact that this has long not been the case, is due to many factors: the Frankfurt School’s deconstructive role regarding Classical music and poetry, the Congress for Cultural Freedom, the advent of “director’s theater,” the Brandt educational reforms, the ’68er movement, the counterculture, and pop culture in general. The end-result of all these influences is a cultural wasteland: shriveled hearts, bereft of all ability to experience profound intellectual emotion; and for many of our fellow men, a loss of the ability to judge, with any sense of justice and injustice supplanted by a striving to conform to popular opinion.
If Schiller, already in his own time—and even more concretely after he witnessed the failure of the French Revolution—had to ask: “How has it come to pass that we are still barbarians?”, then how much more urgently would he be posing that question, horror-filled, today? Unfortunately, yet another facet of our time demonstrates how right he was, that a society that has degenerated from a higher level to a lower one, is more despicable than one that is still striving to free itself from underdevelopment. In his Fifth Aesthetic Letter, Schiller writes:
“Through his actions, Man portrays himself—and what an awful form do we see depicted in our present-day drama! Here brutalization, there decadence: the two extremes of human corruption—and both united in one age of history!
“In the lower and more numerous classes, we see raw, lawless impulses, unleashed after all bands of civil order have been dissolved, rushing with ungovernable impetuosity toward bestial satiation…. Its rudder gone, our society, instead of speeding upwards into organic life, is relapsing back into the inorganic domain.
“On the other side, the civilized classes present us with an even more detestable spectacle of decadence and depravity of character, which disgusts us all the more because it feeds upon the culture itself. I no longer remember which ancient or modern philosopher remarked that the nobler person is all the more abhorrent in his self-destruction; but one will find this true in the moral realm as well. From the savage, run amok, there emerges a madman; from the disciple of art, a worthless nothing.”
In further letters, Schiller discusses how, in view of this situation, any improvement in the political domain can only come about through the ennoblement of individual man’s character—an insight which is equally true today as it was in his own time. But whence, asks Schiller, is this ennoblement to come, when the masses are desensitized, and the nation is in a state of barbarism? And in his Ninth Letter he arrives at the point “toward which I have been striving in all my previous remarks. This instrument is Classical art; these wellsprings open up to us in their immortal exemplars. Art, as well as science, is absolved from everything based on mere sense-experience and imposed by human convention, and both enjoy absolute immunity from the arbitrariness of men.”
The key to overcoming the present existential crisis therefore lies in affording people access to their own creativity, in rekindling within them the divine spark which brings their full human potential to fruition. Our task is thus to strengthen this faculty of the human spirit—a place where scientific discoveries are made, which is the same place where Classical art is born, and where musical and poetical ideas are developed according to the criteria of Classical composition. Whenever man discovers new universal scientific principles, or when the composer or poet harkens to the rules of Classical composition, or lawfully extends them, then the creativity of an inventive mind comes into complete harmony with the creatively self-developing physical universe.
And thus, if we wish to survive the present crisis, a renaissance of Classical culture will be the absolute prerequisite. Therefore the Schiller Institute, along with its cultural journal Ibykus, supports Lynn Yen’s initiative (see below), and calls upon all artists and friends of Classical art to become part of a worldwide movement which will continue to fight for this renaissance until we have banished the current Dark Age—just as the Golden Renaissance of the 15th Century banished the 14th-Century Dark Age, and as German Classicism overcame the destruction wrought by the Thirty Years War.
The latest revelation from an FOIA request on the dirty doings of Christopher Steele is another bombshell, demonstrating that one must hold the British responsible for the dangerous coup attempt against President Trump. And as more evidence emerges daily of the British role, in direct coordination with the Obama intelligence team, where does U.S. Secretary of State Pompeo go to whip up anti-Russian, anti-Chinese sentiment? To London, of course, where he proclaimed that the “Special Relationship” between the U.S. and the U.K. is thriving!
In this week’s webcast, Helga Zepp LaRouche reviews the ramping up of hot spots, especially by Pompeo and Bolton, who are acting at odds with President Trump’s often-stated wish to have good, cooperative relationships with the two nations. Describing the anti-China rantings of intelligence officials, Congressmen and media as a “Yellow Peril rampage,” she emphasizes the importance of getting the U.S.-China trade talks back on track, as a step towards U.S. participation in the Belt and Road Initiative.
The ninety minute call between Presidents Trump and Putin was greeted by Helga Zepp LaRouche as “really good news,” as she reviewed the broader strategic implications of the emerging post-Russiagate situation.
These include:
The importance of the Trump-Putin discussion for economic and strategic cooperation, including addressing the situations in Venezuela, Ukraine and North Korea;
The positive potential for U.S.-China cooperation, with another session of trade talks scheduled — this is proceeding despite the efforts of British-directed neocons to sabotage it;
Broader recognition of the attractiveness of collaboration with the BRI, following the second BRI forum, as seen in several recent reports produced in Germany;
The significance of the meeting on infrastructure between Trump and Democratic Congressional leaders, which highlights the split within the Dems between the crazies, focused still on impeachment and the Green New Deal, and Pelosi and her network, which recognize the need to accomplish something positive;
Growing recognition of the British role in running Russiagate.
The fight to exonerate Lyndon LaRouche offers the best roadmap to understand who ran Russiagate, and the strategic reasons why. LaRouche’s role demonstrates the power of the individual to change history, and should be a source of optimism, a crucial need to win the fight for the New Paradigm.
Declaring the just-completed Belt and Road forum in Beijing a “great success”, Helga Zepp LaRouche reported on the global participation in the event, and the expanded scope of BRI agreements. She described the active involvement of a number of European leaders as “very interesting.” Referring back to her LPAC Class the night before, she urged viewers to watch the clip she used of Lyndon LaRouche’s 1997 address, in which he insisted the U.S. must engage in the Eurasian Land-bridge — looking at what just happened in Beijing, she said, one sees again how prophetic he was in addressing the future needs of mankind.
Now, with Trump openly identifying Russiagate as a “coup”, designed to oust him from office — which the media has for the most part ignored, as incredible as that is — it is clear the British role in orchestrating the coup will come out, along with their role in attacking the BRI. Given that those behind the coup are the same networks which engaged in massive slanders against Lyndon LaRouche, she emphasized that the fight for his exoneration is essential for the survival of the U.S.
As the revival of the work of Plato by Cusa was crucial in creating the Italian Renaissance, so is engagement in the scientific and philosophical works of LaRouche to assure the success of the New Paradigm today. The extraordinary international effort involved in the amazing photos captured of a “black hole” is another demonstration of this principle, that it is essential to challenge all the axioms, from a higher standpoint. International cooperation in space is essential to inspire today’s youth to embrace real science, to create a better future.
“For the last several years or so, Western media and mainstream politicians have chosen to largely ignore the Belt and Road Initiative, which Chinese President Xi Jinping proposed in 2013. The initiative, consisting of the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-Century Maritime Silk Road, efficiently addresses the infrastructure needs of developing countries, which the West simply pretended not to exist.
“But, at a certain point it dawned on the Western establishment that China was not only building an enormous amount of railway lines, ports, bridges, power plants and industrial parks in Asia, Africa and even in parts of Europe, but that the prospect of poverty alleviation offered by China instilled an unprecedented spirit of optimism.”
Kirk Meighoo in Trinidad & Tobago, a former Senator and a notable academic and political figure in the country, has done a beautiful 1-hour podcast with Helga Zepp-LaRouche as his guest. The podcast centered on the issue of the Chinese role in development around the world, as part of the global New Silk Road (Belt and Road Initiative, BRI). Zepp-LaRouche reviews 45 years of initiatives from her husband, Lyndon LaRouche, and herself, for the kind of American System economics embedded in the BRI, and evaluates how the United States can be brought aboard.