April 15-16, 2023 Online Schiller Institute Conference
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A little bit more than one year after the war in Ukraine, which had in reality already started in 2014, escalated with the Russian military operation, it is very clear that the real issue is not Ukraine. It is a proxy war between the US, Great Britain and NATO, on the one side, and Russia on the other — with a conflict with China also looming. The real issue is that the nations of the Global South are trying to shed the colonial order, this time for good, and they have now become the Global Majority.
From the outset, the Schiller Institute has insisted in a number of conferences, beginning on April 9. 2022, that the only solution to this crisis would be the establishment of a new global security and development architecture, which takes into account the security interest of every single country on the planet. This view is shared by more and more forces in the world. The latest example of this is the Chinese 12 Point Proposal for Peace in Ukraine.
Five months ago, the Schiller Institute launched the current round of international conferences of “Political and Social Leaders of the World: Stop the Danger of Nuclear War Now” on Oct. 7, 2022, the world has changed dramatically. There is a “tectonic shift” underway in world politics, in which the nations of the Global South are rising up against the unipolar world order of wars and of deadly financial looting by Wall Street and City of London financial interests.
The center of gravity of world developments has now shifted to that Global Majority. Contrary to propaganda in the Western mass media, it is not Russia and China that are isolated. It is the policies of the West that are no longer being accepted by the majority of the world’s population. China’s 12-point peace proposal for Ukraine is now under wide discussion. It dovetails with the Pope’s offer for the Vatican to be a venue for negotiations, with no preconditions; with Brazilian President Lula’s proposal for a “peace club” of a number of nations of the South to help find a negotiated solution to the war; and with numerous other proposals internationally.
Schiller Institute founder Helga Zepp-LaRouche has welcomed the Chinese proposal, and offered her own elaboration of Ten Principles that should underlie a new international security and development architecture as a discussion document in that direction.
The fact that the Global NATO nations, led by the United Kingdom and the United States, rejected China’s peace proposal out of hand, almost before they finished reading it, exposes the fact that their actual policy, as they themselves have stated publicly, is to dismember and contain Russia and China – up to and including a nuclear showdown with those nuclear powers.
Any country that balks at going along with that unipolar policy, is now being threatened with the “Nord Stream” treatment. The coverup of responsibility in that case means that actual military attacks on civilian infrastructure are now fair game anywhere in the world.
Driving the entire war danger is the systemic breakdown crisis of the trans-Atlantic system, with its $2 quadrillion in unpayable financial assets. The policy of dramatic increases in interest rates being rammed through by the U.S. Federal Reserve means imminent bankruptcy and economic and social disintegration in the nations of the South.
This is why the fight to stop the danger of nuclear war, and the fight to end colonialism once and for all, are the same fight. They will be won together, or lost together. And if the Western powers continue on their current course, then nuclear war becomes increasingly probable. If we do not change, we shall reap what we have sown, and we will probably not even be around to tell the sorry tale to our children and grandchildren.
Today, it is abundantly clear that the security of Russia and Ukraine are indissolubly linked. Only Russia can guarantee Ukraine’s security, and Ukraine can help guarantee Russia’s, among other things by establishing its neutrality as part of a negotiated settlement to the conflict.
On Nov. 17, 2022, organizers of the “Stop the Danger of Nuclear War Now” conferences issued a Declaration and call to action, which we reaffirm at this time:
“We recognize and emphasize that Russia, like the United States, NATO, Ukraine and all countries, has legitimate security concerns which must be taken into account and become one of the cornerstones of the new security architecture. A return to the successful principles of the 1648 Peace of Westphalia – respect for sovereignty, commitment to the good of the other, and forgiveness of debts that make true economic development impossible – is the kind of architecture we seek today.
“The common good of the One Humanity is the obligatory premise for the good of each and every nation. In that way, among all the nations of the world we will be able to help build an organization of citizens in collective global action, and establish ourselves that way as a force to influence the international policy debate.
“We call on people of good will around the world – notwithstanding our diverse and natural differences – to participate in this process of deliberation and search for peaceful solutions, including a thorough examination of the alternative economic policies to replace speculation, which has generated so much poverty and suffering, with a system of production and progress to meet the needs of a growing world population.”
The world urgently needs a new security and development architecture, which represents the interest of every single country on the planet. Helga Zepp-LaRouche has suggested Ten Principles as a basis for such an architecture. The three initiatives of President Xi Jinping, the Global Security Initiative (GSI), the Global Development Initiative (GDI), and the Global Civilization Initiative (GCI) are a close representation of this concept.
PANEL 1—Sat. April 15, 9:00 a.m.-12:00 p.m. ET: The Growing Danger of World War III Underlines the Necessity for a New Security Architecture (Moderator: Dennis Speed)
There is growing, extreme concern that the present geopolitical confrontation between the U.S., the U.K. and NATO on the one side, and Russia and China on the other, could lead to an escalation into a global, possibly nuclear war. This is expressed in a variety of peace plans addressed to the Ukraine war, from China’s Xi Jinping, Brazil’s Lula da Silva, Turkiye’s Recep Erdoğan, and Pope Francis. What is required now is to move rapidly beyond geopolitics into a new security and development architecture which takes into account the interests of every country on the planet.
PANEL 2—Sat. April 15, 1:00 p.m.-4:00 p.m. ET: The “Global Majority” and the International Peace Movement Are Fighting for the Same Goal (Moderator: Stephan Ossenkopp)
The nations of the so-called “Global South,” recently described accurately as the “Global Majority,” are drawing the line at the further looting of their nations and destruction of their sovereignty by the so-called “Rules-Based Order.” They are committed to putting an end to colonialism once and for all. The emerging peace movement in Europe and the United States, as it puts aside divisive ideologies, is addressing the same underlying problem: that the collapsing trans-Atlantic financial system is the driving force towards war.
PANEL 3—Sun. April 16, 9:00 a.m.-11:30 a.m. ET: End the Casino Economy Before It’s Too Late (Moderator: Dennis Small)
The systemic collapse of the trans-Atlantic financial system is destroying the physical economy of entire nations, and is driving the world towards war. There is a renewed discussion about the need for a Glass-Steagall bankruptcy reorganization of the international financial system in order to end the casino economy, as well as the need for Lyndon LaRouche’s Four Laws. The world and every nation in it must move back to physical economy instead of monetarist values. A key example of that is the farm sector, which needs to be able to provide for the international food requirements of the world’s population. A manifesto of farmers from around the world is in preparation, and will be discussed during this panel.
PANEL 4—Sun. April 16, 12:30 p.m.-3:00 p.m., ET: The Necessary Philosophical Foundations for the New Paradigm (Moderator: Sébastien Drochon)
Schiller Institute founder Helga Zepp-LaRouche last November proposed Ten Principles as the basis for bringing about a new international security and development architecture. These include the need to put Man’s physical-economic practice, centered on scientific and cultural creativity, in coherence with the laws of the physical universe; and the underlying philosophical issues of the image of Man, including the affirmation that Man is characteristically good, and that all evil is the result of lack of development—and therefore can be eliminated.
CONCERT—Sun., April 16, 4:00 p.m., ET.: The four panels of the conference will be followed by a concert by the Schiller Institute Chorus: “Let Us Have Peace: Handel Messiah”; Online & St Paul & St Andrew
