Bill Jones of the Schiller Institute participated online today in a conference sponsored by the Moscow State University entitled “A Russian Global Strategic Initiative: A Planetary Partnership of Civilizations for the 21st Century.” Jones’s presentation was entitled “America at War—With Itself: Republic or Empire?” The conference was sponsored by the Moscow Society of Naturalists, of which V.I. Vernadsky had been a member.
In his comments, Jones outlined the traditional American policy stemming from George Washington and John Quincy Adams, and the close relationship between Russia and the U.S. since the American Revolution. He then described the successful British attempts after the death of Franklin Roosevelt to introduce the philosophy of Hobbes and Nietzsche into the academic world of America, creating a new imperial bent in U.S. political circles, and, in present circumstances, pushing the world toward a nuclear war. Noting that these policies had totally ignored the people’s welfare, he indicated that the present turmoil in American society, reflected in the chaos in Congress and the increasing demonstrations and strikes throughout the nation, are placing into question the relevance of this system. Combined with the rejection of U.S. imperial demands by the Global South, and the growing concern over the war in Ukraine and the genocide in Gaza, Americans are making their views known by their presence on the streets. The issue today, Jones underlined, is to bring this popular pressure to bear in order to reach such a threshold that some of our political leaders begin to return to the traditions of U.S. policy.
