The Lead

Exercise the Right To Think and Act: No to NATO’s World War III

by Marcia Merry Baker (EIRNS) — Aug. 27, 2024

Ukraine government officials are in Washington, D.C. and Brussels this week, demanding the OK for unrestricted use of U.S. and Western weapons inside Russia—the stamp-of-approval on a NATO invasion. This is a direct, blatant challenge to the 2020 Russian stated doctrine: Russia will use nuclear weapons, only “when the very existence of the state is under threat.” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov today held a press conference in Moscow, drawing out the implications of this exact point.

The Ukraine diplomatic junkets to promote warfare inside Russia are all set. Coming to Washington this week are two top advisors to President Zelenskyy, Andriy Yermak and Defense Minister Rustem Umerov. Going to Brussels Aug. 29 will be Ukraine Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba. Foreign ministers of all 27 member states of the European Union are expected at the foreign affairs meeting, plus invited nations, including Türkiye. The scheduled topic is air defense, but the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell is already addressing the need to lift restrictions on what Ukraine may do inside Russia. In an X message Aug. 26, he said that lifting such restrictions on Russian targets “would strengthen Ukrainian self-defense….”

Foreign Minister Lavrov spoke sternly in Moscow today. The Reuters headline was on the mark, for a change: “Russia Warns the United States of the Risks of World War Three.” Lavrov said that the Western leaders are “playing with fire, and they are like small children playing with matches—a very dangerous thing for grown-up uncles and aunts who are entrusted with nuclear weapons in one or another Western country.”

It is for us all the world over to sound the alarm. However, we are called upon to fight at the same time for the fundamental right to do that, and to put forward a course of safety for our nations and world.

In this situation of escalating danger, the right of citizens everywhere to exercise not only free speech, religious practice, and human freedom, but also to have the right to obtain information, seek the truth, and to think, is all-important. These rights are under escalating attack.

In the United States an important dialogue on these matters occurred last evening, at the weekly national meeting (online) hosted by New York independent LaRouche candidates Diane Sare (U.S. Senate) and Jose Vega (15th CD in the Bronx). Independent candidate for U.S. Congress in Ohio (7 CD) Dennis Kucinich spoke. Former Cleveland Mayor, Kucinich served in Congress, and was twice a presidential candidate. Other candidates, and campaign supporters participated from many states, including Ben Wesley, running for office in Connecticut, with the endorsement of the Independence Party there.

Scott Ritter, the former UN weapons inspector who is campaigning at-large to make stopping nuclear war the central issue of the U.S. elections, participated as well. Ritter is on the front lines for defending Constitutional rights and responsibilities in the U.S. In recent weeks, the FBI and federal authorities have seized his passport, raided his home, and seized documents.

Ritter said, “I am being investigated for supposed criminal conduct, because I am trying to stop a nuclear war! Because I dare challenge the gospel of the nuclear industry, the war party, that says that not only do we need nuclear weapons, but we must change our nuclear employment doctrine to make it easier to use those nuclear weapons! Thus, the fight to prevent nuclear war is inseparable from the fight to defend free speech.”

The International Peace Coalition, founded 65 weeks ago by Schiller Institute leader Helga Zepp-LaRouche, is the platform for supporting and spreading this fighting spirit of responsibility for humanity everywhere, to stop the war drive, end the centuries of empire, and bring into being a new paradigm of peace and development.

A preview of what the world can be in such a new era, provided we defeat the NATO World War III threat, is available in the deliberations planned for next week at two international conferences: The annual Eastern Economic Forum (EEF) will be in Vladivostok, Russia, Sept. 3-6, on the theme: “Far East 2030—Combining Strengths To Create New Potential.” The Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) take place in Beijing, Sept. 4-6, on the theme: “Joining Hands To Advance Modernization and Build a High-Level China-Africa Community with a Shared Future.”

Representatives from most of the world’s nations, accounting for most of the world’s population, will participate. The topics range from the new integrated steel mill complex in Zimbabwe, to cargo handling in the Arctic, to how to have youth orchestras everywhere.

Today Russian President Putin issued his statement of greetings to the EEF conference. He spoke of the “new opportunities for productive cooperation” that are being created within the framework of such multilateral structures as the Eurasian Economic Union, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, and the BRICS. “I would like to take this opportunity to reiterate that Russia is open to dialogue with all interested partners in the Asia-Pacific region and is determined to actively interact with others to build a fairer, more democratic system of international relations based on genuine equality.”