The 66th consecutive online weekly meeting of the International Peace Coalition (IPC) today featured a uniquely high-powered senior group of scientific, military and political experts in dialogue, all addressing different facets of the insanity of those leaders in the U.S. and Europe who have committed themselves to what Col. Larry Wilkerson aptly described as the suicidal policy of “Cry Havoc, and Letting Slip the Dogs of War.”
Schiller Institute founder Helga Zepp-LaRouche opened the session, warning that “the goal is to inflict strategic defeat on Russia,” which, given Russia’s status as a nuclear superpower, is impossible without initiating nuclear war. She emphasized the role of the British, citing recent statements by Russian government spokeswoman Maria Zakharova that London is behind the drone attacks and the constant escalation in the Ukraine war. President Biden submitted to Congress an amendment to the U.S.-British mutual defense agreement of 1958, to make it permanent, ending the requirement for renewal every ten years, to make the arrangement “Trump-proof.”
She reminded participants of Biden’s new nuclear weapons doctrine, which is so secret that apparently no electronic version exists. In discussions with military experts, we have learned that the decision to station missiles in Germany was actually worked out in 2021. Trump’s National Security Strategy (NSS) of 2017 proclaimed for the first time that Russia and China are geopolitical rivals and was followed in 2018 by a National Defense Strategy (NDS) to modernize nuclear weapons. In response, Russia announced the introduction of new weapons systems, including hypersonic missiles. In 2022, the U.S. Nuclear Policy Review stated that the U.S. can use nuclear weapons to “defend its vital interests.” British Defense Secretary Mark Lancaster proclaimed the same for the British government. Germany, in typical anticipatory obedience, embraced recent U.S. policy changes.
In August 2019 the U.S. withdrew from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty. Zepp-LaRouche proposed that both sides must reinstitute the verification regime.
Dr. Ted Postol, MIT Professor Emeritus and one of the world’s leading experts on nuclear weapons, then characterized recent U.S. upgrading of nuclear weapons systems as “prompt preemptive strike forces.” The U.S. has, at great cost, produced “super fuse” weapons, designed to preemptively destroy silo-based missiles. One would only pursue this approach if planning to fight and win a nuclear war, an extraordinarily delusional mindset. A Russian military officer would be forced to conclude that the U.S. intends to attack.
Col. Larry Wilkerson, who was chief of staff to then-U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, followed, recalling discussions with Powell about the 2002 National Security Strategy, about which Wilkerson warned, “We’re at the peak of the mountain, and if we see anyone stirring at the bottom … we will kill it.… We are going to get sucked into something that is initially conventional … once we start losing—which we will,” we will resort to nuclear weapons.
He is now hearing high-ranking military officers talk about the utility of nuclear weapons for the first time since the Cold War, which are very lucrative for defense contractors. In 1991-92, when both the U.S. and Russia were destroying nuclear weapons, he saw that it “scared the bejesus” out of the leaders of the military-industrial complex.
Colonel Prof. Dr. Wilfried Schreiber (ret.), Senior Research Fellow at the WeltTrends Institute for International Politics in Potsdam, who was born in Dresden, reported that according to military historians, Dresden was intended to be one of the first targets for a U.S. nuclear bomb. The war ended before that could happen. The threat of nuclear war has now re-emerged, hotter than ever before. Germany is taking on greater risk than any other country by stationing missile systems. If you follow military logic, the places where these advanced systems are stationed are the most important targets. The unilateral decision by the Chancellor to accept these missiles means that German democracy has failed.
Lt. Col. Ralph Bosshard (ret.) of the Swiss Armed Forces, a consultant on military-strategic affairs, contrasted the decision by Biden and Scholz to station missiles in Germany to what Chancellor Helmut Schmidt did in 1979, agreeing to station Pershing II missiles—but also pursuing negotiations which led to the INF Treaty. Biden and Scholz will station without negotiating. Bosshard said that what he calls “decapitation strikes,” like the “shock and awe” campaign in Iraq, have weakened the UN Charter. “NATO is nothing more than a safe harbor, behind which Western powers pursue their geopolitical ambitions…. Europe should learn its lesson and not chain its destiny unconditionally to the global players.”
Zepp-LaRouche was moved by the remarks of her countryman, Professor Schreiber, saying that he “touched what is in the hearts of many people in Germany,” and that in the time of thermonuclear weapons, war has become so barbaric that it must be outlawed.
New York Congressional candidate Jose Vega asked Colonel Wilkerson whether someone in the State Department or other agencies could play the same role as Daniel Ellsberg, who exposed plans to use nuclear weapons against China. Wilkerson responded that Ellsberg “was a hero par excellence.” He added that the U.S. is “the only country in the world that divides the world in fiefdoms, and puts a four-star general in charge of each fiefdom.” We had plans to invade countries throughout the Levant, if Iraq had been a pushover. Secretary of State Blinken’s remarks about the sanctity of borders are the height of hypocrisy.
Postol added that nuclear war planning is done in a ritualized way, by people who have no real knowledge of the actual physical effects of nuclear weapons. The side effects, such as massive firestorms, are not included in planning. “They don’t even get the basic physical effects right,” he said. In response, Wilkerson said, “My experience from 31 years of military service is that I am more frightened of the civilian leaders than the military,” to which Postol replied, “Me, too!”
Ambassador Jack Matlock, a scholar of Russian history and culture, who was President Reagan’s choice in 1987 for the crucial post of ambassador to the Soviet Union, reviewed what followed the demise of the U.S.S.R. Secretary of State James Baker and his counterparts gave assurances to Gorbachev that there would be no expansion of NATO—not one inch. But for Russia, the problem is not NATO expansion, but the stationing of American or NATO bases in these countries. The decision of Western powers to interfere in the politics of Ukraine was also particularly provocative.
Donald Ramotar, former President of Guyana, professed his admiration for Matlock, and asked: How much of this situation would you attribute to the deterioration of leadership in the West? Matlock replied that a big problem has been the preference for military solutions to all problems. Ramotar went on to say that the world is presently divided into two blocs: the former colonial powers trying to maintain their domination, and the Global South. He endorsed Mrs. Zepp-LaRouche’s proposed Council of Reason to break out of this trap.
In conclusion, Zepp-LaRouche asked participants to widely share what had been discussed at the meeting, and to take to the streets in the upcoming demonstrations. She urged the U.S. to “stop the geopolitical nonsense,” and collaborate with the Global South. “Move toward solutions, because if we only protest the negative, it will not be sufficient.”
