Dennis Small, a leading spokesman of the Schiller Institute, opened today’s 68th weekly meeting of the International Peace Coalition (IPC), emphasizing the imminent danger of global nuclear war. The decision to give the go-ahead for Ukraine to use long-range precision guided missiles to target cities in Russia was barely avoided this past week. But Biden is meeting acting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the United Nations General Assembly this coming week, which is a likely occasion for an announcement of such an agreement. The “precision guidance” aspect proves that NATO and the U.S. will be running such an assault on Russia. The Russians know this, as has been stated clearly by Putin and other leaders.
The events of the week: the bombing of the Russian arms depot; the launching of war on Lebanon; and the European Parliament voting that long-range missiles must be provided to Ukraine, make the danger clear. The drive to silence all opposition voices—by assassination, by new sanctions against Russian media such as RT and anyone who works with them—is part of the same nuclear war drive, and can be traced directly to London and the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation (CCD).
The threat of nuclear war has now been introduced into the U.S. election, a sign of sanity. Former President Donald Trump three times warned of a nuclear war in a single week; so have former Congressmembers Tulsi Gabbard and Dennis Kucinich, as well as Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. The vote in the UN General Assembly to end the genocide in Gaza demonstrates that the Global Majority is opposed to these wars. The mounting financial breakdown is the driving force behind the wars, and will not be resolved by the Federal Reserve’s decision to cut interest rates and print more money to inflate the financial bubble. Nothing short of a new security and development architecture will provide a solution.
Scott Ritter, a former Marine intelligence officer and UN weapons inspector, followed, adding: “If you are not scared to death, you are the problem.” We nearly had a nuclear war last week, when the British Empire’s current front man, Prime Minister Keir Starmer, met with President Biden on Sept. 13 with a list of proposed targets to destroy in Russia, expecting Biden to sign off on it. “If Biden had signed, the war would have started that night,” and nuclear weapons could have been launched on Saturday, Sept. 14. The Russians know that long-range missiles can only be used with NATO guidance and control, and that would constitute a NATO declaration of war. “We all almost died on Saturday,” Ritter said.
“I have studied the U.S.S.R. and Russia most of my life; Russia is not bluffing. They know what war is, and they won’t allow the U.S. and NATO to put the existence of Russia at risk.” The former head of the U.S. Strategic Command has stated: “I prefer a pre-emptive nuclear strike.” Nuclear war is now an issue in the U.S. presidential election, with Trump warning of a nuclear war. “Whether or not you support Trump, you must make sure your candidate responds to the demand that he or she oppose a war. Jill Stein must be pressured; Kamala Haris must be pressured. Every candidate must respond.”
Asked about opposition to war in the Pentagon, Ritter said: “The professionals in the Pentagon understand war. There are some professionals there.” Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, at Ramstein Air Base in Germany on Sept. 6 with Zelenskyy, was pressured to agree to Zelenskyy’s demand for a go-ahead to use missiles to hit Russian targets, but Austin said that no weapon will solve this conflict. The British don’t have that problem, as 15 military leaders issued a statement that Russian President Vladimir Putin was bluffing, and that Ukraine should be unleashed. Starmer was told that Biden would sign, that the State Department could override the Pentagon. Putin’s clear warning helped stop them.
Ritter addressed the crackdown on free speech: The FBI raided his house; he is accused of being an “information terrorist” by the FBI-run Ukrainian CCD; U.S. courts now declare that free speech and the free press are crimes. We have a “two-front war”; we need to educate citizens on the danger of nuclear war. Yet, the government is claiming that doing so is a criminal act. The U.S. Constitution considers that “fear and intimidation” to prevent free speech is itself a crime. We are in a “legal war,” and must confront these “domestic enemies” with the law—not violence—to rally the people against the Biden Administration’s tyranny.
Jonathan Kuttab, an international lawyer and co-founder of Non-Violence International, addressed the meeting with a stark description of the destruction of international law in Palestine, as Israel has abandoned all restraint in their open effort to kill or drive out all the Palestinians from their land. We must restore the idea that there are limits to the power of a state. Those nations which believe themselves to be “exceptional” think that international law does not apply to them, be it in the U.S. or Israel. International law is being broken in clear sight of the world in Gaza. The UN Security Council does nothing, due to the vetoes of the United States. There is no distinction between “combatants” and “civilians.” The horrors of the genocide and apartheid must be stopped.
Asked about his role in trying to win over followers of “Christian Zionism,” Kuttab called it a “nefarious doctrine,” religion being used to promote violence, in organizations which profess Christianity, Islam, and Judaism. We don’t need to kill our enemies, but “understand people in their own terms. Violence and war will solve nothing.”
Mossi Raz, a former member of the Israeli Knesset and the former head of Peace Now, challenged Professor Kuttab for not also condemning the Hamas raid of Oct. 7, listing the crimes for which they are accused by Israel. Nonetheless, we must put an end to this war, and to the occupation of Palestine by Israel since the 1967 war, and create a Palestinian state either in the pre-1967 borders or some other borders agreed to by both sides, which secure the rights of the people.
Professor Kuttab later responded to Raz, arguing that Raz was “ignoring everything which happened before and after Oct. 7,” and that regardless, every side must follow international law.
Fernando Garzón, head of the Ecuadorian-Palestinian Union, drew out the comparison between Hiroshima and Gaza, in terms of deaths and physical destruction, and argued that the “normalization” of scenes of genocide is designed to prepare people for even greater horrors to come: for nuclear war. He concluded saying the peace movement must present solutions, linking peace to development and technological progress, like the Schiller Institute’s Oasis Plan does.
Independent LaRouche Congressional candidate Jose Vega (Bronx CD15) reported on a team that organized at the UN this week with a leaflet about Dr. Mark Perlmutter’s report on the horror of the medical situation in Gaza. Vega showed a video documenting how UN security personnel were confiscating the leaflets from delegates and others entering the UN building.
Dennis Small closed the meeting, noting that a “pause” in the drive to nuclear war is useful, but that there must be a change of thinking—that identifying crimes alone will not solve the problem, but that, like in the Peace of Westphalia, crimes must be forgiven and cooperation must replace conflict.
