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This transcript appears in the September 18, 2015 issue of Executive Intelligence Review.
SEPT. 12 MANHATTAN CONFERENCE DIALOGUE:

It Is Feasible To Dump Obama
and End This Plan of War

[PDF version of this transcript]

Speed: Now we're going right to our question and answer period.

Q: Hello, I'm E— from Russian Center, New York, and I thank you very much, Helga, for such a nice presentation. I have one question which bothers me a lot, and I'm very concerned. Recently, you talked about this move—Russian military to Syria. Is there any chance that Americans would back a Russian initiative? Or do you think it's going to be the opposite? I'm a little bit concerned about this confrontation between U.S. troops and Russian troops, so what do you think is the possibility that they can really come together and fight ISIS at this point?

Zepp-LaRouche: I think it's not totally decided yet. And I'm not saying I have the last information on it; I'm only going on press reports, which say that the White House was completely caught by surprise. And that there is a big faction fight where one faction says, why don't we just work with the Russians and stabilize Assad, because ISIS is the bigger problem? And there is another faction which is against that. So I don't think it's yet decided.

But I think it was a true flank. You know, when you are confronted with an almost unsolvable problem, an excellent military commander always thinks about the flank; you don't bang your head against the wall in a head-to-head confrontation. Obviously, the situation in Syria had reached a point where, because Erdogan had bombed the PKK, and the PKK was practically the most efficient force outside the Syrian army to fight ISIS; and Erdogan had about two years ago requested Patriot missiles from the United States, Holland and Germany, and they were moved there and they had created a no-fly zone over parts of Syria, since the range of these Patriot missiles was much larger than to the Turkish border.

That no-fly zone allowed ISIS to advance almost to the suburbs of Damascus. And at that point, either Russia would have done nothing, and then the danger would have been that ISIS takes over Damascus; and, as you know, Russia has this naval port Tartous, and it's building a second naval military facility a little bit further north.

At that point the question was, and people realized that if ISIS takes over all of Syria, then the next countries falling would be Jordan and Lebanon. And it is estimated that if that happened, then terrorism would, in a limitless way, go after Europe everywhere. And naturally it is a security threat also for Russia, because a lot of the ISIS fighters are Chechens; for China, because they are into Xinjiang, and working with the Uighurs. So there is a European, Chinese, Russian interest to stop this, because you know this is a barbaric phenomenon.

Obama Thrown Off-Balance

So Putin then made this surprise move. Probably it was planned for a long time, to coincide also with the United Nations General Assembly. And I think that it really makes it so obvious where is right and where is wrong at this point, and I just hope there are enough military, diplomats, intelligence people, in the United States who say that the best way to get out of this is that the United States would join hands with Russia to do this. And that the moment will be at the United Nations General Assembly. In the time between now and then, we must all activate, multiply our own efforts to cause the international community to demand that. Because where should be the place to discuss that, if not in the United Nations General Assembly? That is the only available world court, so to speak; the whole world is looking at it; that's the place where you can bring it up.

UN/Joshua Kristal
President Vladimir Putin at his last appearance at the UN General Assembly, in September 2005. His intervention this year, scheduled for September 28, holds the potential for revolutionary change internationally.

So let's make a gigantic effort that this becomes the change which is so urgently needed.

Speed: Lyn, let me just ask you, do you have any response to that?

LaRouche: No, I think Helga does a good job when she wants to do it. [Laughter.]

Q: Good afternoon, this is J— W—, from Brooklyn, New York, and I want to first address Mr. LaRouche. Good afternoon, Mr. LaRouche, how are you doing? And I want to say that I'm sorry I missed your birthday party. I had to take care of my grandson, who is really cute, by the way, and I will be at the next one, okay?

And with that said, this is my question. It's something in the same vein of the young woman who just spoke. We have seen President Obama, a puppet of the British Empire, promise to fight terrorism while introducing economic and military policies that actually escalate terrorism. Now last week, Mr. LaRouche enlightened us as to the history of the destruction of the cooperation between Israel and other nations in the region, by the British and British-run operations. And we know that in somewhat the same way, British operations have been enhanced in the U.S. through despicable policies put in place under the noses of the American people.

Now, in the same vein, the Israel government, and I want to make it clear that I am not talking against the Jewish people of Israel, or any other Jewish groups; I'm talking about the government of Israel and their policies that support the Al Nusra, which is an ally of al-Qaeda and ISIS in Syria. With the United Nations meeting next week, right here in New York City, by the way, what do you feel,—and this is for Helga, or for Mr. LaRouche,—what do you feel Putin will have to do to deal with Israel, and at the same time, garner support from other nations, in his plan to deal with ISIS, and therefore, indirectly, deal with Obama?

LaRouche: I would say, in this case, that what Putin has done has actually thrown Obama off balance, and things have to be taken from that standpoint of reference. I've followed this thing carefully, and I've watched what Putin was doing, and I began to warn some of our people what was up, what was really happening. That Putin acted to exploit the stupidity of Obama, and Obama brought defeat upon himself.

Now, we hope that defeat is more than permanent, to get rid of him. We want him out of the government under the 25th Amendment, which provides for such actions. But what the issue is, is that there is actually a peace movement implicit in what Putin did. It's not simply some accident, some coincidence.

If you look carefully, you look what happened in the course of this thing in terms of Germany. Now Germany was in a totally accepted submission to Obama on this question of policy. That disappeared. It disappeared when Germany supported the poor refugees, who were facing death in parts of Europe, especially in Germany. You find other developments like that; that Obama's destiny is downward. It could be permanently downward. We would hope that the result of the discussions during the coming meetings of this month, will actually bring the Obama Ddministration out of existence. That Obama will go someplace else, let him not do this any more. Let's get rid of other people. Huh? Cheney, Dick Cheney, "Dirty Dick" Cheney, another one of these characters. And if Bush had any brains, he'd be dangerous.

Therefore the problem is of that nature, that we have a situation where Putin has acted, opportunely, to deal with the opportunity which was presented by the foolishness of Obama. In other words, Obama's own greed and stupidity have been the instrument by which his future is being destroyed now.

Speed: Senator Gravel wants to...

Gravel: I'd like to add a little comment on something that's barely been touched on. If you look very closely, you realize that the United States foreign policy in the Middle East has been dictated out of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. [Applause] And it operates through AIPAC primarily, and I've had my run-ins with AIPAC then and since.

White House/Pete Souza
Neither Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (left) nor Barack Obama, both de facto British agents, can look forward to a promising future. Here they prepare to talk in the Oval Office on March 5, 2012.

But I think you must appreciate that this [the failure of the Congress to kill the P5+1 deal-ed.] is the first time, no the second time, in my knowledge, that AIPAC lost out, or the Jewish community leadership lost out in a confrontation over an issue. The last time was when I voted with respect to others on the jets to Sadat, which were opposed by AIPAC. And I've seen instances where a White House decision was made at 9 o'clock, and by 10:30 there was a majority letter, signed by a majority number of Senators opposing that policy. It worked like magic. But this is the first time that you've seen the Democratic Senators [do this], other than the three who have gone along with Netanyahu.

Now we've really got to thank Netanyahu for what he's done for us. Because what he's done, in my mind, is break the back of the power of what the Israeli government has over the United States. You're going to see this played out. There's going to be payback in the political process with respect with Netanyahu. And I would suspect that this defeat they've suffered will drive Netanyahu from office at some point in the next year or so.

And maybe I'm just wishful thinking and hoping that's the case, but you've got to keep in mind that the Jewish community is not of one voice any more. It was for a great deal of time. What's unfortunate is that the Jewish community, the wealthy people, are older and conservative. And so therefore those are the ones that have been pushing the policies that have been foisted on the United States Congress. And bear in mind, that now that the Republicans have taken over in their association with the Jewish Community to the detriment, political detriment, of Democrats, that in itself is an earthshaking development.

Planet Ponzi

And so what is going to happen as a result of this? Either it will neutralize any influence that we have, and we have very little in the Middle East with respect to being an honest broker, because we're not, never have been, and I don't think we can ever become an honest broker. No. Will Putin and others move into this category? I think we are going to see this at the UN General Assembly.

I'll be speaking at the press club, which is the association of reporters at the UN, at 11 o'clock on Monday, and I'll be carrying the same message about the importance of the Chinese moves, of the loss of influence of the Jewish community on the American body politic, and where the future lies. And I must say, I know you are very enamored of the fact that the United States should and could; and the problem is that it hasn't in the past, and if it doesn't, the question is who is going to do it? And I think it will be a combination of China and Russia, and what I think we can hope for with the influence of your organization, is to get us to go along with that leadership. That's my hope on it.

But bear in mind that this was a very cataclysmic change in power that was suffered by the leadership of the Jewish community in the United States of America.

Q: Hi there Senator, Helga, Mr. LaRouche. My name is Mitch Feierstein. I'm an investment banker and the author of a book called Planet Ponzi, which discusses the debt and the debt problem that we have. I believe that the situation that we have is not sustainable—the $230 trillion that the U.S. has in debt. There were several good points that were made here today about the European Union and about the BRICS. For people who don't know who the BRICS are, it's Brazil, Russia, India, and China.

Gravel: And South Africa.

Q: [follow-up] Sorry, and South Africa.

So I think that what we need to talk about is how we got into the state that we're in. There's too much debt, too much credit, and too much leverage, which started when Glass-Steagall [was repealed] under Larry Summers, the Treasury Secretary, and Robert Rubin who's ex-Goldman Sachs came in. What's happened is the debt has escalated from 1999 to the beginning of the credit crisis in 2007. China's debt has gone up from $6 trillion in the past six years to over $30 trillion. Russia, on the other hand, is probably the only country that runs a surplus.

An International Opening

What we're seeing now is the European Union is falling apart, with the mass of immigration from Syria and the countries where our foreign policy has failed. So I guess my question to you would be, if you could go back 25 years ago and look at what our economic policy has been, and the foundations by Larry Summers and Paul Krugman and the same people, does it strike you that Albert Einstein summed it up best when he said, "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting to achieve a different result?"

LaRouche: I would reply to that proposition on two points. First of all, Einstein is the proper person to refer to, if you understand the entire history of the U.S. economy since the beginning of the Twentieth Century, because we have been in a long period of moral decline, despite things like Franklin Roosevelt. And Kennedy was a great President, actually, if he hadn't been killed, and his brother hadn't been killed.

The problem lies in the idea of Wall Street. Wall Street is the center of this, because what's the situation now? Wall Street is hopelessly bankrupt. It's super-bankrupt. What keeps Wall Street alive is an inflation, in worthless Wall Street money, and as long as people believe that that money which passes through Wall Street and pays off a few people, as long as they trust that, they're going to be suckers. And Einstein, of course, is the kind of person who would cause a problem about that.

Ryan Lawler
One of the biggest sources of inflation in the U.S. economy—the New York Stock Exchange.

But what we're faced with now, we have to do very simply. There's a very simple solution here. We have to simply go back to a Glass-Steagall policy, the one of President Franklin Roosevelt, exactly. Now, Franklin Roosevelt's policy in this regard is somewhat outdated, because the conditions have been outdated, but in principle, if you apply the principle rather than the details, his policy was the policy which is now required. Because all of Wall Street, the whole shebang, is absolutely worthless and should be closed down immediately!

Now, with this thing that's happening this month now, we have an opening, an international opening, because around the world similar kinds of conditions exist. France is in a mess, Italy is almost destroyed, Spain is almost destroyed, Portugal—you can't even find it, that's how bad it is. So these and related kinds of things all come together with the problem in the United States. This is the time for an international Glass-Steagall reform, which cleans up the mess, and waste and fraud, which is shared among various nations. And by cutting out this artificial inflation,—and it is artificial inflation,—when an agency under the power of government begins creating investments which are non-value, that is no value, and no value whatsoever to mankind,—that system has to come to an end on a global scale.

Now this reference to Russia's policy in this question is relevant, but it's not the solution. It can be part of the solution, but what we need to do is actually,—and the United States should do it,—throw Obama out of office right now. We have the 25th Amendment to do that job. Immediately go into a Glass-Steagall reform, which means you cancel Wall Street, all those values which are called Wall Street values, which are fake values, cancel them.

We can take the properties in Manhattan, for example, which have this kind of occupation and say, "What's your income worth," and they don't have much to say. So some agency, of course, like a Franklin Roosevelt agency, would have to step in and organize a redemption of those properties which have some functional use, and use that as one of the ways of getting the reconstruction of the U.S. economy. And doing that will mean that the United States will be highly devoted to what that will have created, and I think that other nations will be equally affected.

Q: [follow-up] I think that one thing I'll follow with is T-TIP, you know the trade agreement that is a secret agreement. The United States has gone from a republic to a republic-democracy, and from democracy to plutocracy, and we're headed towards tyranny, where we're not even allowed to see what this agreement is all about. The Federal Reserve, which is a bunch of non-elected officials under Janet Yellen, and Ben Bernanke, and predecessor Greenspan, have run their balance sheet up to over $5 trillion. And as you rightly pointed out, Mr. LaRouche, the guarantees that were given to Wall Street were over $100 trillion. So our country is not in a position right now where we can get out from underneath the debt, so U.S. dollar hegemony is going to come to a rapid end, I think sooner than a lot of people think. Thanks for your thoughts on that. What do you think about the dollar?

The Israeli Case

LaRouche: [laughs] I think we can recreate the dollar.

Gravel: Today,—and it's very historic,—the person who has taken over the leadership of the Labour Party, which is the only alternative government that exists to Cameron, is a person, essentially his views are the same as Bernie Sanders. And one of the major platform issues is he wants to institute the concept of Glass-Steagall in Britain, if he's elected to take over the government. So this is a significant occurrence today. I don't know if you're aware of it. This could be as earthshaking as what I think happened to Netanyahu.

Q: Good afternoon. Mr. Lyndon, Helga. I was born in Russia, I came to the United States 20 years ago, the most beautiful country in the world. If I, being a Russian, go to Germany, for example, I would still be a Russian in Germany. But the only country in the world in which I can become a citizen is the United States. I love the United States, but I'm very surprised by the people who control the United States for the simple reason that they're not even Americans. The people who control the United States,—these are not Americans. So my feedback on Syria is, see after Sept. 11, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya; so my feedback on that, it's got nothing to do with Sept. 11. I studied history when I was younger, and I realized that history always repeats itself. So, Roman mentality was "divide and conquer." Once you make a chaos, it's easy to control. And once something happens, you should see who benefits the most.

So I think the crisis which is happening in the Middle East right now, if you think who would benefit from the turmoil. My mom was a Jew, so basically, I'm half-Russian, half-Jewish, so it could be your truth, it could be my truth, it could be whole truth, it's in general.

So the Jews for 2,000 years, they want to rebuild Solomon's Temple, because if you don't make a sacrifice in the Temple you're not redeemed. The people who control this country are the Masons—you can check this out—they truly believe the Temple should be rebuilt. So that's what they believe in. So basically, my point of view right now is, they want to make all this chaos; you see, where the Solomon Temple is right now in Israel, there are two holy Muslim spots, which cannot be removed. But once the Middle East becomes turmoil, you can do anything you want to do.

So basically, I'm thinking, that's one of the biggest reasons why the situation in the Middle East is the way it is: The Masons want to rebuild the Temple for one reason; the Jews want to rebuild the Temple for another reason. But it all comes down to the same thing.

Me, personally, I truly believe there is a God, who engineered it all. Once I came to this country 20 years ago, I see all the spots, "God Bless America, God Bless America." I don't see it any more, I'll be honest with you. If I was to say to somebody "God bless you," he would look at me like I'm crazy. I've been honest with you, but I truly believe in that God engineered it for a reason, for a purpose, or we come from monkeys, so make a decision. I truly believe I came from God. I'm finished.

LaRouche: I can answer this thing. I think the point is, I think it's the wrong emphasis, because the point is, we think on details. We think on a detailed experience, a local one. That doesn't make any sense to me.

I look at a longer term, say the period of the Great Renaissance, the Great Renaissance in Europe, for example. And that was destroyed. That was destroyed by a later development. And then there was a development again. Leibniz, for example, was one of the people like Kepler before him, who created a whole civilization. The civilization was essentially international. It does not mean that it included directly all nations, but the process of civilization has been international, in the main.

If you want to account for these things, you try to pick some particular deal, and you say, wait a minute; let's stop right there. Isn't this a part of a larger operation, which is doing it?

Now, the case of the Israeli case, I'm quite familiar with it, because I was involved in this when the Israeli organization was being created, as a military organization. And I associated myself with that institution, and as long as it lived, it was a so-called socialistic union. And they were a military operation. And I was in close support of them, for my own capacity, and I had people who were going into Israel, Jewish persons who going into Israel, to colonize the area.

And then they got knocked out, by whom? By the British Empire! And a British Empire election did it. And then you had assassinations of leading figures, Jewish figures in Israel, who were knocked out again and again by the British control,—and what you have in Israel right now is, you have the British system is controlling Israel right now from the top down. We should hope that that will be changed, very soon.

The Sources of Corruption

Q: Good afternoon. My name is M— G—, and I've been a student of history my whole life, and I thoroughly enjoyed it up to a few years ago, when I realized most of what I learned was all lies. [laughter] And so, it's now a re-investigation of all history that makes it interesting. What I've also learned is that we really don't have a government in the United States. What we have is basically treasonous paid-for prostitutes.

So, with that being said, there seem to be secret organizations that Kennedy spoke of, such as the Trilateral Commission, the Bilderberg Group, the Illuminati, Council on Foreign Affairs; and I believe within those groups, there's between three and five hundred men that control the whole planet. And the true Axis of Evil is the U.S. government, the British government, and the Israeli government, because they're the ones creating all the hostilities in the world, and that are perpetuating the wars.

My question to you gentlemen,—which I have to tell you, I'm astounded the amount of wisdom and honesty that I had to come to a Manhattan basement to learn, after listening to my government for 54 years,—not including Kennedy, of course, because I loved him. But the rest of the B.S. I've heard my whole life just makes me want to vomit. And I think there's more intelligence here than the whole group of people running for President, or that we've had.

So hopefully one of you gentlemen, or this young lady here, runs for President, because you're certainly smarter than all the people running for President put together right now.

LaRouche: I don't know if Helga wants to get involved in that!

Q: [follow-up] So, basically, I personally feel that these secret organizations are at their zenith of power,—and they are the ones controlling it. And you know, we talk of Obama. The guy's a puppet, just like the rest of the government, and to me they're just evil people, but they're being controlled. In your opinions, who's really pulling the strings? Who are really the bad guys?

LaRouche: Well, the history is, the British Empire is still today the one answer. Most corruption in the United States came from the Southerners. Why? Because the Southern part of the United States was corrupt from its conception, in opposition to our greatest leaders at that time. And repeatedly, we've had repeated things. Who were behind this? The British Empire was behind it, all of it.

Q: [Follow-up] I suspect we're kind of vague in that, and maybe if people are a little reluctant to throw names out, I will, and tell me if I'm right. The Rothschilds, Soros, Rockefeller—are they the bad guys?

LaRouche: They're part of it, but that's only a small part. You have many people in government in the United States, who fit the same category. You see it on the street. You see it in people who don't even know that they are evil, and doing evil things. They have evil ideas; their religious beliefs, or similar things. No, the corruption is not the individuals. The corruption lies in the process. That's been the history. And our history of the United States, particularly with Alexander Hamilton's study, and what he did, as opposed to what his opponents did. And that's the real story.

The idea that there are particular bad people running loose. Yeah, I know about the mafia. They're bad people. I know that. But the mafia is not the instrument of evil. It is merely the errand boys of local evil. So, the issues have to go deeper. They go to matters of principle, not to gossip.

What is Money?

Gravel: There was a study done years back in Switzerland by an institute, and what they studied was the aggregation of wealth in the hands of institutions, and they looked at 45,000 institutions that were of a transnational nature. And they winnowed it down to 1500 institutions who controlled the majority, substantial majority, of the world's wealth. These institutions were basically—the top ten were banks, and the others were the families that you associate... And so, when you talk about the Bilderberg, and the Trilateral, these are people who get together for their enlightened self-interest, as they perceive it. And they make various deals in that regard.

Q: [follow-up] ...geopolitics, and decide who and what it's going to be...

Gravel: Yeah, in a de facto kind of way. But as Lyndon was just saying, it's a little deeper than that. It has a moral component to it, that if you're a billionaire, you don't understand the rest of the people, just don't understand, and it's not within their moral comprehension about equality. Because what you think is that this is a God-given right, or gift, that you've got, because you're a billionaire. And so, that's the group of people who essentially operate the economic systems.

What I really liked, Lyndon, was when Lagarde, who heads up the IMF, said that the solution to Greece was just, forget their debt. And I would like to see a concept—and you may want to comment on this—a concept that we use the bankruptcy principle. And that is, that the world's bankrupt, the U.S. is bankrupt, but let's just wipe out all this debt! Who gets hurt with that? The bankers. And they'll write this off, and the world will start a new economic beginning, and burgeoning. So, that's my take on what you said.

Q: Speaking of China getting stronger in the world through development, this past week, ground was broken, I believe, in Springfield, Massachusetts for a company to start building trains, and the company—I forget the name, but it was a company from China—Oh, my name is G—from Massachusetts, and my question is: How do we replace the likes of Boehner, McConnell, as well as Obama, and move to working with the BRICS nations?

LaRouche: Well, what you're asking is a broad question, which is often mentioned, but without a solution being attached to the question. The thing is, this is not really where it's located. Look, it's located in questions of policy. And the question is not the individual per se. It's a question of policy.

What do you mean by policy? You mean the Constitution. Well, if you pick up the Constitution, how is it observed? Is it being actually observed? Or was there an error in it? And these are the things that will decide what will be done efficiently. What will be done as a matter of apparent comment, is not relevant. Because people just don't have that kind of knowledge. They all have ideas about what is wrong, what is right, but they don't know what they're talking about.

For example, take the case of money. And most of this stuff calls to money. Now, what is money, and how is money understood? Well, that's nonsense. Money has no intrinsic value. Money has no intrinsic value. And so all the stuff about speculation on money doesn't solve the question, the essential question. Because, for example, we're talking about mankind. We're not talking about animals. We're talking about mankind. And what defines mankind's appropriate behavior as mankind? And that's what you apply. You don't try to find out who's wrong, who's doing this, who's doing that. Everybody can be wrong. The question is, are you going to solve the problem? Are you going to identify...?

What's the problem? Well, are you going to produce a child, whom you develop, who is going to be a better scientist than you are? And that's the standard. We have a system of money, and a system of policy, which is based on the wrong values.

Anthony Berger/Brady National Photographics Art Gallery
President Abraham Lincoln with his son Tad.

Now, our Constitutional system, when properly advised, will lead in the direction of the answer. Because what's the answer? The answer is, that each generation of mankind, all people are going to die. All human beings are going to die. We know of no case where there's an exception. So, what's the answer? Will the next generation of people be able to make a contribution to the future of mankind, and mankind's behavior?

The green policy, for example,—anybody who supports the green policy, is an enemy of mankind, in principle. Because the requirement for mankind is that mankind must develop the human species to a higher level. That is, to a higher level. There's really an authentic religious meaning to it. That mankind is the only species which has this gift of immortality in that nature. And it's the maintenance of that behavior, and the behavior that goes with that, which realizes the intention of a Creator.

That's the basis on which all morality has to be based. Otherwise it's just junk. It's gossip.

Obama and Iran

Q: Hi, Mr. LaRouche. I am K— from the Bronx. When we are told a lie, and we believe the lie, and then we are told the truth, we go on believing the lie. I am having a very great deal of difficulty wrapping my brain around Obama trying to do something, anything, beneficial to this country or to the world. My concern is the Iranian agreement. I don't approve of sanctions; I don't feel they benefit. I realize Iran has a right to their money. I am very concerned about how they're going to use their money. I'm afraid they're going to create a lot of harm with it.

Now, Obama is leading us into thermonuclear war, and yet we are being told—I think it's coming from LaRouche—that the Iranian agreement is going to lead to peace. How can Obama take us into a thermonuclear war, and create peace on the other hand?

I understand that Russia is moving, and I do believe they are moving as best they can towards trying to create a peaceful world, and I see that a new paradigm is being created, and Iran is an ally of Russia. Is Russia going to draw Iran into a more peaceful mentality? That's really my question.

LaRouche: The answer essentially is Obama. Obama is the immediate factor, most relevant immediate factor in that problem right now. I know I've dealt with this thing with Iran, and I understand it. It's gone through various stages of evolution, since the time of the overthrow of the old Shah. You're absolutely right on this thing. This is simply a matter of understanding a higher value, that the standard is, what does mankind require? And what is mankind that mankind should require a solution of that type? And we try to get people to come to an agreement, and not do harm to one another. And I think if you have the right kind of environment, and can maintain it, you can carry out that policy.

Gravel: I want to speak directly to that. I've been to Tehran. I've keynoted a conference over there. I'm interviewed almost weekly by PressTV, and I've got to tell you, you've got nothing to worry about from Iran. Nothing at all, nothing at all. And what they're going to use that money for: They'll use it for themselves, and they'll use it for their allies. Who are their allies? Hezbollah. Here, the American government has defined Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. That's because of Israel's view on that.

So, we support Israel, and they do some terrible things. Are we a terrorist country because of that? The Non-Proliferation Treaty is very clear that Iran has never violated that agreement. They're signators to it. Now the United States violates it all the time—all the time. And so, when we put sanctions on them, who the hell are we to sanction anybody in the world? It's American arrogance and imperialism!

And so, when you look at Iran, we were able to bring along Europe, we were able to bring along the United Nations. When I was in Tehran, I went to the war museum and saw a United Nations resolution on the wall that said that Iran was the guilty party, and that Saddam Hussein was "our ally" in trying to punish them, because of the revolution that they had. And that they had the temerity to embarrass the superpower of the world for 444 days—that's something that's seared into the American psyche, and the reaction was this unbelievable fear, and the unjust things we've done towards Iran.

Iran has never sought a nuclear weapon. And the day after the signature took place in Vienna, President Rouhani, the President, said finally, we've got an agreement that we won't have the bomb we never want to have anyway. The Ayatollah Khomeini, when the revolution took places, he put forth a fatwa twice, and the recent leader has got a fatwa out there also. Now, a fatwa is where the religious head interprets the Koran in its legal form. And so the fatwa is very simple: "We will not touch, or get involved, in weapons of mass destruction. We read the Koran that way."

And so if you look at this theocracy, which is what Iran is today, and you say, well, sure they want the bomb—they never did it, they never wanted it, and there's no intelligence organization in the world that has any evidence that they've sought the bomb! This is all a fabrication of Netanyahu 20 years ago, when he was telling us that they're going to have the bomb in a year, or two years. And he's been doing that, and it's been sanctioned in the American media, and the world media, accepting that Iran is this terrible, terrible country.

What is Unique about Man?

I've got to tell you, from what I've observed in Iran, it's second to none in terms of scientific accomplishment. What we've done for Iran with our sanctions, is make them the only independent nation in the world. They put up satellites. When you stand in downtown Tehran, you look around, you can count ten different derricks for building. And then you drive down the street, and it's traffic like New York. Now, for me, that's a sense of prosperity. And so to think that we've brought them to their knees, not at all. They obviously want to get their money back, the $150 billion; it's their money. And whenever you hear American leaders saying, "Well, it's terrible, they're going to go to war and they're going to spend this money; they're going to kill Americans,"—we kill Iranians!

Russian TV coverage of the Sept. 12, 2011 launching of Iran’s Bushehr nuclear power plant—the first civilian nuclear power plant in Southwest Asia.

So, it's really the American media, the American people are so uninformed about Persia. Persia is like China. They go back thousands of years in their contribution to human civilization, and when they say that Persia is anti-Semitic, it's ridiculous. One of the leaders of Persia, is the one who ended the Babylonian incarceration of the Jewish population, and brought them freedom. And you've got a Jewish community in Iran. And incidentally, there are Jews elected to the Parliament in Iran. So, to fabricate this situation is just ridiculous.

My words to you are, have no fear. The fact that they will now be recognized for what they are, as a very gifted people, with education. In Iran you have a situation where you go to school as a child, and you can go for a PhD at the end if you choose, and all of it's paid for by the government. They're just like the Chinese in this regard. They value teaching. And of course, the majority of the population of Iran is under 25.

Q: Hi, Lyn. It's A— here. On the calls we've been discussing the possibility in seeing breaks from Obama that can finally turn the tide, and remove him. The one that I'd read recently that I thought would be useful to bring up, is that I understand, there's an article that I read, that 50 NASA former astronauts and engineers have come out writing to the head of NASA, for them to change their position,—this greenie position,—on global warming, because indeed, we do see articles and so-called studies and things being done that support that fascist ideology. And what it seemed to me was, not really just to save NASA, but this represents to me another break from Obama, as the lead Greenie in the planet.

So, that that might be kind of an additional pile-on effect. And it seems that there are more and more people now that are finding the courage, whether it's in the intelligence community, or the scientific community, to display the kind of courage that the Senator did earlier in his career, at great risk to himself, not only from a professional or career standpoint, but right down to their very lives, as you and Helga have continued to demonstrate that. And so, we want to continue that break, and we want to demonstrate that same type of courage, as we come close to removing Obama. and I'd like to hear what you have to say on that.

LaRouche: I would say, mainly, the green policy is Satanic. It's inherently Satanic. Because just from the standpoint of the theological level, it's easy to make the case. What is the purpose, what is unique about mankind, that is not unique about the animals? It's that mankind is the only species we know of, which actually develops to a higher level, and whose development and progress in that development, defines his species.

EIRNS/Ali Sharaf
The anti-nuclear Green policy is inherently Satanic. Here, an anti-nuclear demonstration in Germany in September 2009.

This becomes a theological question, but it's also a scientific question. Mankind is the only species which is able to rise as a species from volition, from volition, and it's mankind's power of volition which makes this possible. And the green policy has always been a policy of genocide. It always was, and the policy of Obama is genocide, for example. And that's the issue.

The idea—people get confused about this religious issue. The point is, what is the difference between mankind and an animal? What's the difference? Therefore, if you define your species as human, what does that mean about your behavior? Your orientation in life? Your ambitions? Your devotions? What are they? Mankind is a unique species, and mankind has to behave like this unique species it is. And when you put a green policy into effect, you are actually—you're Satanic, actually. You're fairly described as a Satanic person. Because it's mankind's obligation to promote the species of mankind, in terms of—as Einstein did, in his own pragmatic way, he did exactly that. And he forced the elimination of what Bertrand Russell did.

Russell's Legacy

And what's the policy today that corresponds? Bertrand Russell's legacy. The British legacy, the British Empire's legacy. That's what evil is. And when people go against the obligation—and sometimes they're just innocent people; they don't really know what they're talking about, they don't know what the issue is—but they have a feeling about the issue. It comes like in family relationships. Families develop a sense of loyalty to the idea of the family: that they're supposed to create children, or help people to do the same thing, so that one generation is going to better than the next, will be better informed, will be a better achievement, will be a more advanced condition for mankind.

The typical thing is you get all kinds of great scientists. Kepler; Kepler discovered the Solar System. He discovered the Solar System; not by some mathematical magic, but he discovered it. Now we have a Galactic System, but the discovery of the Galactic System is a more powerful system and more urgent for the concerns of mankind, than even that system was.

And so therefore, mankind has a natural instinct built into mankind when it's not corrupted, to always ensure that the living generations are superior in their achievement to those that already lived. This used to be normal; I mean, the whole immigrants' process in the United States was full of that: the idea that better people are developed. How? By their own self-development, and by the means by which they're given access to that development.

And what Obama represents,—frankly this man is theologically and otherwise Satanic, period. [applause]


Q: It's been a challenge and I'm very honored to be working with you people for 20 years. I'm going to put my question out really quick, because otherwise I know I'm going to go too far; and then I'm going to footnote it a little bit. And the question is involved in my work with young people; particularly the 20-ish age group, young men and women, whom sometimes I interface with. And they get excited and they get interested; and they begin to talk among themselves and with me and with others about the ideas that we are talking about here, of course. And they go home, and they run into a hammer mill; and they get scared and they run away. And I kind of sense perhaps that their parents don't trust their own children's ability or necessity even to pursue these matters.

And I think of myself and the kind of things that I did, when I first met you people and I went out and I started talking about you; and this I'm going to say outright, it was in the Cornell University area. And I began to say after a while that there was something magic in your name. The reason for that is that if I got somebody to go into the Cornell or Ithaca community and talk about you, use your name and pursue your ideas, or question about you; that they would be sooner or later be attacked by somebody, who would be attacking their intelligence, their ability to reason. They'd kind of direct you to get out of the domain of intelligence and reasoning because you don't qualify. And of course, that's an insult.

And then I find these people, the next time I saw them, I could see in their eyes that they're mad as soon as they approach me; they're upset. So, I know what they've done; so I called that magic. And so, I think what I'm seeing with young people,—my question then is, how best to handle that, when I'm talking with these young people?

LaRouche: Well, let's give it a case. We had up until the Twentieth Century, the leading tendency in trans-European areas was to develop populations which had the equivalent of scientific abilities. What happened was, at the beginning of the Twentieth Century, there was a change. And the change was introduced chiefly by Bertrand Russell. And by that period, by the time that I was going to school, I was up against Satan, in fact; because that was what the policy was. The policy was that mathematics was the basis for reality. Now, mathematics is not the basis for reality; but people are hypnotized into believing that it is.

A Moment of Truth

Einstein was one of the people who was scolded because he didn't believe in these so-called practical forms of mathematics. And mathematics does not do anything for you, really, in terms of the advancement of the human species; it doesn't work.

Albert Einstein Society, Bern
The Twentieth Century’s pre-eminent scientist, Albert Einstein, at Princeton in 1950.

And that's what I've been dedicated to; I've devoted my whole self to this policy for all my life, ever since I was in early school grades. I never accepted mathematics. I knew it was wrong from the beginning; that you cannot base a science on mathematics. And therefore you have to have an insight into those principles of discovery which were well known in earlier centuries; but which began to disappear during the course of the Twentieth Century and presently on. And therefore, the educational systems available to students in schools today, is almost genocide in one sense or the other.

Zepp-LaRouche: Well, this happens all over the world. If I look back for the last several decades of our organizing internationally, that particular phenomenon—what you are describing—is happening all the time. It happened to industrialists in Milan, who were told that if they don't stop working with us, their business will be destroyed. It happens to people in all ranges of—important people, less important people; and I can only say this was the same effort as demonizing Russia; as demonizing China.

And in a sense, this is the method. How do you prevent somebody from doing something different from what the establishment wants? You slander them, you say terrible things about them; you make it look as if something terrible happens to you if you don't quit working with these people. It works for a long time; because it induces a kind of fear. People are afraid that they're being dropped by their peer group, or something will happen to their career, or whatever.

Over the years, we have seen that the slanders are tailored to the specific group which is targeted. For example, if it's a trade unionist, they used to say—now no longer—"They are CIA." If it's an industrialist, they say, "Oh, they are KGB." If it's a Protestant, they say, "They are financed by the Vatican." And so forth and so on. So, they tailor the slanders to fit the fear-pattern of that particular group. And it works for a very long time; but I think now we have reached a point where it's what Lincoln identified: You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.

I think we have now reached a point where people realize that there is a moment of truth. So, you should just tell people that that's the method, and they shouldn't fall for it. In a certain sense, they have to make up their mind: do they want to be part of something which is clearly a destructive force, or do they want to be part of what is the solution? And only truth-seeking people will ever have the courage to stand up. So, you have to give up the idea that you can convince everybody; because people who are mediocre or cowards, you will not win them over. You can only do this to strengthen those who have the moral fiber to withstand tyranny. That's my answer. [applause]

Q: E—, native New Yorker; that's New York State, not New York City.

Europe has been unsuccessful at reproduction; but Islamic states from Indonesia to Morocco have been very successful at reproduction. Islamic nations have a long tradition of excellence in university education that is longer than the European university system. How can Europe best utilize resources from the Islamic world to rebuild its depleted workforce? That's my question.

Gravel: With a migration from the Middle East, in fact, that's the blessing in disguise. Because all of the countries that are being impacted have a problem of gentrification. Which is what made America great: It's not who is here, it's who came here and what they brought—and they don't all have to be educated. They just have to have the will to succeed. And whenever I hear a person like earlier, we had this person saying America's great, and it's the leaders,—well, that's really true. You get most of the immigrants who have a higher opinion of America than many Americans. And this is understandable, because what they're living off of is the American values that were created much, much earlier, and are not being moving up to the top in terms of leadership.

A Vision of the Future

All of this with the exception that we Americans are a violent people; you know, what we did to the indigenous people of this continent, and then what we did with slavery, and now what we still see as the legacy of that. And when Nixon realized that "Hey, we can take the South from the Democrats; all we got to do is play to the white males." And that's what's going on in the Congress today; a lot of this Republican stuff is racist, rancid racism! I just want to add that to you.

Zepp-LaRouche: Well, I think it has to do with a question of a vison of the future. If people have the hope that there will be a future, they tend to like to procreate.

You have now in the United States in America, the first generation, the first time where people are satisfied with the fact that the coming generations will be worse off than the present ones. That has never existed in America's whole history; that's a completely new phenomenon. And I think that that is a sign of a dying society. And if people accept that it will go downhill, then it will go downhill.

So, my hope is that, I mean I have never believed, and there I agree with the Senator in what he said about the United States; I have always said I don't put the saving of Germany on Germany. I have always said I have to encircle Germany to crack it from the outside; through Russia, through China, through other developments. And I think that is exactly what is happening now; because the main center of development now is not Europe, and in a certain sense, it's also not the United States.

The center of development is the BRICS countries, is centered around China. And there is the growth, there is the momentum; that is where people have a future. Why do you think the BRICS countries have all a space program? Why do you think the Chinese have the most advanced space program? Because they are thinking about the next epoch of evolution. And I think what we want to do is, we want to rekindle—I mean, Germany, for example. It used to be called the "country of poets, thinkers, and inventors"; that is what we have to revive. That people have a pride about what they contributed and revive that. And then we'll talk about this tonight again. So please come tonight, because this is important.

A rocket installation in BRICS nation Brazil.

I wouldn't look at it only as the Islamic world; because that in a certain sense is true, but it's also true for Africa. The Africans are also having lots of children. So I would look at it more from the standpoint of which countries have a vision of the future, because that what makes people want to build a family, want to be educated, want to study. If you think the world has come to an end, you may as well sit at home and pick your nose! [laughter]

Q: My first question is what kind of economic system are we trying to create, what kind of new paradigm is trying to be created? Is it going to be a system in which all of us as a collective are going to have power, and we're going to be leading the world as a collective? Or is it going to be a system in which I'm going to have an elite or a group of wealthy people making the rules for us?

Gravel: There are two elements to that. The first element is to solve the problem of poverty. It's a little bit like, you can't be reflective and mature if you don't have enough food to eat; that's what's going to command your intelligence. So the first step—and that's the reason why the Chinese "One Belt, One Road" is going to be so significant—is because of the prosperity it will bring to all of these areas. Not at the point of a gun, but as a point of personal need and success.

And so that's the first stage. And once you arrive at that stage where you can now reflect, you can mature, and that's where education comes in. And so when you want to see the countries that are moving ahead and that are going to be the leaders of tomorrow, just look at what countries are providing the most education to their young; and it's not the United States, it's not the United States. And that's the sadness of it, because we're squandering our wealth on a culture of militarism, and I don't see—I'm just not optimistic in that regard. And that's the reason why in my earlier comments I was looking to—I want a solution, too! Very much! And that solution, I see coming is from China and the BRICS. And so those are the two stages that I feel in responding to your question.

Speed: Do you want to respond to that?

What is Education?

LaRouche: No, that's a perfectly fine answer.

Q: [follow-up] Now, the other question I have is if there was another way as a collective that we all could free ourselves from the,—because you know the system we have been living in since thousands of years, the people in power have kept all this knowledge from us, and only they have the knowledge and the power, and they keep us ignorant. If we do have this knowledge, we would realize that eventually we don't really need an elite to be telling us what to do or what we cannot do, you see? Like, for example, there is a way the rich people make their money; and we can learn eventually, as a collective, how to make money too. How to build wealth.

Now, my question is, are the Chinese and Russians willing to make knowledge available for everybody? Are they going to disclose the file—because there is so much that has been hidden from us, and not only the United States, but a lot of world leaders know about a lot of stuff.

Now, are they willing to disclose this file, disclose, for example, something of the extraterrestrial phenomena? I know to a lot of people it might sound crazy, but at this point, there are so many proofs of so many sightings of this phenomenon, that I do believe that a lot of world leaders know about it, and they're just keeping it from us. Are they willing to disclose these files?

Speed: If you just asked a question, we should answer, because there's other people ...

Q: [follow-up] OK, that's fine.

LaRouche: There are problems here in what your question is, and that's what stymies some of us to some degree. Education is not something which is delivered, as by a recipe. And so you're not be denied the recipe. Because the development of the human mind comes from childhood, and it comes from the development of childhood in understanding what is wrong or right about what education is.

EIRNS/Philip Ulanowsky
“It’s self-development of the individual mind, which is the foundation of true education.”

And there've been a few heavy survivors in the history of science, real heavy survivors, but they've been limited in number. Most people have a mixture of something they learned, not necessarily science, but they have gained what we call skill. And the distinction of skill, is that it's something you can pass on to other people and show them the tricks that will do something, help them to understand how they might find a trick. But the idea that you can sort of "deliver" education, per se,—it's not possible. It's the self-development of the individual mind, which is the foundation of true education: self-development, not being instructed from the outside but self-development, and seeking out people who will give you access to what you use as self-development.

So the principle is not some idea of the greedy people are holding back any facts. But the fact is, the educational system has gone down, consistently, over the entire period since the beginning of the Twentieth Century. In the Twentieth Century, education in general was dominated by one person, Bertrand Russell, and Bertrand Russell's policy determined the education of scientists. And the incompetence introduced to the factors of science, has been the major problem; it's been the thing I've made my career out of, of attacking this crap, that the stuff that's practical is important.

Because if you don't have a discovery by yourself, if you haven't worked it out by yourself, you don't know it. And the point you want to do is to stimulate people,—like children, you want to stimulate them to make discoveries, true discoveries, which are discoveries on their part. You want to stimulate them by asking the right questions. And the secret of education is asking children the right questions. And you should have all the information and gadgets and so forth around it, to help them struggle through that question. [applause]

Speed: That's nice!

Q: Happy birthday! Sorry I was a little bit late, but I'm very pleased to be able to wish you happy birthday. I also wanted to take a minute to ask you a question, and also to Helga; and to also thank you for your relentless attack on reductionism for the last 40 years that I've known you. Because it's always been a breath of fresh air, and I grew up in an educational system where we were taught to dot our t's and cross our i's, and all kinds of things that were backwards. And when I ran into people who had been in dialogue with you and they were saying, "Wait a minute, is that really the way it works? What do you think? Does it work that way, or the opposite?"

Derivatives

It's like Euclid, the attacks on Euclid that we've made as a movement; it's based on this relentless attack on reductionism as a mentality instead of embracing of universal principle. And there can't be any education that doesn't put universal principles front and center. And that's why our scientific education has failed, because that's totally left out. You know, you've got a bunch of engineers that can put a man on the Moon, but they can't figure out that killing people for no reason with napalm is wrong! There's something wrong with their scientific education, when they have that kind of an inability to understand humanity. So I just want to thank you for that.

And Helga, I think what you've tried to do in conceptualizing the Schiller Institute, it's so valuable to us—and we want to create a sea change in the world around the discoveries of what—we have some wonderful things to spread the news about today, about what the BRICS are doing, and what the future is, what we can accomplish; and we have a population that has withdrawn from reality because they don't trust the news any more, and they're right about that. But they don't realize that they can discover the truth on their own.

So this is the nut we have to crack. And as you were saying about Germany, where it was destroyed, it was targetted precisely because it was the center of a Renaissance quality, with Bach and Beethoven and Riemann, and the great artists, and Schiller; this was why Germany was attacked. It's also why the United States was attacked in the postwar period,—we didn't have that quality but the kernel of this was still alive here. And we've got to keep that alive and revive this.

And my question is, what do you think we should do next, to revive and to create a mass movement for development in this country, which means to recover our wits about what our country is dedicated to? And you've already done a lot, but maybe you can throw out some more ideas.

Zepp-LaRouche: I can give you a very short answer: Go out into the whole world and multiply. [LaRouche laughs] Go out into the world and multiply! [applause]

Q: Hello, Mr. LaRouche, and thank you for the knowledge and the insights that you give us in these sessions. I really appreciate that a lot, so thank you for that.

I have a question and it's on derivatives. When I was reading about it the past week, I finally got an explanation that made sense. Usually it's just explained as "It's too difficult to explain," and it's left at that. Now, they mention is being something like an insurance contract, so when it comes to term and expires, it's done. But you're hedging on a loss that you hope doesn't happen. So I just wonder, what's the cultural problem that allows derivatives and other forms of gambling hedges to be seen as economic wealth, and I would like to address this to the Schiller Institute, and in particular to Helga, if you're able to explain that?

Zepp-LaRouche: Well, originally, it was legitimate that you would take out insurance on business in the future, so that you think, let's say, in three months, I will buy something, and I want to make sure the currency doesn't collapse in the mean time, so there was a certain rationale in saying I will take insurance on that, so that I'm covered and don't have a total loss. Like also a ship, in even earlier times: you would take insurance that the ship arrives in time with the cargo for some contract you made maybe a year earlier.

But then, in a certain sense, that became a thing in itself, so people would bet on the insurance, and then bet on the bet, and bet on the bet, and bet on the bet, and this became so complicated, that these things become completely divorced from the actual, physical economy. And the whole derivatives market by now is a complete fantasy, because there is absolutely no correlation any more between real production and these derivatives. So you have a situation where the total outstanding derivatives, according to our best estimate, is $2 quadrillion! That's about ten times the GDP of the world.

A Credit System

And therefore, this system is hopelessly bankrupt, because they did the bailouts after 2008,—you know, quantitative easing, bailouts, all these measures. Then they came to the conclusion that you cannot continue to do that, and they started to invent the "bail-in." Now, both the United States and all European countries have a bail-in law, which is the Cyprus model. And if you look at the EU legislation which made this bail-in law, which means basically confiscation of all the accounts of people who have either private accounts or business accounts, you just cut it in half, or you cut 60%, you take all of it away: That's bail-in.

When we did this work many years ago, I looked at who came up with this idea, and it was something called ISDA [International Swaps and Derivatives Association], which is short for an organization which consists of the 28 largest banks in the world. So the EU Commission went to the 28 largest banks in the world and had them make a law for a bail-in, in case of some bankruptcy.

FIGURE 1

This BIS chart, published in its September 2015 Quarterly Report, shows the dramatic growth of dollar-denominated foreign exchange derivatives (i.e. unpayable gambling debts) since 2007-8.

So, you can go to the wolf and say, "protect the chickens;" you know, that's the same thing!

In a certain sense, if now this event happens, which you know, several people have joined Lyn in saying that it could happen any moment; it could be triggered by a Grexit, it could be triggered by one big bank failing; if this bail-in mechanism were implemented, it would probably cover only 1% of all existing accounts. Because the outstanding derivatives are so much bigger, there is no way,—you know, in a certain sense, this is why what these governments are doing is really criminal! All of them know that this system is bankrupt, because they have probably even more detailed data than we have, because they can collect the central bank data. So for them to drive this in the way they are doing, they are gambling with the lives of billions of people. So the derivatives are completely unnecessary. We should eliminate them. I mean, the idea,—people who say that you need derivatives, it's a complete lie, you don't need them.

What you need is a credit system, which is basically a system of sovereign countries having national banks, and there must be some kind of a clearing agency inbetween, because you want to have long-term trade, you want to have long-term international investment, and there must be some kind of accounting way of balancing the differences; some countries are rich with raw materials, some have no raw materials; some countries are big, some are small; and you have to balance that somehow. And for that, you need an international clearing agency, which calculates these balances, and you don't want to have monetarism sneak back in. Therefore you have to look at the real economy, the increase of productivity, as the only measurement. Because you want to have 10-year investment, 20-year investment, and to have a credit system is relatively easy: You don't need derivatives.

You have to get rid of this entire philosophy of money making money. Money doesn't make money! I mean, I have never seen a dollar shovelling a shovel or something.

No, I think we need to go back to a system of real production, of the measurement being the increase of the productivity of the population, and everything should be subsumed by that. So the earlier questioner was asking, what is the new paradigm, or the new society going to be? I think that we will only come out of this as a human civilization if we replace the present thinking about money. Phenomena like Trump should be renamed from Trump to Dump; and we should have a dumping system for trumping. [laughter]

We will only come out of this if there is a completely different idea that what human creativity can produce in terms of science, in terms of art. That is what makes a human life livable. And that will become the dominant philosophy. In a certain sense China is the closest country to doing that, with their meritocracy. And they're trying to move very quickly to eliminate remnants of corruption from the past; they're moving to eliminate the speculation bubble, which had built up around Shanghai and Hongkong, and I think that that will be in a certain sense, a beacon for the world how to go. And I'm saying this, in this hotel. [laughter]

Schiller Institute
The evening session of the Sept. 12 Schiller Institute event featured a number of musical presentations. Kicking off the proceedings was the Schiller Institute chorus’s presentation of some sections of Bach’s Jesu Meine Freude, shown here. John Sigerson is conducting.

Q: This is R— from Bergen County, New Jersey. I'd like to address my question to Helga. I'm very disturbed about a lot of the activities that had been going on under the Bush and Obama administration, that I think can only be characterized as criminal. I'm talking about war crimes, I'm talking about atrocities.

For example, in the recent refugee crisis, LPAC is the only organization that I know of that has actually traced the origins of the refugee crisis to the activities of the Obama administration in bombing Libya, executing its leader, and creating God-only-knows what kind of chaos within that country. I also have not noticed in the press any kind of tangible description of what is really going on in Libya, that would cause people to risk a horrendous death to get out of it. That seems to have been blacked out.

Nuremberg Trials

So it seems to me, we're talking about major war crimes, murder.

Now, I'm under the impression that murder is considered to be a crime; and because Americans aren't raising enough of a ruckus about it, the longer that it is allowed to happen, the more it becomes legitimized. And people go around thinking, "Yeah, we can kill anybody we want, because we do it, right?" Now, in Germany I know you had Nuremberg Trials, and so my question to you is, what was the point of the Nuremberg Trials, and what effect did it have on Germans at that time?

And secondly, do we not need a Nuremberg Tribunal at some point to completely purge ourselves of the evil that is going on, and has been going on for the last 100 years, with regard to the United States?

Zepp-LaRouche: I think that concerning the German side of it, unlike Japan, Germany has reviewed its crimes, and I think that there is a very strong impulse that the vast, vast, vast majority of Germans never want war again. The reason why Schröder went against the Iraq War, and why the government went against the Libya war and did not participate in it, despite massive U.S. pressure to do so, is because, I think the German population had, between the experience of two world wars fought on its soil, and a recognition that the Nazis were about the deepest you could fall, that I think there is a genuine desire, never, ever to have war again. And in a certain sense, that is one of the stronger qualities which I think play in the present situation right now.

Now, concerning the second part of your question: I mean, the Nuremberg Tribunal Statutes say that to prepare a war of aggression is already a war crime, and by that standard, well, the people who are playing around with a first-strike policy with the implicit intention that you could win a thermonuclear war, in my view, fulfill that question of a war crime already.

And obviously, in order to enforce that, you need somebody to do it. It's not enough to state it, but you need some authority to do that, and I think the only people who could do that are the American people. I do not expect the United Nations to do; I don't expect anybody else to do it.

But in a certain sense, it's like what happened with Germany, the country which was at one point, in my humble opinion, really the most advanced culture: Because in the period of the German Classic you had the most lofty ideal of humanity ever; if you look at the writings of people like Schiller, or the music of Bach, Beethoven, and others; there is no higher expression of the beauty of the human being than that. And with the Humboldt education system, Germany came very close to making that the universal principle to mediate that image of man to the whole society.

So from that standpoint, to drop that deeply, as the Nazis did,—then the question is, why did the German people not resist more? Now one thing one can say, is, it was not so clear what Hitler would become—I mean, that's the only apology one can say, that it only became gradually clear. But then you had this complex geopolitical situation, where Hitler was financed from abroad; I'm not saying the Germans did not also support him, but without Montagu Norman, without Prescott Bush, without Averell Harriman, who knows if Hitler would have made it?

So then, we see how people get accustomed, how they adapt. In the beginning, there was a stronger resistance; then, as the majority was backing Hitler and you had the different pogroms and elimination of opposition, people adapted more and more and more! I think the same process is going on in the United States; people look at it, and then, you know, you get used to what you're seeing! That is something you have to recognize and wake people up.

But, in my view, to prepare a war of aggression, including the use of nuclear weapons, including the threat or the risk that that may lead to the extinction of civilization, I think that is a war crime. And people better start to think about that, because you know, I think that that is a moral challenge for the American people.

Gravel: [audio loss] If I'd to add to that, just in pure hindsight ....

Moving Now to Prevent War

Here, there's hope. Watch what's going on in Britain right now. There's a group that wants to use the same legal vehicle they did with Pinochet, and try to arrest and hold Netanyahu as a war criminal for what's happened; and are using the fact that some of the people killed in Gaza were of British citizenship.

The answer's real simple. It's the Treaty of Rome, which the United States has not bought into, but keep in mind, we also had the situation in Spain; the reason why Henry Kissinger can't travel to Europe is because the Spanish judge tried to catch him, and he was spirited out of Paris overnight for fear of arrest. So, it's closing in on these criminals. And those criminals include American Presidents and Vice Presidents.

Zepp-LaRouche: And also I should add that Jeremy Corbyn who was voted in today [as leader of Britain's Labour Party] not only wants to implement Glass-Steagall; he wants to put Tony Blair before a war crimes tribunal. And he wants to abolish the Monarchy! [applause]

Q: My name is S—, I've been very active with Mr. LaRouche's campaigns before, as well as with Mr. Ramsey Clark: They are the two men who I think the whole world have entrusted them with some hope. I stopped attending any functions after the crazy things happened in 9/11 and whatever commotion in the world came afterwards, but finally, when [Schiller Institute organizer] Angela Vullo sent me this email telling me about your new campaign for peace, I thank you both for bringing the blood back into my body. I'm running for Senate for the Parliament of Egypt, and I will definitely do my best to connect both of you and this movement with the Egyptian people. I thank you very much! And I'm just thrilled. Thank so very much, and thank you, Mrs. LaRouche. [applause]


Q: Good afternoon, Mr. LaRouche, R— from Brooklyn. You were discussing on the Thursday night call [Fireside Chat] about Putin taking a tactic that would outflank Obama, and the fact that this would perhaps be a preventative to nuclear confrontation. One of the things that was I was thinking of asking, do you foresee any future tactics that would help in this area, to keep the United States and Russia from having a nuclear exchange?

LaRouche: OK, fine: Yes, I do have a view on this thing. What I've mentioned in the opening of this event today, is, the fact is that we have, with the United Nations meeting coming in the course of this next week,—this thing by itself can be the instrument for preventing thermonuclear war. Now this is not an isolated matter; it's complicated, but life is always complicated in the main. It's that what has happened is that Obama has lost trend, he has lost footing, and he's hanging out there, and what happened was that Putin fooled him. It was not any bad fooling business, but simply what Putin did has screwed up, as we say, the kind of plan that Obama was committed to.

He was concentrating on going directly into the center of Europe and areas like that into fringes, spreading things as had been done before, which Obama had done; Obama was a prophet of this kind of thing especially. Dick Cheney was a comparable figure, but Cheney is mild compared to Obama.

So the point has come that this thing got jammed up. You saw a change, first of all,—I picked up the change in Russia, on the events that were developing in Russia, that something was happening. What happened with China [their Sept 3 Victory parade], which was organized largely in coordination with Putin; Putin was a big organizer of this thing. Then I saw what was happening next, and Putin made a smart move, which by his methods outflanked Obama.

So now, what happens, this means we have an enhanced opportunity to rid ourselves of the Obama pestilence by concentrating on support, appropriate forms of support, for the United Nations meeting which is coming up now during this month. This is the best option we have now, for a peaceful solution, for this crisis now.

It can work. Look at the facts of the matter; look at what China represents. Now look at what India represents, combined with that. Look at some other locations on the planet. Look at the BRICS movement in general. All of these forces are converging, whether they're fully witting or not, in a direction to what? Avoid thermonuclear war. But at the same time, eliminate the agency which would launch the thermonuclear war.

Leaders with Courage

We saw this in Germany. We saw this change in Germany in the way the refugee population was being handled. And Germany decided to make that move; that was a highly moral move. It was a unique one. Now, Germany was the first nation outside of Russia, in a sense, to make that kind of step. And what happened, parts of the United States were trembling out of guilt; Wall Street is trembling, because Wall Street knows it cannot survive! It wants all kinds of terror.

Now what is happening in the coming week and beyond, and what is implicit now at this time, because it's coming on: The time has come, that it is possible, it is feasible, to dump Obama one way or the other, and to end this plan of major war which we've been discussing here so far; we've been discussing around those same areas.

Therefore, this is the moment, the greatest opportunity of moment, now placed on the desk before us right now. This may not be the final solution; this may not be the answer. But it's an indication the answer is possible now. And the best shot we have, is going to be by influencing the people in the United States and other countries, around the United Nations event now, and next week. This is the best option in sight right now, considering what I've already referenced there. These are the best options available.

And we should just go like tigers, and get this thing moving: integrate everything with what this United Nations event is. Push it for all it's worth. It's the best instrument because we see that many parts of the planet don't want that kind of war. And that's the best shot we have available to us right now.

Speed: So we're going to ask now for summary remarks from Helga, Senator Gravel and then from Lyn.

Zepp-LaRouche: I think what Lyn just said is what I would to underline. Because there will be an extraordinary combination of world leaders all being aware of the dangers, and if you can help us in the next days, I think the actual United Nations process will go on, with the top leadership being there until Oct. 6, so that is a window of three weeks. And I don't know exactly when who will speak, but there will be a special session on refugees; there will be a special session on climate change that we should not forget, even if that's not the main focus.

But we produced this new report, that climate change is not science but depopulation. You should absolutely get this report, read it, and also distribute it as much as you can to the embassies, to institutions. There are many institutions in New York which have headquarters here. We can really have a major, major impact right here in New York, in Manhattan.

And I think the more people who would join this idea, you know, I wrote this appeal to the governments to use this UN General Assembly to really address the issue, and anybody can address this forum. Remember, many years ago, [then Guyana Foreign Minister] Fred Wills used this exact platform to bring in the question of the just new world economic order; so any representative from any country—it can be a small country; the smallest country can bring into this platform the need to move to the World Land-Bridge. If we get one leader to say, "we need the World Land-Bridge as a program for reconstruction," I think the genie would be out of the bottle forever!

EIRNS
A revolutionary change occurred globally when Guyanese Foreign Minister Fred Wills addressed the UN General Assembly on Sept. 8, 1976, and called for replacing the IMF with “international development banks.”

So, I think all we need is one, hopefully more, leader who addresses the issue the way we do. They don't have to use our words, because everybody has their own style and way; but somebody has to say that the system is bankrupt, that we are approaching World War III, and we need a global program of reconstruction which allows the survival of all human beings on this planet. And that there is a program that the BRICS countries and the Chinese have offered, the "win-win" policy, and there is a demand that all the governments respond to that in a positive way.

So if any one leader would say that, and make a motion in front of the world public, I think everybody would agree! But what is required is that one country or a group of countries has the courage to do that. And we can help to create an environment so that could take place. So that is what I would say you should concentrate on with all your force for the next days and two, three weeks.

Release the 28 Pages

Gravel: I would associated myself with her remarks, period. So I can't add anything to that.

I would just add, that one of the issues that's perking within the Congress, is, of course, the release of the 28 pages [of the Joint Congressional Inquiry on 9/11]. And that situation I characterize, and I'm ashamed to say it: it's truly ridiculous; it's a ridiculous issue. Because the Congress is the one that classified it, and therefore, they can un-classify it. But what they want to do is do it through a legislative process. Well, my court case in 1972, where the Supreme Court ruled that whatever I did, or whatever any member of Congress would do, in releasing classified information, he could not be detained in any other locale. And this is in the Constitution: It's the "speech and debate clause" of the Constitution.

And so what we need, and I've already been approached and I'll be going to Washington to try to help out, but what we need is for any single member to release those papers, the 28 pages. But here again, it's the Congress itself that's bound itself by this element of secrecy that really doesn't exist! It's a figment of their imagination! And that, of course, is what's destroying our democracy.

Sakharov made what I thought was a very perceptive statement. He said what brought down the Soviet Union was not missiles, was not weaponry; what brought down the Soviet Union was the dismemberment of the elements of secrecy which denied the Russian people the knowledge of what was going on. This is called perestroika; perestroika and glasnost. And that's what caused the implosion.

Now what we need to do is have a similar implosion in the United States, where any one member of Congress would stand up and release—there's no threat! There's no legal threat to that person, and that's what the case had been all about in 1972. And of course, no one has done anything since '72 to utilize the principle in the Constitution, now unanimously approved by the Supreme Court of the United States, and in subsequent case law.

And so, hopefully that would change, and be somewhat of a revelation to the American public, because there's so much attention being focussed on the 28 pages. I can tell you what's in it. It's just the financing that was going on through the Wahhabist movement within Saudi Arabia; this is no secret. It's been going on for decades and decades, and that's what's created the extreme elements of Islam. And so it was funded by the leadership, whether it was organized or not, it was just the de facto leadership; in fact, the King in Saudi Arabia is very limited as to what he can do, because of this climate of supporting Wahhabism financially throughout the Kingdom.

So, let's hope that there's a change that takes place in Congress. It would accelerate other facets of this; and I will certainly try to bring to my audience at the UN on Monday the message we have from the EIR and the answer from my perspective. I know that from your organization, you feel that the answer is in the United States. Unfortunately, I'm ashamed to say, I've given up on that score; I think the answer is with the other countries coming in, and China and Russia will save us from ourselves.

Thank you.

LaRouche: I'm alive as usual. I would pick on the same thing that he just presented. It's the same issue. But just autobiographically: I went through this process, which led into 9/11; at that point, I was concentrating on some evidence which we had from certain parties in the British Empire, in Manhattan. And I was then informed, more or less, with all of the kinds of evidence which indicated what 9/11 would become; in other words, I didn't exactly how it would happen, but I knew all the evidence of how it was organized, and I still have that knowledge.

So the point now is that Obama is defending this policy, this crime. And we have now a new meeting in Manhattan [the United Nations General Assembly], a great meeting in Manhattan, an international meeting in Manhattan. I think the time has come, to break that privilege which had been taken to hide everything about 9/11 so-called.

I know what the evidence was that was leading into 9/11. I knew it was the British Empire; I knew it was a special committee organized by the British offshore, of the oil provisions, the oil games, I knew that! I'd been doing also some work in Germany in terms of investigating certain areas. But I knew a certain number of members of the press, in Germany, who shared the information that I had. And we have some other members of our organization in the United States, as well as abroad—we know every important fact required, and sufficient to throw Obama out of office, for his continued efforts in defense of what happened in Manhattan and elsewhere.

This is the operation, and every member of Congress who lacks the guts to come forth and state that information, who had that information as such, is really guilty. And the time has come for them to confess their guilt and say, I'm holding evidence, which would force the United States to hold the guilty responsible. I myself knew every bit of the information needed, and I have other persons who, like me, knew that information. And I was there, one time, by video means, to see the planes which had been captured by the Saudi agents who actually destroyed people in the 9/11 operation.

This is a crime. We know who did it. We know what kinds of people did it. And that has been suppressed. I think that that issue is very important as a weapon, because some of us have known the actual facts, by personal knowledge of what was behind this. But the powers that be said "No, you can't say that." And a lot people said, "No, you can't say that." But it always was true. It's still true today. Right now, it's still true.

And that is the way we can get the United States and its honor back again. [applause]

Speed: That concludes our session. And we're now going to take a break.

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