Schiller Institute Weekly Dialogue with Helga Zepp-LaRouche

The Western ‘Elites’ Have No Right
To Destroy the Future!

The following is an edited transcript of the Nov. 12, 2025, weekly Schiller Institute dialogue with Schiller Institute founder and leader Helga Zepp-LaRouche. Subheads have been added. The video is available here.

Harley Schlanger: Hello, and welcome to the Schiller Institute weekly webcast with Helga Zepp-LaRouche. She is the founder of the Schiller Institute and the initiator of the International Peace Coalition. Today is Nov. 12, 2025. I’m Harley Schlanger, and I’ll be your host.

Helga, over the last week there has been a remarkable increase in the circulation of ideas previously introduced by Lyndon LaRouche, yourself, and the LaRouche movement. We spoke last week of Pope Leo XIV’s discussion of Cardinal Nicholas of Cusa, and his scientific, philosophical development of the method of the Coincidence of Opposites, which was introduced by Nicholas in the middle of the 15th Century and revived by you six centuries later. Also of note is the interest in the Bering Strait Tunnel, which became a discussion point around the mid-August meeting in Alaska of Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Donald Trump. This, of course, is the kind of great project that Lyndon LaRouche and you have long favored as the basis for peaceful cooperation.

Last weekend there was a conference in Paris, which took up the necessity of the creation of an international youth movement with a leading focus on the development of Africa. Can you give us your assessment of why it was necessary for this conference to take place and how it went?

Helga Zepp-LaRouche: It was necessary, because the world needs to go in a different direction—or at least parts of the world need to go in a different direction. The Coincidence of Opposites as a new paradigm of international relations is on the table; but unfortunately, the Western countries are opposing cooperation with the Global Majority, and in this way preventing the emergence of a new system. So, the whole idea is that the young people of the world—the young people of the Global South, but also the young people of Europe and the United States—must take a much stronger role in leadership, because it’s their future. The so-called “elites” of the Western world, who are now in a war-mongering mode like we have not seen since the 1930s, have no right to destroy the future of the youth.

So, we had this incredible conference in Paris, and I can only suggest to all of our listeners and viewers to take the time and go to the website of the Schiller Institute, where you will find—maybe not immediately in all languages, but in English for sure, and soon in German, French and Spanish translations—this conference, which was an extraordinary event. It had speakers literally from all continents except Australia, and many young people. We had two days of very intense presentations on strategic thinking and dialogue, after which the young people took to the streets of Paris to organize more young people. Everybody came back completely excited; there were a lot of reports of the camaraderie and feelings of brotherhood; just total joyfulness that young people are not so burdened with all the prejudices and crimes of their ancestors, which allows them to communicate in a completely different way.

This conference was the third one of the international Schiller Institute this year: The first in New Jersey in the United States, the second one in Berlin, Germany, and now the third one in Paris, France. If one looks at the process of these conferences, I would say it is a really rare, if not unprecedented, density of concepts of ideas; of dialogue on a very high level. People should go to the Schiller site and take some time. Everybody has some downtime in the evening, or on weekends. Or, read the articles, read the speeches, because it not only presented a strategic assessment from different countries’ perspectives; it also had in-depth research about the history of ideas in the whole world—in Europe, but also China, Latin America and Africa. It was just a wealth of ideas. Naturally, we had beautiful music; we had two concerts and many other performances. It was just very rich.

Schlanger: From what I’ve seen on the videos, they’re very good and very provocative.

We have the first question, from someone in Cameroon, about the conference. She writes: “I could not come to the conference, but was inspired by watching the videos and seeing some of it on YouTube. What plans do you have to follow this up? And can you provide some speakers if we set up this kind of event in my country?”

Zepp-LaRouche: Yes, we can; not one speaker, but many. You can have speakers from all of our international movement and our contacts, who are getting more and more excited about this perspective of building an international partnership of world citizens; people who regard it as their first identity to be a world citizen. Therefore, not be a chauvinist, not be a nationalist saying “My country first,” but first being a world citizen. But that must not be in contradiction to being a patriot of your own country, provided that you define your national interest in cohesion with the interests of the One Humanity.

Our next plan is to have an international youth Zoom conference, probably in December. Then again, hopefully soon, in-person conferences. So, if you have concrete suggestions, get in contact with our organizers, and we will help you to set up a conference. Whatever topic you want to discuss, I’m absolutely sure that we can do a good job in helping you.

Schlanger: She also writes, “I know from going to your website that you have plans for most of the world, so I’m sure there is something that is relevant for people in my country.”

The next question comes from a long-time contact who says: “Harley, I heard you say yesterday that the leaders in Europe intend to continue the war against Russia and Ukraine. Can you ask Madame LaRouche what they hope to gain by continuing this senseless slaughter?” There’s a second, similar question from someone who identifies himself as a Ukrainian living in exile. He asks, “By what sorcery is V. Zelensky remaining in power?”

Zepp-LaRouche: Look for the British role in any spook or sorcery, and you will find something. But I and many other people, including from other countries, are really at a loss to understand what is going on in the minds of the people who are pushing this militarization and confrontation: the German media, for example. If you read some of the headlines of the last several days: “Russia Can Attack Tomorrow!” “Russia Will Attack Immediately!”—the more moderate ones say it will be in three years—it’s absolutely insane. There is no evidence whatsoever that Russia is intending to do this.

Many military experts of the highest qualification have pointed out that Russia has no reason—because why would they want to attack when they already have the largest country in the world? They have 11 time zones; they have 150 million people, which is really a very thin population. If you have 11 time zones and you only have 150 million people, you don’t need new territory. They have the greatest amount of raw materials on the planet. They need foreign investment, but they don’t need more territory. Why would they conquer Germany, which has almost no raw materials whatsoever? I’m just saying it does not make sense.

It has something to do with a completely different motive, and that is that the establishments of the countries that are pushing the continuation of the war have so much invested in the NATO narrative, that they cannot think anymore. They cannot think, and they cannot see the changes which have taken place. The reality of the matter is that Russia cannot be defeated militarily. Forget it! It’s a nuclear power, and they have the technological edge on weapons, on nuclear weapons, on hypersonic weapons, on submarine weapons like the Poseidon [nuclear-powered, nuclear-armed autonomous torpedo with unlimited range]. They have the Oreshnik [hypersonic intermediate range missile with speed exceeding Mach 10 and multiple warheads]; they have the nuclear-powered Burevestnik [low-flying subsonic cruise missile with unlimited range]; these are weapons which cannot be defeated; they are maneuverable; they don’t have a ballistic trajectory. So, the idea that you can defeat the strongest nuclear power on the planet is just madness.

Germany’s Stupid, Incompetent Policies

Then look at the German economy. You have [German Chancellor Friedrich] Merz, who is a member of the so-called Coalition of the Willing. What is the German economy able to do, when it has to deal with the totally stupid and incompetent economic policies of this government? The IFO Institute [for Economic Research], a leading economic institute in Munich, just put out a report saying that German industry is in agony; that the representatives of the different [sectors of the economy] are so desperate and demoralized that they just see their country and their industry falling apart without [the government] acting—at least not at this point. The entire German economy is collapsing. There will be no militarization, because you cannot, with militarization, bring a shrinking, collapsing economy up to parity with economies like China; forget it!

Europe is already isolated. It’s highly dangerous, because they can, together with war hawks in the Trump administration—who, unfortunately, are also quite active—create a global catastrophe, but they cannot win. So, it’s a form of madness which has gripped these people. They obviously owe their careers, their privileges, their entire positions to a narrative which was wrong. It was the idea that after the end of the Cold War, you could have a unipolar world dominated by the NATO countries. That is clearly not the case, because NATO is also collapsing. It may not look like it, but if the economies of the NATO countries collapse, what can you do? Likewise, the EU is in a process of disintegration.

So, it’s complete madness. The best thing which could happen, is that many citizens in these countries get together with us and demand that we change the direction and adjust to the changed strategic situation, which is, instead of confrontation, having cooperation with the countries of the Global Majority.

Schlanger: You can see the madness and the desperation in some of the proposals coming out of the United Kingdom. One is an article talking about the importance of going to war against Venezuela so that the United States could pump massive amounts of oil from Venezuela to bring the price [of oil] down to hurt Russia. The other proposal is the idea of basically fencing in Russia by closing off the Baltic Sea. There were British soldiers actually practicing boarding ships in Estonia. So, the question that came in on this is, “How can the British still put themselves forward when their economy is in shambles?” This person writes that he bets the British economy is worse than the German economy. I don’t know if you want to debate that, but clearly there’s a miscalculation across the board here.

Zepp-LaRouche: The role of the British is becoming crystal clear. You have, all the time, these scenarios, either in nuclear brinkmanship over Crimea, or now having a land invasion in Venezuela to start exporting Venezuela’s oil to ruin Russia. People may remember this movie, Dr. Strangelove; it is that kind of mindset, that people are sitting in some bunker and coming up with crazy ideas for how to rule the world. The role of the British has become so obvious that I do not foresee a good future. Once people start to put together the history of the British Empire, it may not look so pretty for them. A bad mood is developing, because the British—having no empire left—pretend to still rule the world through the Commonwealth, through the IMF, the World Bank, and now increasingly through AI [Artificial Intelligence] and the military-industrial complex. This is a bubble, and there is no real, physical economy to back it up. So, the more these desperado scenarios are being pushed, the more the British are inviting the rest of the world to tell the story of colonialism in Africa, in India, the Opium Wars against China. Unfortunately, it goes up to the present time, so maybe that’s helping to cause such a reaction.

Schlanger: We did get a message from our friend in Smolensk, who says she did not watch the conference Saturday evening, because they didn’t have internet, due to the drone attacks by Ukraine against Russia. So, that’s worth noting. Smolensk is close to the border of Belarus.

There are a lot of questions about the economy, but there’s a question from a supporter in Switzerland who attended a meeting I addressed on Saturday. He says, “In the past, Lyndon LaRouche advocated the ‘debt bomb,’ the cancellation of debts, rather than austerity or bailouts. Why are you not calling for this again as a way to bring down the corrupt central bankers?”

Zepp-LaRouche: Lyndon LaRouche never called for the debt bomb. As a matter of fact, he always proposed an orderly reorganization, and then Wall Street interpreted some of the motions in this direction as the debt bomb; but it was not like that. For example, in 1982 when President López Portillo of Mexico had asked my husband to come to Mexico to help him defend the Mexican economy against the capital flight out of the peso, we indeed did go to Mexico. Lyndon LaRouche not only wrote a program for the defense of Mexico, but for all of Latin America, which was called Operation Juárez.

Then, López Portillo started to implement that program. On September 1, 1982, he started to impose capital controls to prevent capital flight. I remember this very well, because on that same day, my husband and I had a meeting in Frankfurt with a leading bank’s top management. While we were standing there greeting each other, the main exchange trader stormed into the room and said, “Oh, the debt bomb! The debt bomb! We are finished! We are finished!” We were smiling and said, “No, don’t worry. It’s not the debt bomb; it’s a proposal to have an orderly reorganization of the debt.”

If you remember at that time, the Latin American countries had about $200 billion in foreign debt, which is peanuts compared to today, but at that time it was a lot. What my husband proposed, was to reorganize that debt; turn short-term, high-interest debt into long-term credit with low interest; use that credit for investments in the real economy, and in that way create a real economic motor to bring the economies up—and therefore be able to pay down the debt over a longer period of time. So, it would have honored the debt, except it would have enabled the economies to do so by building up the physical economy.

LaRouche’s Four Laws

Naturally, the fear of Wall Street was that they would lose their high-profit, quick-profit money machine—and therefore they called it the debt bomb. But we never proposed the debt bomb. I just want to make that clear, because, if you declare a debt bomb without a positive idea of how to reorganize the debt, you can create total chaos. What would you gain by that? You would have a breakdown of everything. I don’t think that would be a good idea.

What would be a good idea, is to have a discussion regarding the Four Laws of Lyndon LaRouche. The first one is to reintroduce “Glass-Steagall” [President Franklin Roosevelt’s U.S. Banking Act of 1933] on a global scale; nationalize the banks in every country. Have a national bank as a place for the issuance of new credit. Then, have cooperation among these national banks constituting a new credit system. That’s essentially what the countries of the BRICS and the SCO are doing right now. And the West would be very well advised to just indicate that they want to cooperate and reorganize the “everything bubble,” which is becoming completely unmanageable. If you don’t do what I’m talking about now, it does have the danger of an uncontrolled explosion, which would bring down the whole world economy.

Schlanger: I’m very happy with your answer, because that’s basically what I told him: that you need to have an alternative system; you don’t want to just blow things up.

Here’s a question for you from a “transplanted New Yorker”—I guess it’s someone who used to live in New York. She says, “Helga, what are your thoughts on our Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani? Is he an Obama type, or might he be a real agent of change?”

Zepp-LaRouche: I don’t know yet. It looks very promising, but so did [Barack] Obama—and Bernie Sanders looked promising in the beginning. So, I do not know. It depends on a lot of factors, but it also depends on citizens holding his feet to the fire, so to speak—because what he says sounds very good. I think the fact that he got a lot of the Jewish vote is also very interesting. New York has a lot of Jewish voters. You can see the freakout by the ADL [Anti Defamation League of B’nai B’rith] already. They called for a block-watch system to report on Mamdani, which is unbelievable.

I think there is a good prospect of hope, but, obviously, he will be mayor of New York from January 1 onwards, and if he wants to implement what he has promised, he will have a big fight with Wall Street—which is in New York. That is a big one, and that does require a lot of support if he is serious about it. And it would call for a lot of mobilization of citizens around the world to make sure that that is the change which people want. So, I always, when there is a new candidate where you have reasons to hope, I want to give him the benefit of the doubt, but it will not be an easy thing.

Schlanger: Here’s a question that I find quite interesting, from a podcaster in the United Kingdom. He says: “I’m having trouble placing you [the LaRouche movement] on the left-right spectrum. I know that’s not how things work, but here’s my problem. Where does China fit? Is it still communist? You say it’s an example for developing sector countries, and it certainly has been a success. But how would you describe their economic system? This is important, because it works, and people want to know.”

Zepp-LaRouche: I think that the best approximation is really the early American System of economy. What China has been doing, while on the one side they do give credit to Karl Marx, they are, in my view, 90% Confucian—because the whole approach is not class struggle; it’s harmonious development. That is more like Confucius than Karl Marx. Their economy is very much based on directed credit, so to speak, for furthering everything that is innovation; scientific and technological progress. So, it is really more like what Alexander Hamilton [first Secretary of the Treasury] proposed for the United States, which was then repeated by Henry C. Carey [President Lincoln’s economic advisor]. It is much more what Friedrich List described as the difference between— Read Carey and Friedrich List and their description of the difference between the American System of economy and the British system of economy.

Creativity Is the Only Source of Wealth

The American System was devoted to the development of the citizen, because the citizen and their creativity is the only source of wealth. It is the creativity of the individual which contributes to the increase of the productivity of both the labor force and the industrial capacities. That creates profit and promotes the general welfare. Whereas, the British system is free trade; it pays no attention to the development of the citizen, but it pays attention to the control of trade. It’s the old [British Prime Minister] Margaret Thatcher formula, “buy cheap, sell expensive”—and the margin is what you make money on.

Then, you create [financial] derivatives, and derivatives on derivatives; that becomes a major source of profit. In the meantime, there are derivatives on AI investment and military-industrial complex investment. So, it’s the combination of AI and military expenditures, which, from the standpoint of the real economy, is a complete waste. Nobody can eat cannons, so that’s the difference.

If you look at it that way, China is absolutely going in the direction of Alexander Hamilton, Henry C. Carey, and Friedrich List. I think this right-left characterization was always stupid. It comes from the seating order in the French National Assembly shortly after the French Revolution. That is so outdated. It’s much more adequate to say that forces and countries are either for development and the common good, or oligarchical; that’s a much better separation. From that standpoint, China is effective, progressive, for the common good. People in China are much happier than people in Europe, for example; probably than the United States, as well. For me, the telltale sign on whether a country is being governed good or bad is always the happiness of the people.

Schlanger: There’s one more question which I also find interesting. This just came in. It’s from someone who identifies as a young person. He says: “I’ve heard Mrs. LaRouche speak about Confucius quite a bit. I have no idea where to start to study Confucius. Could she give me some advice?”

Zepp-LaRouche: There are several books by Confucius; they are difficult to read because they are not really developed, how should I say? Just read them. It’s more like shorter descriptions of ethical behavior. But you get a good introduction. Then, there are some very good biographies and historical studies, and, naturally, many academic articles. So, I think the best thing is to go to the EIR, put “Confucius” in the search engine, and then take it from there. That’s always a very good way to start.

Schlanger: I think that’s important, because if you speak to Americans and ask them if they’ve read Hamilton, they’ll say they don’t understand the language, either. It really requires just taking the commitment to jump in.

There’s going to be another meeting of the International Peace Coalition on Friday. This has become an increasingly important institution for real dialogue. What are the plans for this week, Helga?

Zepp-LaRouche: I’m sure there will be a certain amount of report-back from the Paris conference, because that was a clear effort to answer the war danger with an extended peace movement by creating a new paradigm based on Cusa’s idea of the Coincidence of Opposites, which has many echoes in these peace proposals, like the Global Governance Initiative of [Chinese President] Xi Jinping, the Peace of Westphalia, and so forth.

Then, I’m sure there will be a report on the horrible situation in the Middle East, because there is the annexation of the West Bank going on. The humanitarian aid going into Gaza is minuscule; there is the danger of a partition of Gaza. The latest thing, which I have to verify, is that I saw a photocopy of a letter signed by Donald Trump from the White House to [Israeli] President Herzog, demanding the exoneration of [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu—but with official stamps and everything. Sometimes you are speechless about these kinds of things. That will be a big topic for sure.

We will also discuss the situation in and around Venezuela and the effort by the neocons in the Trump administration to form an anti-BRICS, anti-[Brazilian President] Lula, anti-China alliance in Latin America around the Venezuelan developments; that will be a topic. And I can already announce that on our EIR, which we are expanding right now and will have a lot of live interviews, we are planning a special seminar on the situation in Venezuela. Go to our website and look out for it, because we have put together some of the top experts. The VIPS—the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity—have written an to President Trump to not go for this Venezuela invasion, because there is no good option for the United States to come out of it. So, that will be a big topic as well.

Schlanger: There’s one other question that came in while you were talking about Gaza. Trump promised there would be no annexation of the West Bank. The question is, “Do you think Trump will do something to stop that, when the settlement movement around Netanyahu is already taking more and more land?”

Zepp-LaRouche: If that letter which I just mentioned is true, maybe he made a deal whereby he does something, but I am less hopeful. Trump right now is surrounded by a lot of elements in his administration which are more in line with the previous Biden administration than what Trump’s intention was when he began his second term. I can only hope that the better elements in his administration go on the offensive and make sure that he can fulfill what he wanted to do when he came into office in January. Right now, it looks very much in danger.