Schiller Institute Conference

New Dark Age, or Peace Through Development

Nov. 14—The International Schiller Institute Conference on Nov. 13-14, “All Moral Resources of Humanity Have To Be Called Up: Mankind Must Be the Immortal Species!” began, appropriately, with soprano Lisa Bryce performing a Lied by Johannes Brahms, Von ewiger Liebe (“Of Eternal Love”). Never has there been a moment in history when the very existence of civilization has been so threatened, when the power of creativity and love, those qualities which distinguish man from beast, has been so demanded of the world citizenry, to assure that mankind survives to carry forth that unique species created as imago viva Dei.

Lyndon LaRouche, in a video clip from a speech given on July 2, 2011, in Germany, which was shown at the conference, said the following:

What is there in us that is not in other living species known to us? That might, somehow, miraculously, pronounce a destiny for our human species which we grant to no other living species? The name for that specific quality, which we know in the human species, which does not exist in any other known living species? There’s a quality of creativity, which is absolutely unique to mankind. And if you’re not creative, and if you don’t understand creativity, you haven’t got a ticket to survival yet! Because creativity won’t save you, unless you use it. All you have to do is adopt a zero-growth policy, a zero-technological-growth policy: I can guarantee you, your extinction will come, delivery on time! I don’t know what the time is, but it’s soon, in terms of geological and galactic time.

Helga Zepp-LaRouche, the founder and president of the Schiller Institute, began her keynote speech with a “thought experiment,” observing:

It would actually be quite easy to solve almost any of the many problems we are confronted with today if the majority of the governments of the European nations and possibly even the United States administration would say, “OK, we messed up. We have to change our way of thinking. We committed a lot of mistakes.”

She referenced some of those mistakes: turning our financial system over to speculation, neglecting infrastructure and agricultural expansion, waging war for the sake of war while making Russia and China enemies rather than friends, privatizing health care, promoting ugliness and perversity as “entertainment,” and promoting fake science about the climate.

But, she continued, such an honest accounting of our mistakes is unlikely to happen, because—

So far, despite one policy failure after the other, the establishments of the West have shown zero capability to recognize and admit their mistakes and make the appropriate corrections. As a consequence, it is more likely that the entire trans-Atlantic system is about to disintegrate.

But, Zepp-LaRouche stated, “We in the West may also regain the integrity and the moral stature which we need to get out of this crisis. Let us call up all the great thinkers and philosophers of our traditions to join together in this effort.” By joining with China in the greatest infrastructure development project in history, the Belt and Road Initiative, she said, we can create a new paradigm for mankind.

She closed as follows:

It is therefore a challenge for all serious scientists around the world to investigate why Lyndon LaRouche was so absolutely accurate in forecasting the timing and character of the present worldwide financial monetary and economic breakdown crisis, as well as his method of physical economy, if we want to develop our planet to be livable for all human beings, and living in the future. In this spirit, let’s act on the joyous assumption that we are the uniquely creative species in the universe, that we are not Earthlings, but the potentially immortal species in the universe. Thank you.

Panel 1: “Can a Strategic Crisis Between the Major Powers Be Avoided?”

Also speaking on the first panel was Ms. Chen Xiaohan, the Deputy Secretary General of the Chinese People’s Association for Peace and Disarmament, addressing, “Major Country Relations and Global Development.” She explained: “The whole world has entered a period of turbulence and change,” but went on: “The new situation brings new opportunities, as well as challenges.” While calling for all nations, especially the major powers, to work together for the development of all nations, she also addressed the different views of “democracy” in the West and in China. She said:

As President Xi Jinping has stressed, democracy is not for decoration, nor for displaying, but for solving the problems that people need to solve. Democracy is the right of all peoples, not the monopoly of a few nations. Whether a country is democratic or not should be judged by its own people, not by the finger-pointing of a few outsiders; should be judged by the international community, not by a self-righteous few....

It is undemocratic to measure the colorful political systems of the world with a single yardstick and examine the colorful political civilizations of mankind with monotonous eyes.

Ms. Chen described the participation of the population in all layers of local, regional, and national policy discussions and the choosing of the leadership.

She emphasized the “Global Development Initiative” proposed by President Xi Jinping at the General Debate of the 76th Session of UN General Assembly,

which called for adherence to the concept of putting development first and people first, [and] a more equal and balanced global development partnership to provide new impetus for developing countries to accelerate development.

Two leading representatives from Russia addressed the extreme tension between the U.S. and Russia, urging urgent measures to avoid war through cooperation:

Ambassador Anna Evstigneeva, the Deputy Permanent Representative to the Russian Federation Mission to the UN, addressed the situation in Afghanistan, where the rapid withdrawal of U.S. forces left no one, including the Taliban, prepared to deal with the already disintegrating structure after 20 years of war. If Afghanistan is allowed to “fall into the abyss,” it could take the region with it. She proposed that the “Extended Troika,” which has the U.S., Russia, China, and Pakistan working together, must act to unfreeze the funds belonging to the Afghan people, end the sanctions, and cooperate to restore the economy.

Dr. Andrey Kortunov, Director General of the Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC), asked: “Is There a Pathway for an Improved Relationship Between the U.S. and Russia?” Speaking moderately about the extreme provocations taking place on Russia’s borders by U.S. and NATO forces, Kortunov raised the issue of Friedrich Schiller’s legacy, as a poet and philosopher, calling on us all to live in our century, but not to become its creature, and also Schiller’s admonition to give people what they need rather than only what they want. The small steps toward cooperation with the Biden Administration—in arms control, non-proliferation, and cyber talks—are important, he said, but there have been no breakthroughs, no change for the better. No reset is possible, as the U.S. continues to accuse Russia of many things with no basis in truth. The next few months are critical, but he sees no dramatic change until 2024, when there may be a “generational change” in the White House and the Congress. Survival from this crisis requires recognition of a “Global Commons.”

Col. Richard H. Black (US Army ret.), former Virginia State Senator and former Chief of the Army Criminal Law Division, Office of the Judge Advocate General at the Pentagon, spoke on “U.S.-China Relations: Potential for War Avoidance and Cooperation.” He reviewed the opening up of China after President Nixon’s visit in 1972, and the huge benefit to both the U.S. and China, and the world, by the rise of China, warning against the mounting anti-China hysteria. Provocations around Taiwan threaten to undermine world peace, he said, as do the wild lies about the Uighurs, where the al-Qaeda-linked terrorists among the Uighurs were defeated primarily by a vast education program of young Uighurs in temporary internment camps, and the economic development of the region.

Dr. George Koo, the Chairman of the Burlingame Foundation, and a leading spokesman for the Chinese American community, spoke on: “The Survival of Our World Depends on Whether the U.S. and China Can Get Along.” He went through the many attacks on China, one by one, demonstrating that they are both false and self-serving, but are also very dangerous. The FBI attacks on Chinese scientists working in the U.S. is a case of shooting ourselves in the foot. He asserted that China will certainly surpass the U.S. economically and in science and technology very soon, but that rather than containing, or even competing, the self-interest of the U.S. is to join in the Belt and Road.

Former NSA Analyst Kirk Wiebe reviewed the work he did with his associate Bill Binney in exposing the Russiagate hoax, “that the story that Russia hacked the Democratic National Committee was in no way corroborated by evidence.” He said that if Julian Assange and Edward Snowden had been allowed to speak to the American people, the regime-change wars would not have been supported by the population.

The Panel 1 presentations and discussion follow in this issue of EIR. Future issues will feature the presentations in Panels 2-4.

Panel 2: “The Science of Physical Economy”

The panel opened with a performance of “Lord God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel,” from Mendelssohn’s oratorio Elijah, by bass Kevin Thompson accompanied by Dura Jun.

The keynote was by EIR Economics Co-Editor Paul Gallagher, who developed the intentional creation of the now expanding hyperinflation, using Lyndon LaRouche’s Triple Curve, Typical Collapse Function to trace the massive money printing, especially after 2008, followed by the infamous Jackson Hole bankers conference of 2019, where Mark Carney and the BlackRock group announced the “regime change” in the Western financial system. That change was formally adopted at the COP26 this month in Glasgow, where the same crew created a Western bankers’ cartel to take control over sovereign governments, in order to dictate energy, industrial and agricultural credit policies, cutting off productive investments in favor of a new green bubble, hoping to save the collapsing Western banking system for a bit longer, while wiping out the debt through a massive devaluation of the dollar.

Gallagher demonstrated the inflation of 11% that led to the 2008 breakdown, followed by nearly zero inflation until 2019, and now a spike of 30% since 2019, with 125% from July to October. This fascist policy, like that of Nazi Finance Minister Hjalmar Schacht, will fail, and only implementation of Glass-Steagall can prevent the disintegration of the Western financial system.

A section on Afghanistan followed, starting with Pino Arlacchi, who, in 2000-2001, as the UN drug chief, successfully negotiated with the Taliban to almost entirely shut down poppy production. The U.S. policy today, he said, appears to be to starve the population in order to achieve regime change—a crime against humanity according to international law.

Amna Malik, the President of the Center of Pakistan and International Relations (COPAIR), decried the humanitarian disaster unfolding in Afghanistan, demanding action, including a “donors conference” to raise the necessary funds. She pointed to the “Extended Troika” of the U.S, Russia, China and Pakistan, meeting in Islamabad on Nov. 11, calling on them to take joint emergency action.

Dr. Shah Mehrabi, now a professor in the U.S. but also a Member of the Board of Governors of the Central Bank of Afghanistan (since 2002) and Chairman of its Audit Committee, emphasized that the situation in his country was deteriorating long before the Aug. 15 departure of the U.S. forces and the Taliban takeover. The total cutoff of all aid, which had sustained 60% of the economy during the U.S./NATO occupation, is driving the economy to “full stop.” He called for immediate cooperation with the Taliban, observing that the Taliban had made no effort to seize the funds remaining in the Central Bank—in fact, they had collected $50 million of corrupt cash in the homes of the previous government officials and turned it over to the Central Bank, giving the lie to the U.S. claim that it was not releasing the Afghan people’s money because the U.S. doesn’t trust the Taliban.

Iliad Alexander Terra, Founder and President of the Council on Global Relations, said that some Afghans are so desperate that they are selling their children for food. He pointed to the fact that Afghanistan had been at war for 40 years, but that the destruction of the once-thriving region goes back to the “Great Game” between the British Empire and the Russian Empire in the 19th century. He called on the international community and the Afghani diaspora to work with the Schiller Institute to mobilize the necessary forces to save the country.

Dennis Small, EIR’s Ibero-American editor, revealed the vast growth of drug production and usage under “Dope, Inc.,” the banking cartel which runs the international drug trade, over the past decade. Marijuana is the largest quantity and money value drug today, due to the legalization in most of the U.S. states. Both Afghanistan and Haiti are now in a state of total collapse due to the power of Dope, Inc., with the banks not only “allowing” it, but running it, and preventing the urgently needed assistance to stop it. He showed that only an economic development policy, to provide jobs for the youth, can make it possible to crush the gangs running Haiti and other nations worldwide.

Many more speakers addressed the crisis in Haiti, the war on poverty, and the fight to implement a modern health system in every country. Transcriptions of all the presentations and discussion will be available in the Nov. 26 issue of EIR.

Panel 3: “There Are No Limits to Growth in the Universe”

The panel opened with a performance of Beethoven’s Lied “Abendlied unter’m gestirnten Himmel” (“Evening Song Under the Starry Heavens”) by tenor John Sigerson accompanied by Margaret Greenspan.

The keynote by Schiller Institute Science Advisor, Jason Ross, demonstrated that the insane “Green New Deal” and anti-development policies do not come from the mindless “leftists” and brainwashed children ranting on the streets, but from the highest levels of the oligarchy, turning economic policy over to the global banking cartels to impose this Malthusian destruction of the human race. He explained that LaRouche had long ago equated this green genocide to the story of Prometheus, who was tortured by the gods of Olympus for the “crime” of giving the power of fire to mankind.

Dr. Augustinus Berkhout, Emeritus Professor of Geophysics at Delft University of Technology and a Member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Science, presented his powerful “Message to the Young People at COP26.” He pointed to the “filthy rich” oligarchs gathered in Glasgow telling the youth that their fathers and grandfathers had caused a disaster by discovering new principles of science which had increased the population at higher standards of living, lying that it was destroying the planet and destroying their future. He presented seven points under the title , “Dear Youngsters, Please Wake Up,” including that CO₂ is of great benefit to the planet and to mankind while having virtually no impact on climate, and that climate and environment are different phenomena. He asserted that science itself is in crisis as a result of this fraud being peddled in our schools and in the media.

Prof. Sergey Pulinets, from the Space Research Institute, Moscow and the Russian Academy of Sciences, spoke on “Earthquake Forecasting at the Frontiers of Science,” addressing both the breakthroughs in space-based techniques for earthquake forecasts, and why the “establishment” seismologists insist that earthquake forecasting is impossible.

Prof. Carl-Otto Weiss, Director and Professor (former) of the German Principal Institute of Meteorology, Braunschweig, Germany, exposed the repeated “forecasts” that the world would be destroyed by such and such a date, which never happened. He reviewed the history of mankind from the stone age, to the bronze age, the iron age, the hunting and gathering paradigm to the steam engine to the internal combustion engine to nuclear power and eventually fusion, demonstrating that every discovery of a new technology redefined the resources which were available to mankind—i.e., that there is no such thing as “limited resources.”

Dr. Kelvin Kemm, a nuclear physicist and former Chairman of the South African Nuclear Energy Corporation, presented a “A COP26 Post-Mortem: End Eco-Colonialism Through Climate Truth.” He said that energy is the fundamental blood of every economy, and that the constant refrain of “scientists say carbon dioxide causes global warming” is not from scientists, but from the media and the bankers and politicians who want you to believe the lie. He affirmed that greenhouse gases, by warming the planet, had made life on Earth possible, but that carbon dioxide had essentially nothing to do with it. In fact, it is scientifically obvious that warmer climates, caused by variations in the solar cycles and galactic variations, tend to cause carbon dioxide increases, not the inverse.

Mike Thompson, a meteorologist who now serves as a Kansas State Senator and Chairman of the Senate Utilities Committee, said: “Stop the Weaponization of Science.” He said that Al Gore in 1997 invited meteorologists to the White House, including himself, to peddle his lie about carbon dioxide. Most of them swallowed it, but he did not, and he has investigated and promulgated the truth about Milankovitch cycles and climate ever since.

Prof. Franco Battaglia, Professor of Physical Chemistry at the University of Modena, Italy, and a Member of the Initiating Committee of the Petition on Anthropogenic Global Warming of June 2019, demonstrated that the Nobel Prize winners who “proved” that global warming is caused by mankind’s action, had used demonstrably fake computer models. This was proven by testing the models to see if they could “predict” earlier climate changes, such as the Roman warming and the Little Ice Age, and the models totally failed. Garbage in, garbage out.

Panel 4: “The Beauty of True Human Culture”

The fourth panel began with a performance of the spiritual “He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands,” arranged by Moses Hogan and sung by alto Linda Childs, accompanied by Dura Jun. This was followed by a performance of the final movement, Agnus Dei, of Beethoven’s monumental Missa Solemnis, performed by the Schiller Institute NYC Chorus. The Mass was performed during the pandemic lockdown, so each singer was recorded remotely, and all were joined electronically into a united performance. The final section, Dona Nobis Pacem, (“Give Us Peace”), was a fitting musical contribution for such an historic conference.

Jacques Cheminade, President of the LaRouche-allied Solidarité et Progrès in France, opened the panel with a demonstration of the degeneration of Western culture through the video game and TV glorification of wanton killing, extreme violence and sexual perversity, pointing to the Game of Thrones (praised by Queen Elizabeth) and the South Korea video game Squid Game. He connected this to the role of H.G. Wells’ promotion of universal fascism after World War I, creating cultural pessimism. Cheminade counterpoised the cultural optimism coherent with the true nature of man.

Prof. Zaher Wahab, a Professor Emeritus of Education and former Advisor to the Afghanistan Minister of Higher Education, addressed the universal crisis facing his adopted nation of the United States, and the destruction of his home country of Afghanistan. Having come to the U.S. for graduate school a half-century ago, he expressed his horror and disgust at the deterioration of the country, and the “highly irrational and anti-scientific” ideology which now dominated the nation, including even the threat of nuclear war.

Three educators, from the U.S., China, and Germany, addressed the collapse of education in the West and contrasted this to the educational system in China:

Denise Rainey, a retired educator and principal in Rochester, New York, who spent time in China in an educational exchange program, gave a passionate description of the optimism, enthusiasm, and rigor of education in China, including close participation of the families with their children’s schooling, contrasted to the demoralized, dumbed-down education situation in the U.S.

Xu Wang, the Executive Dean of Boao Culture and Creativity Institute in China, spoke on “The Aesthetic Education in China,” describing a project for 6-10-year-old students to design schools from their sense of the role of education. With some building physical structures and others computer designed structures, the contest involved hundreds of students, working in teams, with amazing results.

Prof. Ole Döring, PhD, a German sinologist and philosopher who teaches both in Germany and China, described the bright and enthusiastic student population in China, reviewing their philosophical traditions going back to Confucius, Mencius, and the 12th-century genius Zhu Xi, who designed the system of universal testing on philosophy, science, poetry, and music as the qualifying requirements for political leadership. He compared the ideas of Confucius and Schiller as the roots we must restore to escape the current decay of culture and education.

Diane Sare, founder and former chair of the Schiller Institute NYC Chorus, chaired the panel. She also addressed the moral transformation which occurred in the Montgomery, Alabama Bus Boycott in 1955, and how it transformed the citizenry and the youth through participation in an action based on moral truths. She proposed a “youth corps” for today’s generation, providing the emergency health care needed within the U.S. and around the world, as an uplifting moral experience to reverse the cultural decay.

Helga Zepp-LaRouche concluded the conference with an appeal for Americans to learn something about other great cultures. She noted that Lyndon LaRouche wrote many articles in the 1960s warning that the “rock-drug-sex counterculture” would destroy the cognitive capacity of the population. As we see today, the libertarian “everything is allowed” has done exactly that. We must have a Renaissance which draws on the best of every culture of human history, addressing man’s relation to the universe, natural law, and beauty. She called for support for her concept of an “Operation Ibn Sina” for Afghanistan and for mankind, to lift all cultures to the level of creativity and beauty.