EIR LEAD EDITORIAL FOR THURSDAY, JULY 1, 2021

Putin Cautions U.S. To Rethink Its Priorities and Interests: The World Is Changing Dramatically

June 30, 2021 (EIRNS)—In his annual “Direct Line with Vladimir Putin” Q&A dialogue with the Russian population today, Russian President Putin addressed a myriad of concerns about the domestic economy, the coronavirus, and day-to-day living conditions in the country. But he also took up the central strategic issue of relations with the United States. In the course of his 3.45-hour dialogue, answering 70 questions from over 2 million that came in, Putin appealed for the normalization of relations with the United States:

“I do hope that the realization that the world is changing—and in this changing world there will be a rethinking of one’s priorities and interests—will lead to the fact that the world order will become more favorable, and our relations, including with the United States, will return to normal,” the President said.

As he had in his press conference after his summit meeting with President Biden, Putin took note of the fact that there is a policy fight underway in the United States over how to address the strategic crisis. “The world is changing dramatically. And our partners in the U.S., on the one hand, understand this, and this is why the Geneva meeting took place. On the other hand, they seek to preserve their monopoly position at any cost,” he commented. Hence, the threats and “further, destructive behavior involving exercises, provocations and sanctions,” he said.

“The period of the unipolar world has gone. And you should proceed from the fact that the world is changing and it is changing very quickly,” Putin advised.

A joint statement issued this week by Russia and China on the 20th anniversary of the signing of the Sino-Russian Treaty of Good Neighborliness, Friendship and Cooperation, also addressed the need for a new paradigm in international relations. The document pointed to Russia-China relations as a model for the kind of shift that is needed from today’s geopolitical, unipolar world of confrontation. “The Sino-Russian relationship is not similar to the military and political alliance during the Cold War, but transcends this model of state-to-state relations, does not seek expediency, is not ideological, comprehensively considers each other’s interests, does not interfere in each other’s internal affairs, has independent value, and does not target an enemy,” the joint statement reads. The joint statement further emphasized the importance of cooperation on great infrastructure projects between the Belt and Road Initiative and the Eurasian Economic Union.

Russian Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York Vassily Nebenzia stated today that the strategic stability talks that Presidents Biden and Putin had agreed to at their recent Geneva summit, will begin in July. “Talks on strategic stability will kick off in July. The sides are getting prepared for that,” and he continued that following the Geneva summit, Russia had taken note of the American side’s attempts to impose new conditions for cooperation on issues of bilateral relations.

What course will those relations now follow? Will the U.S., in particular, wake up and rethink its real priorities and interests? In her weekly strategic webcast today, Helga Zepp-LaRouche referred to the June 23 British-American provocations against Russia in the Black Sea:

“It has all the signs that somebody wanted to destabilize things with these provocations. Just when there was a baby step in the direction of a dialogue between the United States and Russia, in the form of the Biden-Putin summit, obviously somebody thought that it would be necessary to destabilize things.”

Responding to the information that an American plane had coordinated the provocations with the British HMS Defender warship, Zepp-LaRouche asked: “This raises the question: Can Biden rein in whoever did that, which is threatening to ruin what he tried to accomplish with Putin in Geneva?...

“I think it’s really important for people to be aware that we are presently in a dynamic which, as with the global NATO 2030 plan, is meant to involve all countries all over the globe in a war machine designed to encircle Russia and China. If this is not stopped, it will lead to a catastrophe.” Referring online viewers of last weekend’s Schiller Institute international conference, in particular Panel 1 which addressed the strategic crisis, Zepp-LaRouche added: “I think this was a very timely discussion, and I would urge you to take the time to watch this panel, because it gives you a very good idea of where the world stands strategically.