EIR LEAD EDITORIAL FOR THURSDAY JULY 20, 2023

Time Is Not on NATO’s Side; Look for Rapid British Escalation Towards Nuclear Showdown With Russia

July 19, 2023, 2022 (EIRNS)—It is now one week after the July 11-12 NATO Summit in Vilnius, Lithuania. During this past week, the British-steered NATO apparatus has issued two discernible policy statements on where they intend to take the Ukraine war, to punctuate their resolution coming off Vilnius. The first took the form of a drone attack on Russia’s Kerch Strait bridge, which produced modest structural damage and killed two civilians.

As Russian President Vladimir Putin promptly noted, the Kerch bridge has zero military value—no troops or weapons travel over it. The purpose of the London-Washington-Kiev attack was simply to send a message: We will strike Russian territory at will, no matter how many times you warn that Russia’s “red lines” are being crossed.

A second, related policy statement—this time, a written one—appeared in the pages of the July 18 Financial Times, authored by a prominent, high-level representative of the British Establishment: Baron Mark Sedwill, former National Security Adviser to the British government (2017-2020), who today is a member of the House of Lords and the top echelons of RUSI, the IISS, the Trilateral Commission and other think tanks. “NATO should not relax after the Vilnius summit,” Sedwill warned, suggesting instead that NATO extend its nuclear Article 5 mutual defense clause to the entire world: “NATO’s nuclear doctrine also needs a refresh: We should signal to Russia that any use of nuclear weapons anywhere, not just in NATO territory, could be met with force. Nuclear deterrence is terrifying, but more terrifying is an isolated, desperate autocrat misjudging our resolve and pressing the button.”

Establishment analysts and think-tankers are advising NATO to move quickly in this insane direction of thermonuclear confrontation, since time is not on their side: The Ukraine offensive has failed and is going nowhere fast; as winter sets in, it will get even worse for Ukraine; and the U.S. elections are coming soon, and “war-fatigue” is rapidly setting in with the American body politic. Hundreds of congressmen on both sides of the aisle are now voting against increased military aid for Ukraine. And there are Presidential candidates—also on both sides of the aisle—who are speaking out for the need for a negotiated peace.

London is not amused—in fact, they are alarmed. Donald Trump is about to be served with his third round of criminal indictments, to see if something will stick and he can be knocked out of the race in that way. And what might the British have in store for Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. on the Democratic side, to silence his anti-war voice?

Above all, what humanity cannot allow to be silenced are the voices of the countless individuals, organizations and nations around the world that are speaking out for a new security and development architecture, in order to stop the current drive towards nuclear war. This coming August 6, the anniversary of the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima, will be a Day of Action in many locations around the world, led by a Humanity for Peace rally in front of the United Nations in New York City.

As Helga Zepp-LaRouche put it in her weekly webcast dialogue today: “The ball is in the court of Western Europe and the United States to change their policy. The more people speak out and say, ‘We demand a peaceful solution to this conflict,’ the better. And the faster it occurs, also. Because before World War I and World War II, there came a certain point when the window of opportunity closed and the war became inevitable. I’m just afraid that, although nobody knows when that window will close—you can have a mistake, something could happen by accident—we are very close to that window of opportunity closing. That is why I think the efforts of the International Peace Coalition and the Humanity for Peace efforts, with the upcoming demonstrations, are so extremely important.”

Join the effort, in whatever way you can, to strengthen those actions and their four-point program:

1. End the supply of weapons to Ukraine.

2. Begin unconditional peace talks with all parties to the war.

3. End the NATO alliance.

4. Establish a new security architecture for all nations, ending the division of the world into warring “blocs.”

Please visit Humanity for Peace.