EIR LEAD EDITORIAL FOR MONDAY AUGUST 14, 2023

Building Two Opposing ‘Blocs’ Will Only Lead to War

Aug. 13, 2023, 2022 (EIRNS)—The world is observing two diametrically opposite approaches to preparing the next era of mankind. The failed colonial and neo-colonial system is frantically trying to preserve the “unipolar world” under U.S.-U.K. leadership, through provoking wars wherever possible, while the BRICS countries and the overwhelming majority of nations in the “Global South” are preparing to end colonialism once and for all, while building a new era of cooperation in scientific and industrial development of all nations.

With the Ukrainian “counter-offensive” now widely acknowledged as having been a colossal and bloody failure, the Biden response is to prepare for $21 billion more in military hardware and financial support for Ukraine, to keep the slaughter going at all costs. Zelenskyy has just fired all his recruitment officers for running a massive scheme to sell fake medical exceptions, to paying customers of course, to escape being drafted. But still the bloodletting goes on.

Russia has now returned to the offense, closing in on a key city in the Kharkiv region. Meanwhile, Aleksandr Lukashenko, the President of Belarus, has moved to restore diplomatic relations with Poland, insisting that they are “neighbors” and “fellow Slavs,” despite Poland’s threat to move 10,000 troops to the Belarus border.

A similar failure of the imperial war drive is occurring in Africa. The Niger coup, described across the West as a dirty military attack against “democracy,” is seen in most of Africa for what it really is—a further expression of the mounting rejection of the colonial powers and colonialism itself. Niger is the fourth Francophone country—Mali, Guinea, Burkina Faso, and Niger—to overthrow puppet regimes under the control of NATO powers and ordering the removal of French colonial troops in their countries. Even the deployment of U.S. heavy hitters Tony Blinken and Victoria Nuland to Niger, with threats of military action to restore the deposed government, had no effect in weakening the anti-colonial resolve. The effort to coerce ECOWAS (Economic Community of West African States) into taking military action has (thus far) failed, with both political and social forces rejecting war.

This is not ideological, not “democracy vs autocracy” as Joe Biden likes to say, but rather it is development and sovereignty vs colonialist domination. As part of the Russia-Africa Summit in St. Petersburg last month, with 49 African nations represented, a session titled “Nuclear Technologies for the Development of the African Continent” unanimously agreed that the continent has a better option in nuclear energy to light up Africa, and that the continent needs regional cooperation to pursue aggressive reformation of their different power sectors with nuclear energy.

The African leaders recall that in a 2018 BRICS meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin promised that Russia would “light up Africa” by providing electricity, not from oil and gas, but through helping African nations to build nuclear power plants.

The case of Niger is exemplary: While the country is one of the world’s leading suppliers of uranium for nuclear power plants around the world, more than 80% of the Niger population has no electricity, and of course no nuclear power plants of its own!

Asia is also experiencing the two opposite approaches to the creation of a future paradigm. Japan and Australia, both backed by Washington, launched a new Reciprocal Access Agreement today, which was originally signed in January 2022, in order to strengthen “deterrence” against China, according to a document released by the Japanese Ministry of Defense.

The U.S. is also doing all in its power to disrupt the unity of the 10 nations of ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asia Nations) through their successful inducement of Philippines President Marcos Jr. to pick a fight with China over disputed islands in the South China Sea, while Marcos is also allowing the U.S. to build four new U.S. marine bases on the northern coast, across from China.

But China is not countering this U.S. militarism with its own militarism (despite the media-hyped claim in the West that China’s “aggression” in the region is the cause of U.S. anti-China hysteria), but rather through development, through the Belt and Road Initiative. Foreign Minister Wang Yi completed today a four-day visit to three ASEAN countries, Singapore, Thailand and Cambodia, where Chinese investments in railroads, roads, ports and industrial development were the primary topics of interest, along with diplomatic efforts to reach a “Code of Conduct” to establish peace and cooperation in the South China Sea.

The once-almighty colonialist forces are now on the defensive, as the Western economies are falling into de-industrial decline, while the BRICS nations are growing and taking their success story to the nations of the Global South. The BRICS Summit coming up in South Africa from Aug. 22-24, will be considering three crucial topics: how to deal with the 23 nations that have applied to join the grouping; the establishment of a non-dollar financial system for world trade; and the industrialization of Africa. The vast majority of the world’s countries and populations are looking to the BRICS, not to the City of London or Wall Street, for their future.

Nonetheless, despite this bright potential, the dying dinosaur of the former colonial powers is not yet willing to confront the truth that the 500-year “colonial era” no longer exists. Some of the aging and deranged leaders of these failed states would rather risk nuclear war, and its likely annihilation of the human race, than acknowledge this new reality.

Bringing the emerging International Peace Coalition launched by Helga Zepp-LaRoouche and the Schiller Institute together with the revolutionary ferment in the Global South is the necessary means of preventing such a tragedy, and creating a new architecture for security and development of all nations.