In the event of a war, not a stone will be left standing in Germany. Why take this risk? The British Empire, which today exists in the form of an oligarchic financial structure, is coming to an end!

Magdeburg in Germany after it was bombarded

E.I.R. News (eirna.de)

Below is an edited version of the comments made by the founder of the Schiller Institute during the dialogue at the 105th weekly meeting of the International Peace Coalition on 6 June.

Helga Zepp-LaRouche: "I am an optimist because I believe in the fundamental ability of humanity to always find solutions that are based on reason and are better than anything that has been thought of before. However, that does not prevent me from being extremely concerned about the short-term future. It is true that it takes two to tango, but I would like to quote a German proverb: “Even the most pious cannot live in peace if their evil neighbour is not pleased.”

I think that is exactly what we are dealing with here. The Russians' attempt not to be provoked, to be patient, to manoeuvre and to rely on their military advances is certainly effective. But I believe that there are forces that want to destroy Russia. Deputy Foreign Minister Ryabkov has just issued a very clear warning. He said that there are serious forces in the United States – he could have added the United Kingdom and, unfortunately, continental Europe – that want to break Russia into many pieces. One of these forces is the Jamestown Foundation, which is currently holding a conference in the United States to discuss precisely that: breaking Russia into 40 or more pieces. If you go back to the Great Game, you can see a continuous pattern.

Another question is: Why is this confrontation happening? Why have the continental Europeans – or at least those in the coalition of the willing – never proposed a diplomatic alternative? Why were they out to ruin, weaken and destroy Russia from the outset, as former German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said? Did they even consider that diplomacy is a means of conflict resolution, especially when dealing with the world's most powerful nuclear power? What is the motive behind this madness? If war breaks out, Germany will be reduced to rubble, let alone whether anyone will survive. Why take such a risk? What is behind this madness?

I think the simple answer is that when empires collapse, they tend to attack each other. I'm not talking about Trump's America, but the British Empire, which exists not in the form of nations, but in the form of an oligarchic financial structure. This is based in the City of London, on Wall Street, and one could add Silicon Valley and the famous MICIMATT.

Their situation is catastrophic. The financial system of this neoliberal system is on the verge of collapse. They are in an uncontrollable situation with a highly indebted America with 37 trillion dollars in debt. More importantly, however, is the two trillion dollar bloated derivatives market, which is like a powder keg. Since they are unwilling to change this because the system is based on maximising profits for a very small class of billionaires and millionaires at the expense of billions of people around the world, this is the driving motive for war.

So, as long as we do not eliminate the real cause of war and they try to feed this system with one bubble after another, we will be exposed to this threat of war.

I am quite hopeful and agree with the detailed analysis that the damage caused by the drone attack on Russian bombers was really not that great. It is not a game changer. I agree with all these details, but I share the concern about the big picture. Because when you consider how fragile world peace is, it only takes one or two successful assassinations. There have already been two attempts on Trump's life. If just a few things go wrong, civilisation could collapse.

In my opinion, this danger is so great that we cannot just fight the current dangers and rush from one flashpoint to the next to extinguish them. We need to put humanity on a completely different platform: the new security and development architecture. This represents a form of coexistence as a human species and rejects war as a means of conflict resolution. Because in times of thermonuclear weapons, war means the threat of annihilation – and we must prevent that.

We are not animals. Animals do not strive for world domination; they may want a good dinner and to eat their neighbour. But when the lust for power gets out of hand, humans can be worse than animals. Until we fix this and put humanity on a safer course, we should not stop our efforts, but redouble them.