Date: Tuesday, 25 February 2025
https://ericzuesse.substack.com/p/jeffrey-sachs-taught-the-world-the
Jeffrey Sachs taught the world the past, and the correct future, on February 21st.
24 February 2025, by Eric Zuesse. (All of my recent articles can be seen here.)
My article yesterday was “Jeffrey Sachs today insulted the EU’s leaders, and Obama & Biden.” It showed an excerpt (27:50 to the speech’s end at 54:36) from his 54:36-minute speech on February 21 (which was misidentified as having been on February 22) to members of the European Parliament, and none of the extraordinarily enlightening 64-minute Q&A after it (with questions from the Members and from journalists). So, I am completing this presentation today, with all of the Q&A, and prefacing that now with the 3-minute segment (4:46-7:55) from the speech itself in which he described his involvement in the transitioning of the Soviet economies into capitalism (an impotant part of the history that produced the world we have today) — which participation by him was and is grossly misrepresented in Naomi Klein’s best-selling 2007 book THE SHOCK DOCTRINE, though far more accurately documented in David McClintick’s lengthy and classic article in the 27 February 2006 Institutional Investor magazine, “How Harvard Lost Russia”, which makes clear that the real villain in this entire matter (other than the U.S. Government) was the Democratic Party billionaires’ favorite economist, Lawrence Summers, and also his pet Russia hand Andrei Shleifer — certainly NOT Sachs. This portion of Sachs’s speech provides the fullest account that I have seen of that matter from Sachs’s own viewpoint:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_RNE3X41IvM
“Jeffrey Sachs Brings Real Politics to the EU Parliament”
4:46
My point of view is not uh secondhand, it's not ideology, it's what I've seen
4:52
with my own eyes and experienced during this
4:57
period in my understanding of the events that have uh befallen Europe in many
5:06
contexts, uh and I'll include not only the uh Ukraine crisis uh but uh
5:15
Serbia 1999, the wars in the Middle East
5:21
including Iraq, Syria. the wars in Africa including
5:27
Sudan, Somalia, uh Libya, these are to a very significant
5:36
extent that would surprise you perhaps, uh, and would be
5:42
denounced about what I'm about to say: these are wars that the United States
5:48
LED and caused. and this has been true
5:53
for more than 40 years now, what happened
6:01
more than 30 years I should say, to be more precise the United States came to the
6:10
view especially in 1990 91 and then with the end of the Soviet
6:16
Union, the U.S. now ran the world, and that the U.S. did not have to
6:24
heed anybody's views, red lines, concerns,
6:30
security viewpoints, or any International
6:35
obligations, or any U.N. framework [which includes interntional law]. I'm sorry to put it so plainly, but I do want
6:44
you to understand I tried very hard in
6:52
1991 to get help for Gorbachev, who I think was the greatest statesman of our
6:57
modern time. I recently read the archived memo of the
7:05
National Security Council discussion of my proposal, how they
7:11
completely dismissed it and laughed it off the table when I said that the
7:16
United States should help the Soviet Union in financial stabilization and in making its
7:24
reforms, and the memo documents including some of my former colleagues at Harvard
7:31
in particular, saying we will do the minimum that we will do to prevent
7:37
disaster, but the minimum — it’s not our job to help, quite the contrary, it's not
7:43
our interest to help. When the Soviet Union ended in
7:50
1991, the view became even more exaggerated.
7:58
(Secretly, U.S. President GHW Bush was behind that when on 24 February 1990 he started privately informing his European stooges, starting with Helmut Kohl, that the U.S. would be extending NATO right up to Russia’s borders despite the promises to Gorbachev’s team, because “To hell with that [those promises]. We prevailed and they didn't. We cannot let the Soviets clutch victory from the jaws of defeat.” and “We have weird thinking in our Congress today, ideas like this peace dividend. We can't do that in these uncertain times.” The neoconservatives — U.S.-imperialists — believe that if the U.S. empire won’t continue expanding, the U.S. economy will collapse, because the U.S. economy is built upon the sales of U.S.-made weaponry.)
.
HERE IS THE COMPLETE Q&A:
.
54:52
QUESTION (from a Czech — Central-European — Member): Are we supposed to create some
55:00
kind of neutrality for the Central Europe, or what would you suggest us to do?
55:08
SACHS: Yeah, so, uh, first of all, uh, all my
55:13
grandchildren are Czech I want you to know, uh, and Sonia [his wife] is a Czech born and
55:20
Czech citizen, um, so, we're very proud, uh, I'm I'm the trailing spouse in this, but
55:26
I'm a Czech wannabe.
55:34
Um, Europe needs to have a foreign policy that is a European foreign policy, and it
55:41
needs to be a realist foreign policy. Realist is not hate, realist is actually
55:48
trying to understand both sides and to negotiate. There are two kinds of
55:54
realists, a defensive realist [and] an offensive realist. Uh, my dear friend John
56:00
Mearsheimer, who is the offensive realist, I, we're very close friends, and I love him,
56:06
but I believe more than he does, you talk to the other side and you find a way to
56:12
make, uh, an understanding [Though Sachs does’t condemn “offense” — which means aggression — I and international law do, because an aggressor STARTS a war, a defender merely RESPONDS to it, which EVERYONE has a RIGHT to do; so, I reject Mearsheimer, because he accepts aggression, and I do not — aggression is subversions, sanctions, coups, invasions and such, but regardless of its form, is the fundamental evil, in my view]; and, so, basically,
56:21
uh, Russia is not going to invade Europe. This is the fundamental point. It may get
56:29
up to the Dnieper River [I think it’ll go beyond that] it's not going to invade Europe.
56:35
But there are real issues: the the main issue for Russia was
56:42
the United States, because Russia as a major power and a, the largest, nuclear
56:50
power in the world, was profoundly concerned about U.S. unipolarity [U.S. aggression]
56:56
from the beginning. Now that this [the Cold War, but sadly NOT U.S. aggression] is seemingly possibly ending, Europe has to open
57:04
negotiations directly with Russia as well, because the United States will quickly lose interest, and you're going
57:11
to be living with Russia for the next thousands of years. Okay, so what do you want, do you want
57:20
to make sure that the Baltic states are secure? The best thing for the Baltic
57:25
states is to stop their Russophobia. This is the most important
57:33
thing. Estonia has about 25% Russian citizens, Russian-speaking citizens,
57:39
ethnic Russians. Latvia the
57:45
same. Don't provoke [aggress against] the neighbor, that's
57:52
all. This is not hard, it really isn’t hard. And, again, I
57:59
want to explain my point of view. I have helped these countries, the
58:05
ones I'm talking about, trying to advise. I'm not their enemy. I'm not Putin's puppet. I'm not Putin's
58:12
apologist. I worked in Estonia, they gave me — I don’t [remeber], it's not, I think it’s — the
58:19
second highest civilian honor that a president of Estonia can bestow on a
58:24
non-national, because I designed their currency system for them in
58:31
1992, so I'm giving them advice [and it is]: do not stand there, Estonia, and say we want to
58:37
break up Russia. Are you kidding? Don’t. This is not how to survive in this
58:46
world. You survive with mutual respect,
58:52
actually you survive in negotiation, you survive in discussion, you don't
58:59
outlaw the Russian language — not a good idea when 25% of
59:05
your population is, has a first language of, Russian. It's not right even if there
59:12
weren't a giant on the Border. It wouldn't be the right thing to do. You'd
59:18
have it as an official language, you'd have a language of, a, in lower school you
59:24
wouldn't antagonize the Russian Orthodox Church so basically. We need to behave
59:31
like grown-ups, and when I constantly
59:38
say that they're acting like children, Sonia always says to me that's unfair to
59:46
children because this is worse than children. We have a six-year-old
59:52
granddaughter and a three-year-old grandson, and they actually make up with their
1:00:00
friends, and we don't tell them go just just ridicule them tomorrow and every
1:00:08
day. We say go give them a hug and go
1:00:13
play and they do. This is not
1:00:19
hard by the way. Well, anyway, I won't belabor the point. Thank you. So, elect a new Government, elect the
1:00:25
new, I should say, all I should say, is change, change
1:00:31
policy. MODERATOR: I don't want to have a political leaning here. Yeah, maybe a lady, and does that work? QUESTION: Yeah, hi, my name
1:00:39
is Cara, I'm a reporter with the Brussels Times. Um, thank you for the fascinating talk Jeffrey, um, I just wanted to ask you
1:00:45
about Trump's statements about wanting uh NATO members to increase their spending by 5%, and we're now seeing lots
1:00:51
of countries scrambling to prove that they're going to do that, including Belgium and given that Belgium is also
1:00:56
the NATO headquarters, um, I wanted to ask you what would be the appropriate response to those statements by NATO
1:01:02
members? Thanks, great, thank you. SACHS: Uh, we don't see exactly eye-to-eye on this
1:01:08
question, so let me, let me give you my own, uh, my own view,
1:01:14
um — My first recommendation with all respect to Brussels, is move the NATO
1:01:20
headquarters somewhere else. I mean it seriously, because one
1:01:28
of the worst parts of European policy right now is a complete
1:01:34
confusion of Europe and NATO. These are completely different but
1:01:39
they became exactly the same. Europe is much better than
1:01:46
NATO. In my opinion, NATO isn't even needed anymore. I would have ended it in
1:01:54
1991 but because the U.S. viewed it as a
1:01:59
instrument of hegemony, not as a defense against Russia, it
1:02:04
continued afterwards. But the confusion of NATO and Europe is
1:02:12
deadly, because expanding Europe meant expanding NATO, period, and these should have been
1:02:20
completely different things. So this is uh the first point.
1:02:27
My own view again with all respect to Michael [MEP Michael von der Schulenburg, who organized this event, for any Members of the European Parliament who DON’T owe their careers to the U.S. Government], we only had a brief conversation
1:02:32
about it, is that Europe should have, Europe basically should have its own
1:02:38
foreign policy, and its own, uh, its own military security, its own
1:02:45
strategic autonomy so-called, and it should, I'm in favor of, that I would disband NATO, and maybe Trump is going to
1:02:53
do it anyway, maybe Trump's going to invade Greenland, who knows, then you're really
1:02:59
going to find out what NATO means.
1:03:04
So, I do think that Europe should invest in its
1:03:09
security. 5% is outlandish, ridiculous,
1:03:16
absurd, completely absurd [I disagree: it is completely rational for America’s billionaires who control U.S. mega-corporations such as Lockheed Martin], no one needs to spend anything like that
1:03:23
amount. 2 to 3% of GDP probably under the current
1:03:30
circumstances. What I would do by the way is buy European
1:03:38
production, because actually strangely
1:03:43
weirdly unfortunately in this world, and it's a true truism, but it's unfortunate,
1:03:51
so I'm not championing it, a lot of technological Innovation spins off from
1:03:59
the military sector because governments invest in the military
1:04:04
sector. So, Trump is an arms salesman, you
1:04:10
understand that he's selling American
1:04:16
Arms, he is selling American Technology. Vance told you a few days ago
1:04:23
don't even think about having your own AI
1:04:28
technology, so please understand that this increase of
1:04:34
spending is for the United States, not for
1:04:40
you, and in this sense, I'm completely against that approach, but I would not be against an
1:04:47
approach of Europe spending two to three% of GDP for a unified European
1:04:54
security structure and invested in Europe and European
1:05:00
technology, and not having the United States dictate the use of European
1:05:07
technology. It's so interesting, it's the Netherlands that produces the only
1:05:12
machines of advanced semiconductors, extreme ultraviolet
1:05:19
lithography, it's ASML. But America determines every policy of ASML.
1:05:26
The Netherlands doesn't even have a footnote. I wouldn't do that if I were
1:05:32
you, hand over all security to the United States. I wouldn't do it. I would have
1:05:39
your own security framework, so you can have your own foreign policy framework,
1:05:45
as well. Europe stands for lots of things that the United States does not stand
1:05:51
for, Europe stands for climate action, by the way rightly so, because our
1:05:57
president is completely bonkers on this, and Europe stands for
1:06:04
decency, for social democracy as an ethos, I'm not talking about a party I'm
1:06:10
talking about an ethos of how equality of Life
1:06:16
occurs Europe, stands for multilateralism, Europe stands for the U.N.
1:06:21
Charter, the US stands for none of those things. You know that our secretary of state Marco Rubio
1:06:30
cancelled his trip to South Africa because on the agenda was equality and
1:06:38
sustainability, and he said I'm not getting into that, that is an honest reflection of
1:06:46
deep AngloSaxon
1:06:51
libertarianism. Egalitarianism is not a word of the American
1:06:57
lexicon. Sustainable development not at all. You probably know by the way that of
1:07:04
the 193 UN member states,
1:07:10
191 have had SDG [Sustainable Development Goals] plans presented as voluntary national reviews.
1:07:17
191. Two have not: Haiti and the United
1:07:22
States of America. The the Biden Administration wasn't even allowed to say sustainable
1:07:29
development goals. The treasury had a policy not to say sustainable
1:07:34
development goals. Okay, I mention all of this because you need your own foreign
1:07:41
policy. I issue a report, two reports each year. One the world happiness report and
1:07:48
18 of the top 20 countries if I I remember correctly are European. This is
1:07:53
the highest quality of life in the world, so you need your own policy to
1:07:59
protect that quality of life. The United States ranks way
1:08:05
down. And the other report where's my colleague Guillaume is somewhere in the room,
1:08:10
here, there he is, Guillaume Lafortune, is the lead author of our annual Sustainable
1:08:16
Development report, and almost all of the top 20 countries are European countries,
1:08:23
because you believe in this stuff, and that's why you're the happiest except in
1:08:32
geopolitics, but quality of life. So you need your
1:08:37
own foreign policy. But you won't have it unless you have your own security. You
1:08:42
just won’t. And so, and by the way, 27 countries cannot each have their own
1:08:49
foreign policy. This is a problem: you need a European foreign policy, and and a
1:08:55
European security structure, and by the way although Michael assures me it's dead, I was the greatest fan of
1:09:04
OSCE and believe that OSCE [Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe] is the proper framework for European security. It could
1:09:11
really work. MODERATOR: Okay, and um afterwards first, thank
1:09:19
you, thank you very much, you at the lunch, no, you can, yeah, yeah, okay. QUESTION: Uh, well uh thank you Professor, I'm from Slovakia
1:09:26
and my prime minister Robert Fico was almost shot dead because the opinions you had the similar with him, uh, yes, we
1:09:34
are as a Slovakia, Slovak, government, of the few countries in the European Union, we are talking to Russians. Uh, two months
1:09:41
ago I was talking with Mr Medvedev, uh, in two weeks, I will be talking uh in Duma with
1:09:47
Mr Slutzki, who is the chairman of the Russian, uh, Foreign Affairs Committee in uh Moscow. Maybe my question is what
1:09:54
would you be your message to Russians in this moment, because as I heard they are on
1:10:00
the victorious wave, they have no reason to not to conquer the Donbass, because that's their war aim, and what can Trump,
1:10:07
uh, can offer to them, uh, to stop the war immediately? What would be, what would be
1:10:13
the message for Russians from your side? Thank you very
1:10:20
much. SACHS: Lots of, uh, important things are, uh, now on offer, and on the table, and I
1:10:27
believe that the war will end quickly because of this, and this — this will be at
1:10:34
least one blessing in a very uh very difficult time. Exactly what the
1:10:40
settlement will be I think uh is now only a question of the territorial
1:10:47
issues, uh, and that is whether it is the complete four oblasts, including all of Kherson
1:10:55
and Zaporizhzhia or whether it is on the contact line, and how all of this will be
1:11:01
negotiated I'm not in the room of the negotiations, so I can't really say more,
1:11:07
but the basis will be there, will be territorial concessions, there will be
1:11:14
neutrality, there will be security guarantees for Ukraine for all parties,
1:11:20
uh, there will be at least with the U.S. an end of the economic sanctions,
1:11:26
but what counts of course is Europe and Russia. I think that there are and maybe
1:11:33
there will be a restoration of nuclear arms negotiations, which would be
1:11:40
extraordinarily positive. I think that there are tremendously important issues for
1:11:48
Europe to negotiate directly with Russia,
1:11:53
and so I would urge uh President Costa [António Costa, the new President of the European Council] and the leadership of Europe, to open
1:12:01
direct discussions with President Putin, because European security is on the
1:12:08
table. I know the Russian leaders, many of them quite well, uh, they are good
1:12:17
negotiators, and uh you should negotiate with them, uh, and you should negotiate
1:12:23
well with them. Uh, I would ask them some questions, uh, I
1:12:30
would ask them what are the security guarantees that can work so that this
1:12:36
war ends permanently? What are the security guarantees for the Baltic states? What
1:12:43
should be done, part of the process of negotiation is actually to ask the other
1:12:48
side about your concerns, not just to know what they know as you think is, to be
1:12:55
true, but actually to ask: we have a real problem, we have a real worry, what are
1:13:01
the guarantees? Well, I want to know the answers also, uh, by the way, I know Mr
1:13:07
Lavrov, Minister Lavrov, for 30 years. I, I, regard him as a brilliant foreign minister. Uh, talk with him, negotiate with
1:13:16
him, get ideas, put ideas on the table, put counter ideas on the table. I don't think
1:13:22
all of this can be settled by pure reason, because, uh, of oneself, you settle
1:13:30
wars by negotiating and understanding what are the real issues and you don't
1:13:36
call the other side a liar when they express their issues — you work out what
1:13:42
the implications of that are for the mutual benefit of peace. So the most
1:13:50
important thing is: stop the yelling, stop the war mongering, and discuss with the
1:13:58
Russian counterparts, and don't beg to be at the table with the United States. You
1:14:04
don't need to be in the room with the United States. You're Europe you should be in the room with Europe and
1:14:11
Russia. [I would add: you should discuss whether Russia wants to be part of the EU, since even only the European part of Russia is Europe’s biggest and wealthiest country.] If the United States wants to join, that's fine [I disagree: Russia is part of Europe, America is not], but to beg, no, and, by the
1:14:19
way, Europe does not need to have Ukraine in the room when Europe talks with
1:14:27
Russia. You have a lot of issues, direct issues. Don't hand over your foreign
1:14:34
policy to anybody, not to the United States, not to Ukraine, not to
1:14:40
Israel. Keep a European foreign policy. This is the basic idea.
1:14:49
[Applause]
1:14:55
QUESTION: Hans Neuhoff, from the sovereignist political group in this Parliament um Alternative for Germany [AfD] as political
1:15:02
party. First of all, let me thank you Mr Sachs, for being here and sharing your ideas with us, and be assured that many
1:15:10
of your ideas, and of your colleague John Mearsheimer have well been received by
1:15:16
political groups here and have been integrated into our agenda. I widely
1:15:21
share your views, um, yet there's one question regarding the historical
1:15:27
account that you gave, uh, where I would like to go in some detail and this concerns the beginning of NATO expansion.
1:15:36
Um you um uh uh reported from uh um the
1:15:42
website um What Gorbachev Heard, that there are many um quotations from Genscher
1:15:48
for example, um that NATO will not move one inch eastwards. Now the two-lus-four
1:15:55
treaty has been signed in September 1990, right in Moscow, so at that point in time
1:16:02
the Warsaw Pact still existed and countries like Poland Hungary and Czechia were not part of the
1:16:10
negotiations for the two plus four treaty, so Warsaw Pact actually dissolved in
1:16:16
July 1991 and the Soviet Union dissolved in December
1:16:21
1991, so nobody who was was present in the negotiations could speak for Poland
1:16:28
could speak for Hungary could speak for Slovakia, that they would not try to become member of NATO once the overall
1:16:37
situation has changed, so the counterargument um which we have to
1:16:42
counter um is that it was on the will of these countries of Poland of Hungary of
1:16:50
Slovakia that they wanted to join NATO because of the very history
1:16:55
they had with the Soviet Union, and of course Russia was still perceived in a
1:17:00
way, um, as a follower of the Soviet Union, so how do you counter that
1:17:12
argument? SACHS: I have no doubt of why Hungary Poland Czech Republic Slovakia wanted to
1:17:21
join NATO. The question is what is the U.S.
1:17:27
doing to make peace, because NATO is not a choice of Hungary Poland Czech
1:17:34
Republic or Slovakia. NATO is a U.S.-led military Alliance [AGAINST AND TO CONQUER RUSSIA] and the question is
1:17:42
how are we going to establish peace in a reliable way? If I were uh making those decisions
1:17:52
back then, I would have ended NATO altogether in
1:17:58
1991. When those countries requested NATO, I would have explained to them what our
1:18:05
defense secretary William Perry said what our lead Statesman George Kennan
1:18:11
said, what our final ambassador to the Soviet Union Jack Matlock said. Uh, they
1:18:18
said, well we understand your feelings, but it's not a good idea, because it could provoke a new cold war with Russia.
1:18:26
So, that's how I would have answered it when those countries joined uh in the
1:18:32
first wave. I don't think it was that consequential in fact, except that it was
1:18:40
part of a bigger project and the project was spelled out already in 1994 there's
1:18:46
a very good book by Jonathan Haslam Harvard University Press called Hubris
1:18:54
which uh gives a detailed historical documentation of step by step what
1:19:00
happened uh and uh it's it's really worth reading. Um, so, this is a now — but
1:19:08
the point I would really make is that Ukraine and Georgia were too
1:19:16
far. This is right up against Russia. This is in the context of the
1:19:23
complete destabilization of the nuclear framework. This is in the context of the
1:19:29
U.S. putting in missile systems on Russia's borders. If you listen to
1:19:34
President Putin over the years, probably the main thing, if you
1:19:39
listen carefully that he's concerned about, is missiles 7 minutes from Moscow,
1:19:45
is a decapitation strike, and this is very real. The U.S. Not
1:19:51
only would freak out but did freak out when this happened in the Western
1:19:57
Hemisphere so it's the Cuban Missile Crisis in reverse, and fortunately Nikita Khrushchev
1:20:06
did not stand up and say open door policy of the Warsaw Pact — we can go
1:20:13
wherever we want, Cuba's asked us, it's none of America's business — what Khrushchev said Is: War, my God,
1:20:21
we don't want war! We end this crisis we both pull back that's what Khrushchev and
1:20:27
Kennedy decided in the end. So, this is the real consequential — Russia even
1:20:34
swallowed with a lot of pain the Baltic states Romania Bulgaria Slovakia and
1:20:40
Slovenia [being in NATO]. It is Ukraine and Georgia, and it's because of geography, it's because
1:20:48
of Lord Palmerston, it's because of the first Crimean War, it's because of the
1:20:53
missile systems that this is the essence of why there was this war.
1:21:03
[Applause] MODERATOR: Um, yeah, is there anybody else,
1:21:10
because then we maybe close — what, you want to be the last one? Oh, which one?
1:21:19
Oh, can can we still continue? Yeah, no you you come for the lunch, don't take
1:21:25
you. QUESTION: Thank, thank you very much, Professor Sachs, for coming, um, here um, you've
1:21:31
mentioned that the European Union needs to formulate its own foreign policy. Um, in the past, the German Franco Alliance
1:21:38
was a big driver for, for those policies. Now with the Ukraine war, arguably that
1:21:44
received the crack. Um, do you think that in the future when the European Union is going to formulate this new foreign
1:21:49
policy, that they are going to be again in the front seat, or, uh should it be other, other countries, or other blocs, um,
1:21:56
trying to make that change? Thank you very much. SACHS: Oh it's hard. It it's hard because
1:22:08
uh, of course you don't yet have a a constitution for Europe which really
1:22:16
underpins a European foreign policy and it can't be by
1:22:22
unanimity there has to be a structure in which Europe can speak as Europe even
1:22:28
with some uh dissent but with the European policy I don't want to
1:22:35
oversimplify how to get there exactly but even with the structures you have
1:22:40
you could do a lot better with negotiating directly. The first rule is
1:22:47
your diplomats should be diplomats not secretaries of War.
1:22:58
Honestly that would go halfway at least to where you want to
1:23:04
go. A diplomat is a very special kind of
1:23:09
talent, a diplomat is trained to sit together with the other side and to
1:23:16
listen, to shake hands to smile and to be pleasant. It's very hard, it's a skill,
1:23:25
it's training, it's a profession, it's not a
1:23:31
game. You need that kind of
1:23:37
diplomacy. I'm sorry, we are not hearing anything like
1:23:45
that. I'll just make a couple complaints first Europe is not NATO as I
1:23:53
said I thought Stoltenberg was the worst but I was
1:24:00
wrong, it just keeps getting worse. Could someone in NATO stop
1:24:08
talking, for God's sake, about more
1:24:14
war? And could NATO stop speaking for Europe, and Europe stop thinking it's
1:24:21
NATO? This is the first absolute point. Second, I'm sorry but your high
1:24:28
representative vice presidents need to become
1:24:35
diplomats. Diplomacy means going to Moscow, inviting your Russian counterpart
1:24:45
here, Discussing this doesn't happen till
1:24:52
now, so this is really my point now.
1:24:59
I believe that Europe should become more integrated and more unified in the years
1:25:06
ahead. I'm a strong believer in subsidiarity; so, we were discussing I
1:25:13
don't think housing policy is really Europe's main issue I think this can be
1:25:19
handled at the local level or at the national level I don't see it as a European issue but I don't see foreign
1:25:26
policy as being a 27 country issue. I see it being as a European issue, and I see
1:25:33
security being at a European level. So, I think things need to be readjusted but
1:25:39
I'd like to see more Europe for truly European issues, and maybe less Europe
1:25:45
for things that are properly subsidiary to Europe at the national and the local
1:25:50
level, and I hope that, uh, such an evolution can take place. You know, when
1:25:56
the world talks about great powers right now, they talk about U.S. Russia China, I
1:26:04
include India and I really want to include Europe, and I really want to
1:26:10
include Africa as an African Union, and I want that to happen, but
1:26:17
you'll notice on the list Europe doesn't show up right now, and this is because there is no European foreign policy.
1:26:28
MODERATOR: Okay you maybe after you one more then we when I close is there is there
1:26:33
anybody wanted I would prefer a woman actually if I'm there you you you wanted
1:26:40
no first first this gentlemen and then you close okay sorry for this one it's
1:26:46
a QUESTION: Thank you very much and thank you very much Professor for this very courageous speech very clear speech, also that you
1:26:52
made I'm an MEP from Luxemburg. Uh, my question is the following: what are the long-term
1:26:58
consequences of this lost war? We lost the war now, we have an uncertain future for NATO we have also clearly, and you
1:27:06
refer to it, the marginalization of Europe, we have um a strengthening of the
1:27:11
BRICS countries, which can be rivals in many uh respects, so will there be a
1:27:17
future for a collective West over the next 20 or 30 years? thank you very much.
1:27:26
SACHS: I I don't believe there is a collective West, uh I believe that there is a United
1:27:32
States and Europe that are uh in some
1:27:37
areas, uh, in parallel interests, and in many areas not in parallel
1:27:43
interest. I I want Europe to lead, uh, sustainable
1:27:51
development, climate transformation, global
1:27:56
decency. I believe if the world world looked more like Europe it' be a happier
1:28:03
more peaceful safer world and long longevity and better food by the way, uh
1:28:11
but uh just saying, um, in any event Europe has a vocation that is
1:28:17
rather different from the American tradition, and frankly from the Anglo
1:28:24
tradition because it's been 200 years of anglo-saxon hegemony or aspirational
1:28:31
hegemony the British still believe they run the world it's amazing what
1:28:36
nostalgia means uh they don't even stop
1:28:42
it's almost like a Monty Python skit actually uh but in any event
1:28:49
um where was I I'm thinking of Monty Python when uh
1:28:54
when the Knight gets all his limbs cut off and says everything's fine I'm Victorious that's Britain unfortunately
1:29:01
uh and so it's uh it's it's really terrible so no I don't believe in the
1:29:07
collective West. I don't believe in the global South, uh, I don't believe in uh,
1:29:13
all these geographies don't even make sense, because I'm actually you know I look at maps a lot, and the global South
1:29:20
is mostly in the North and the West is not even West uh and so I don't even
1:29:26
understand what this is about. I do believe that um we could be in a true
1:29:36
age of abundance if we got our heads on straight we're in the biggest
1:29:43
technological advance in human history. It's truly amazing what can be done
1:29:50
right now. You know, I marvel at the fact that that somebody who knows no
1:29:56
chemistry won the Nobel Peace Prize for chemistry because he's very good at Deep
1:30:03
neural networks a genius Demis Hassabis.
1:30:09
Um they figured out protein folding uh that uh generations of biochemists spent
1:30:16
their whole lives on and now U Deep Mind figured out how to do it U you know uh
1:30:24
by the thousands of proteins we have friends that spent their entire life on one protein brilliant friends and uh now
1:30:32
what we can do so if actually and same with renewable energy as everybody knows
1:30:38
the prices come down by more than two orders of magnitude the costs we could
1:30:45
transform the planet we could protect the climate system we could protect biodiversity we could ensure every child
1:30:52
gets a good education we could do so many wonderful things right now and so
1:30:58
what do we need to do that in my view we need peace most importantly and my basic
1:31:06
point is there are no deep reasons for conflict
1:31:11
anywhere as every conflict I study is just a mistake it's not we are not
1:31:19
struggling for laon's real that idea that came from Mal
1:31:24
and it became a Nazi idea was always a wrong idea it was a mistake a
1:31:31
fundamental intellectual mistake an intellectual Mistake by the
1:31:37
way cuz leading scientists adopted the idea that we had race Wars we had
1:31:42
National Wars we had Wars of survival because we don't have enough on the planet as an economist I can tell you we
1:31:50
have plenty on the planet for everybody's development plenty we're not in a conflict with
1:31:57
China we're not in a conflict with Russia if we calm
1:32:04
down if you ask about the long term the long term is very good thank you the
1:32:11
long term if we don't blow ourselves up is very good and so this is what we
1:32:18
should aim for a positive shared Vision under International
1:32:24
law because of our technology things operate at a regional scale now it used
1:32:30
to be it was Villages then it was a it was small areas then it was unification
1:32:36
of countries now it's regional that's not just because regions are wonderful
1:32:42
it's because the underlying technological reality say Europe should be an integrated area by transport by
1:32:49
fast rail by digital by and so there's Europe the politics follows the
1:32:55
technological realities to a very important extent we're in a world of regions
1:33:00
now so Europe should be Europe with subsidiarity don't lose all of the
1:33:08
wonderful wonderful national and local elements but Europe should be Europe so
1:33:16
the good side is let's I want Europe to have diplomacy for example with Assan I
1:33:22
spend a lot of time with the aan countries if the the EU green deal wonderful
1:33:31
idea I said many years ago okay to the Assan leaders make an Assan green deal
1:33:39
and then talk with the Europeans so that you have this uh wonderful relationship
1:33:45
trade investment technology so last year they announced an aan green deal what
1:33:51
did Europe do about it nothing it said sorry we're in the Ukraine war thank you no interest so this is my
1:34:01
point the prospects are very positive if we construct the
1:34:08
peace. [Applause] MODERATOR: yeah because we have to go I get all the
1:34:16
time messages that I should here leave the room can you something very short yeah.
1:34:23
QUESTION: Um, do you think that a way out of the conflict is some kind of style of
Finlandization?
1:34:28
finlandization um and then like is that what you would have sorry yeah is that what you would have lik to see like
1:34:35
Sweden and finland's foreign policy as an example like is that instead of them becoming members of NATO is that the way
1:34:42
that you would have likeed to see these countries handled out foreign policy um and do you think that these countries
1:34:49
that border Russia should just kind of succumb to their fate that okay we can't provoke Russia like this is the way we
1:34:54
have to live? SACHS: Yeah very good excellent question and let me let me just report
1:35:03
one uh part about finlandization finlandization landed Finland number one in the world
1:35:11
happiness report year after year rich successful happy and secure that's
1:35:21
pre-NATO, so finlandization was a wonderful thing, number one in the world,
1:35:28
when Sweden and Finland and Austria were neutral, Bravo! Smart when Ukraine was
1:35:36
neutral smart. If you have two superpowers, keep them apart a little bit,
1:35:42
you don't have to be right with your nose up against each other, especially if one of them the US is pushing its nose
1:35:49
into the other one, and so Finlandization
1:35:55
to my mind has a very positive connotation, so does Austrianosation.
1:36:00
Austria 1955 signed its uh
1:36:06
neutrality, the Soviet Army left, and Austria is a wonderful place by the way
1:36:12
absolutely wonderful, and so this is uh basic how to avoid conflict. If the
1:36:19
United States had any sense at all it would have left these countries as a neutral space in between the U.S. Military
1:36:29
and Russia but that's where the U.S. lost it. MODERATOR: Thank you very much. Let
1:36:35
[Applause] me I I just want to end with an appeal I
1:36:42
think we both agree that we will have a — the war will end within a month or two
1:36:49
and that means the fighting will end. It doesn't mean that we will have peace in Europe, the peace in Europe that has to
1:36:54
be done by us by Europeans, not by a president from the United States. We have to create this peace, and that is Europe
1:37:01
which includes of course Belarus Russia and all these other countries so we have to do something, and we are here at
1:37:08
Parliament. As parliamentarians we represent people, we are the only legitimate democratically legitimate
1:37:14
institution in the European Union. Maybe we should have become all a little bit more proactive in trying to move this
1:37:22
peace process forward across party lines, I think. I don't know how many parties here really are but that we can talk to
1:37:27
each other without saying ah you're from this party you're from this party. I think we really have to concentrate if
1:37:33
here we could not take more initiative from the parliament vis-a-vis the commission and saying we are presenting
1:37:40
the people not you we are presenting the people and these people in Europe want peace and that's what we should go so
1:37:46
maybe this is the beginning of one we will make every month I will organize with my colleagues an or the same thing
1:37:53
here about different topics which were all around it and we hope that this one we get a discussion that is different
1:37:59
what we have in the plenum where we basically don't have a discussion but that we have a discussion and also
1:38:04
across the party and invite also people from other political parties we don't bite anybody let's discuss it in the end
1:38:11
we want all want this the same peace for the next generation and I have plenty of children grandchildren you too and
1:38:17
that's what we need okay thank you very much professor [Applause] [Music]
1:38:23
[Applause] [Music]
.
Basically, Sachs is advocating that international relations must stop being on the neoconservatives’ purely competitive, win-lose, basis, and instead switch to as much of a win-win, cooperative, basis as is possible, so as for the entire world to improve, instead of (as now) being zero-sum (if win-lose) or else negative-sum (if wars and other such intentional destructions will harm BOTH sides — such as in today’s Middle East, and in the Cold War that at least until now has been NON-STOP ever since 25 July 1945). He is trying to replace Truman’s plan by FDR’s plan for the world’s future. Based upon the questions that were asked of him, I got the impression that many of the attendees might not have understood Sachs’s plan — much less understand the existing reality in the way that Sachs does. Perhaps thinking this way — basically in a positive-sum way — is still too new for them, though they might gradually come around to it. If they will come around to it, then the U.N. will need to be reformed so as to make it possible.
PS: If you like this article, please email it to all your friends or otherwise let others know about it. None of the U.S.-and-allied ‘news’-media will likely publish it (nor link to it, since doing that might also hurt them with Google or etc.). I am not asking for money, but I am asking my readers to spread my articles far and wide, because I specialize in documenting what the Deep State is constantly hiding — what the ‘news’-media ignore if they can, and deny if they must. This is, in fact, today’s samizdat.
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Investigative historian Eric Zuesse’s latest book, AMERICA’S EMPIRE OF EVIL: Hitler’s Posthumous Victory, and Why the Social Sciences Need to Change, is about how America took over the world after World War II in order to enslave it to U.S.-and-allied billionaires. Their cartels extract the world’s wealth by control of not only their ‘news’ media but the social ‘sciences’ — duping the public.
