A Forty-Year Fight for a New World Economic Order-Part 1 | WPN World People News

For over four decades, Lyndon LaRouche has provided the intellectual and political leadership in the fight for a new international economic order for the planet, for the purpose of ending the historic imperial control by monetarism and unleashing mankind’s creative powers as a species.

The profound impact of LaRouche’s intellectual leadership is clearly reflected in the current actions being taken by the BRICS nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) and others to create a new global financial architecture and strategic alliance among nations, with the recent establishment of the New Development Bank and related developments. The July 15-16, 2014 BRICS summit in Fortaleza, Brazil was a turning point in this process, as EIR has reported at length.

The LaRouche movement in the United States has campaigned throughout this 40-year period for this country to return to its American System tradition, as enunciated by President John Quincy Adams and others, and join the fight for a global community of sovereign nations in the interests of all: a new, just world economic order. These U.S. initiatives have notably included the call for Russian-American cooperation in the Strategic Defense Initiative; a New Bretton Woods financial system; the reinstatement of the Glass-Steagall Law to destroy the Wall Street monetarist faction; the Homeowners and Bank Protection Act of 2007; and such development projects as the North American Water and Power Alliance (NAWAPA).

A partial timeline of LaRouche’s role in leading the fight for a new world economic order, with an emphasis on international initiatives, is chronicled below.

The 1970s

LaRouche Calls for International Development Bank -

At press conferences in April 1975 in Bonn, Germany and Milan, Italy, LaRouche presents his plan for “the immediate establishment of an International Development Bank as an agreement among the three principal world sectors—the industrialized capitalist sector, the so-called developing sector, and socialist countries.” He specifies that the immediate concentration of the investment thus made possible should be industrial development and expanded food production worldwide.

LaRouche predicts that the present, or then-existing, international monetary system of the IMF, would inevitably go bankrupt, and should be replaced by a different credit-creating institution, namely, an International Development Bank (IDB), to facilitate long-term, low-interest credit for capital investment and capital-goods transfer from the industrialized sector to the so-called developing sector, in order to overcome the underdevelopment of Africa, Latin America, and large parts of Asia.

LaRouche issues a policy document for international circulation titled “IDB: How the International Development Bank Will Work,” in which he writes that two immediate, interconnected actions are imperative:
•The declaration of a commitment to sweeping reorganization of the world monetary system, involving an orderly process of debt moratoria and the establishment of an institution such as the proposed International Development Bank (IDB).
•Immediate commitment to enact, within each national sector of the capitalist world, these measures of emergency financial-reorganization legislation required to facilitate immediate economic recovery in conjunction with IDB efforts.

Non-Aligned Movement Endorses New International Economic Order

Within months, 85 nations, representing 2 billion people, meet in Colombo, Sri Lanka for the Fifth Summit of the Non-Aligned Movement and issue a unanimous declaration calling for a new international economic order on Aug. 19, 1976, identical in many regards to LaRouche’s proposals spelled out in his policy document from the preceding year.

The declaration endorses both the establishment of a new international monetary and financial system to replace the International Monetary Fund and provide capital for Third World development through the creation of a Bank of the Developing Countries, as well as a debt moratorium for the least developed countries whose outstanding debts at the time made economic development for those nations impossible. The heads of state of the Non-Aligned nations declare that this summit represented:

“... a new step for the establishment of the new world economic order, and in particular, the essential element of such a new order, a new monetary and financial system.”

In her keynote address to the summit, Sri Lankan Prime Minister Sirimavo Bandaranaike endorses the establishment of a development bank for the Third World:

“The developing countries are consistently denied the true value of their output by the vagaries of the international market and the manipulations of international finance. The developed countries have shaped the international financial system to suit their interests. Should we in the developing world sustain such a system? Should we not, instead attempt to develop a system all our own? ... One area of great promise, would be the establishment of a commercial bank—a Bank for the Third World—the bank of Asia, Africa, and Latin America. This would not be another non-aligned solidarity fund. It would be a genuine commercial bank and a truly multinational enterprise.”

Guyana’s Wills Calls for International Development Bank at UN

Immediately following the Colombo Summit, the Foreign Minister of Guyana, Frederick Wills, addresses the United Nations General Assembly in New York, on Sept. 27, 1976, and calls for a new international economic order through the creation of an international development bank and a debt moratorium for the developing world. Wills declares that “there can be no meaningful economic advance without the implementation of the New International Economic Order.”

Wills asserts:

“The IMF and the Bretton Woods monetary system must give way to alternative structures like international development banks.... The crippling problem of debt and the servicing of debt has assumed a special urgency. Developing countries cannot afford to depart from their basic and fundamental demand made in Colombo earlier this year calling for measures of cancellation, rescheduling, and the declaration of moratoria. We cannot afford to mortgage the future of unborn generations to the obligations of burdensome capital repayments and crushing debt servicing. The time has come for a debt moratorium.”

LaRouche: U.S. Must Integrate Itself into the IDB

As a Presidential candidate for the U.S. Labor Party in 1976, LaRouche celebrates the historic decisions made by the Non-Aligned Movement at the Colombo Summit saying:

“We have succeeded in mobilizing 85 countries and 2 billion people around our program. That is what I have worked for all my life. Our small organization has accomplished what many termed impossible. We must use our victory at Colombo to organize the American working class behind our program. They want to do something, but the average person lacks the sense of how to fight. Colombo changes this prescription. Colombo has shown these forces what can be done on a world scale with a cadre of a handful of people.... The United States will have to integrate itself into the International Development Bank (IDB).”

LaRouche Situates India’s Role in New International Economic Order

In an EIR Special Report titled “The Struggle for Indian Freedom: A New Program,” LaRouche states that India can lead the Non-Aligned Movement in declaring a debt moratorium as a “strategic weapon,” as well as establishing the International Development Bank:

“The first contribution India must make in this battle is to lead the developing countries, in concert with leading Third World nations, in a declaration of moratoria on the payment of all debt to the bankrupt monetarist institutions of the IMF-World Bank and their aid consortia. The freezing of unpayable debts to the monetarists is not only morally imperative but is the strategic weapon we must wield to open the way to the establishment of a new monetary system. As the 1975 programmatic document, ‘The International Development Bank,’ proposed, the central task of a New World Economic Order is to facilitate the greatest possible flow of technologies and industrial processes from the advanced sector into the developing sector.”

Indira Gandhi’s Interview to EIR

In 1978, the year before her stunning comeback victory as Prime Minister of India, Indira Gandhi gives the first of several interviews to EIR. In the interview, conducted at her home in New Delhi, Mrs. Gandhi strongly defends a return to the non-aligned foreign policy of her father Jawaharlal Nehru, and insists that only a policy of aggressive government support for investment in science and technology can save India from crushing poverty:

“Science and technology, this is essential to fight poverty. It is ridiculous to say that you can solve rural problems without science and without industry; you simply can’t. In our scheme of things, there is no conflict between agriculture and industry; they complement one another.”

In another interview with EIR following her victory in the 1980 elections, Mrs. Gandhi elaborates on her development policy:

“India is a developing country, and development has been rather uneven. It is obvious that where there is industry, it is much easier for that area to grow and for people to get more jobs. We have a program for developing backward areas and we have made progress in it.... We have to encourage investment to increase production, we have to build up the distribution system for essential commodities.... We have to take up again the special programs for the poorest and weaker sections of the population.”

Program for the Industrialization of Africa

The Fusion Energy Foundation, an international association of scientists co-founded by LaRouche, holds an international conference in Paris in June 1979 titled “The Industrialization of Africa” on the subject of a New International Economic Order as the indispensable precondition for the development of the African continent.

The 1980s

Forty-Year Plan for the Industrialization of India

LaRouche releases a program to transform India into an industrial superpower, at a conference on May 5-6, 1980 in Frankfurt, Germany, sponsored by EIR and the Fusion Energy Foundation. Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi sends greetings to the conference:

“Since 1947 India has made considerable progress in science and technology. The world now recognizes the versatility and capability of our industries. Our aim is to make our country self-reliant.... It is appropriate to assess our progress now and to look into the future. My good wishes to the conference on India’s industrial development being held by the European Fusion Foundation and the EIR.”

LaRouches Meet with Prime Minister Indira Gandhi

In April 1982, Lyndon and Helga LaRouche travel to India where they meet with Prime Minister Indira Gandhi for the first time, along with several members of Parliament, leading scientists, industrialists and economists. While in New Delhi, LaRouche addresses the Indian Council of World Affairs, as well as the Institute for Defense Studies and Analysis, and the Jawaharlal Nehru University School of International Studies. LaRouche then travels to Bombay to tour the Bhabha Atomic Research Center.

LaRouche’s speech to the Indian Council on World Affairs is titled “A New Approach to North-South Relations” in which he states that the program adopted at the Non-Aligned summit in Colombo must be the model for achieving a new world economic order, and declares:

“I propose that the developing nations, and the spokesmen of them, make a unilateral statement to this effect: that there will be international cooperation on East-West/North-South development interrelatedly; that conditions of political stability and peace be premised upon the mutual self-interests of the parties in promoting economic development.”

LaRouche Meets with Mexican President López Portillo

Immediately after returning from his meeting with Indira Gandhi in India, LaRouche travels to Mexico City to meet with President José López Portillo on May 27, 1982. At a press conference at the Presidential palace Los Piños following the meeting, LaRouche proposes that the nations of Ibero-America unite to deploy a “debt bomb” against the City of London to force a restructuring of the world economic system as the means to usher in the New International Economic Order. Multiple leading Latin American newspapers publish stories on May 28 covering LaRouche’s proposal.

LaRouche Issues ‘Operation Juárez’ Proposal for South America

In the aftermath of his meeting with President López Portillo, LaRouche issues a major policy document titled Operation Juárez, on Aug. 2, 1982, in which he elaborates his original proposal for an International Development Bank in the context of the debt crisis facing South America. LaRouche proposes that the nations of Ibero-America use their collective strategic leverage as debtor-nations to unite in a common bloc and unilaterally declare a restructuring of their debts and the establishment of a new monetary order.

The formation of an international development bank among these nations, he writes, would serve

“as a coordinating agency for planning investments and trade-expansion among the member-republics. This bank will soon become one of the most powerful financial institutions in the world.... The Ibero-American continent could rapidly emerge as a leading economic power of the world, an economic super-power.”

López Portillo Demands New International Economic Order at UN

In August 1982, Mexican President José López Portillo acts on LaRouche’s proposals as contained in Operation Juárez by adopting credit controls on Mexico’s currency, nationalizing the banking system, and announcing a debt moratorium on Mexican debt. On Oct. 1, 1982, he addresses the UN General Assembly, where he declares:

“The most constant concern and activity of Mexico in the international arena, is the transition to a New Economic Order.... It is imperative that the New International Economic Order establish a link between refinancing the development of countries that suffer capital flight, and the capital that has fled.... Let us not continue in this vicious circle: it could be the beginning of a new medieval Dark Age, without the possibility of a Renaissance....”

LaRouche in Rome: ‘The Theory of the New World Economic Order’

LaRouche delivers a speech on Oct. 20, 1982 in Rome titled “The Theory of the New World Economic Order” in which he says, “I shall summarize the scientific basis for the establishment of a New World Economic Order.” LaRouche states:

“My chief personal role in the effort to establish a just new world economic order has been to apply my special skills as an economist to design policy-structures of economic and monetary policies.”

LaRouche elaborates the scientific theory behind his Operation Juárez proposal, specifying “potential relative population density” as the necessary measure for the performance of economies, and states:

“We define economic science as a study of the manner in which the use of technological progress maintains and increases this potential relative population density.”

Founding Conference of the Club of Life

With simultaneous founding conferences in Rome and Wiesbaden, West Germany Oct. 20-22, 1982, joined by supporting conferences in nine cities of the Americas, the Club of Life was born, as proposed by Helga Zepp-LaRouche, to galvanize a counterpole of optimism throughout the world to the rampant neo-Malthusian ideology being fostered by organizations such as the Club of Rome More than 1,000 people attend, including some 400 in Rome, despite efforts by the U.S. Embassy to discourage participation.

Attendees included the embassies of Colombia and Guatemala to the Vatican; the embassies of Senegal, Venezuela, and Vietnam to Italy; the Italian Foreign Ministry; cultural and trade union groups; and large student delegations. There were also economists, anti-Malthusian activists, journalists, scientists, and industrialists.

Zepp-LaRouche sounds the theme of the events with her keynote in Wiesbaden, “On the Urgent Necessity to Create a Just New World Order.” Lyndon LaRouche follows with a presentation on the economic theory behind the New World Economic Order, noting especially the process underway since the Malvinas War in lbero-America, towards forced debt renegotiation.

Indira Gandhi Hosts Non-Aligned: ‘New Economic Order or Nuclear War’

Prime Minister Indira Gandhi hosts the 7th Summit of the Non-Aligned Movement in New Delhi, March 1983, where she warns, “Humankind is balancing on the brink of the collapse of the world economic system and annihilation through nuclear war,” and calls for the convening of “an international conference on money and finance for development.” She specifies that such a conference “should suggest comprehensive reforms of the international monetary system to facilitate the mobilization of developmental finance for investment in vital areas of food, energy and industrial development.” Mrs. Gandhi also calls for “a major debt restructuring exercise,” stating that the “debt problem of developing countries has assumed an unprecedented dimension.” She appeals to the 100 heads of state present to seize the “marvelous opportunity” before them, saying:

“The eyes of the world are upon us. Let us decide here to usher in a New International Economic Order, to call for an International Conference on Money and Finance for Development.”

The “New Delhi Appeal” which is adopted by the 100 world leaders present, representing almost half of humanity, echoes Indira Gandhi’s warnings of “the threat of a worldwide nuclear catastrophe” as well as her demands for an international conference on finance for development:

“A thoroughgoing restructuring of the existing international economic order through a process of global negotiations is necessary. Non-aligned countries are committed to strive for the establishment of the New International Economic Order based on justice and equality. We propose the immediate convening of an international conference on money and finance for development, with universal participation, and a comprehensive restructuring of the international monetary and financial system.”

LaRouche’s call for debtor-nations to unite and unilaterally declare a restructuring of their debts, as specified in his Operation Juárez, pervades the debate at the summit, and is raised by the President of Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega, who calls for the establishment of “a common organization of debtor countries” to conduct “joint efforts and actions that would induce the creditors to seriously consider the necessity of a new international economic order.” Ultimately, the Economic Declaration of the summit states:

“It is essential to secure a cancellation of the external debt owed to developed countries.”

Reagan Announces Strategic Defense Initiative

On March 23, 1983, President Ronald Reagan shocks the world by announcing the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), calling on the scientific community to “turn their great talents now to the cause of mankind and world peace; to give us the means of rendering nuclear weapons impotent and obsolete.”

The policy unveiled in this historic announcement had been discussed for months in back-channel negotiations with Soviet representatives, which Lyndon LaRouche conducted personally at the behest of leading members of Reagan’s national security team.

LaRouche began calling for economic and scientific collaboration with the Soviet Union in the mid-1970s to develop new physical principles for space-based missile defense systems as a driver for global development.

LaRouche had proposed beginning in 1977, in a pamphlet titled “Sputnik of the Seventies,” that an international crash program to develop such a system would provide the economic driver to fuel global development. The pamphlet proposed “long-range economic and scientific collaboration with the Soviet Union among other nations, which will eliminate the danger of world obliteration,” and emphasized the

“tremendous revolutionary industrial implications available to this nation and the world if the political will of the United States forces a recommitment to technological progress in the form of an International Development Bank (IDB) and its national concomitant, the Third National Bank.”

On March 24, LaRouche greets Reagan’s announcement:

“There is, at last, hope that the thermonuclear nightmare will be ended during the remainder of this decade.... The words the President spoke last night can never be put back into the bottle. Most of the world will soon know, and will never forget that policy announcement. With those words, the President has changed the course of modern history. Today I am prouder to be an American than I have been since the first manned landing on the Moon. For the first time in 20 years, a President of the United States has contributed a public action of great leadership, to give a new basis for hope to humanity’s future to an agonized and demoralized world. True greatness in an American President touched President Ronald Reagan last night; it is a moment of greatness never to be forgotten.”

LaRouches Meet With Indira Gandhi for Second Time

On July 13, 1983, as part of a tour of several nations in Asia, Lyndon and Helga LaRouche have their second meeting with Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. Ten days later, Mrs. Gandhi inaugurates a new heavy-water nuclear reactor at Kalpakkam, saying:

“Our science, particularly nuclear science, is dedicated to development, the achievement of freedom from want, and the provision of essentials and an honorable life for the masses. We are to make the deserts bloom.”

In the weeks following, LaRouche issues an EIR Special Report titled “A 50-Year Development Policy for the Indian-Pacific Oceans Basin,” proposing three projects for the development of the Pacific region: 1) a canal through the Kra Isthmus of Thailand, 2) a new sea-level canal across the Panamanian Isthmus, and 3) the expansion and improvement of the Suez Canal. LaRouche writes that the preconditions for developing the Pacific Basin are the “required reforms of the international monetary system specified in Operation Juárez” which would create

“a new international economic order not inconsistent with the monetary and economic policies of the American System. The paradigm for a republican monetary order is the statement of policies set forth in U.S. Treasury Secretary Hamilton’s famous Reports to the Congress, on credit, a national bank, and manufactures.”

LaRouche Addresses Conference in Bangkok on Kra Canal

LaRouche travels to Thailand in October 1983 to address the first of several conferences in Bangkok on building the Kra Canal, jointly sponsored by EIR, the Fusion Energy Foundation, and the Thai Ministry of Communications. This conference is followed by another in October 1984 for which LaRouche writes a policy paper titled “The Pivotal Role of Thailand in the Economic Development of Southeast Asia” in which he states:

“The prospect of establishing a sea-level waterway through the Isthmus of Thailand, ought to be seen not only as an important development of basic economic infrastructure both for Thailand and the cooperating nations of the region; this proposed canal should also be seen as a keystone, around which might be constructed a healthy and balanced development of needed basic infrastructure in a more general way.”

Source: Executive Intelligence Review