Trump-Xi: Cooperation, Not War

Added: 2026-05-15

[00:00:01]Good morning. I'm Harley Schlanger from the LaRouche organization with your daily video update for May 15th, 2026.

[00:00:10]It's a Friday, so I'm going to take your questions and there were a number of questions that basically revolved around one concern.

[00:00:18]What was the effect of the Trump meeting with Xi Jinping in China uh over the last couple of days? Will this bring about a change in the overall strategic situation?

[00:00:30]Is it positive? Where is it heading?

[00:00:33]Now, I'd recommend that the best place to get the answers to that would be to log on today to the emergency EIR round table discussion, which begins at 11:00 a.m. Eastern Time.

[00:00:47]Uh I'll have a link to this in the description section. There'll be speakers from a number of countries.

[00:00:54]Uh the keynote will be delivered by Helga Zepp-LaRouche and the topic is the Iran war, the the controlled disintegration of the world economy. Is this going to happen?

[00:01:08]Again, 11:00 a.m. Eastern Time.

[00:01:11]The link for the Zoom connection will be in the description section.

[00:01:16]Now, the actual discussion will take place around the Trump and Xi meeting yesterday in Beijing.

[00:01:24]Did it offer a path for mutual security, peace, and economic cooperation?

[00:01:30]Or is [snorts] the permanent war faction of the City of London and Wall Street a step ahead, pushing for a new round of military confrontation and economic collapse?

[00:01:42]Now, Helga Zepp-LaRouche asked, have the results thus far in the Iran war, in which Iran has been able to to survive a brutal assault by the US military and Israel, have these results changed the strategic chessboard completely?

[00:02:00]Now, this will be a topic for discussion in this conference today.

[00:02:05]And what's the background to this? Well, there is a reality. You don't get it from the mainstream media, you don't get it from commentators in general, but you will get it from us. And And what is that reality?

[00:02:17]Well, first of all, there are no military solutions. This should be clear in the results stretching back to Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, and now the Iran war, and Ukraine is the most recent examples of this.

[00:02:33]The The search for military solutions is bankrupting countries, including the United States.

[00:02:42]The example for this is that the now discussion about the golden dome that President Trump wants to build is 1.2 trillion over the next 10 years, and it may not even work.

[00:02:54]Uh the Europe is is adding defense spending of 1 trillion euros.

[00:03:01]There's no way that even 1 trillion euros will get the European armies up to snuff to be able to face the Russian army with the the new military technology that's been built by the Russians over the recent years.

[00:03:16]And then the US, the proposal for 1.5 trillion annual defense budget, adding 500 billion to the cost. This is bankrupting the United States. This is not the way to go.

[00:03:31]Now, this is Let's Let's Let's Let's go back to the intent of Western strategists. And And in this, what we can see is that the strategy behind this war policy is that of the commitment to something called the controlled of the Western economies.

[00:03:55]And this was stated explicitly in 1978 by Paul Volcker, who later became US Federal Reserve Chairman.

[00:04:03]Volcker said in London, and he said this as a chairman of the Tri- Trilateral Commission.

[00:04:10]He was laying out what's called the 1980s project, and he said, "Quote, a controlled disintegration of the world economy is a legitimate object for the 1980s." Unquote.

[00:04:25]Now, this was built on the strategic assessment put out several years earlier by then National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger in something called National Security Study Memo 200, where Kissinger said that the world faces a scarcity of resources, and that the biggest problem is population growth.

[00:04:48]Something must be done to reduce the population growth, especially in the poorest countries in the world, including black African nations, uh Latin America, and Asia.

[00:05:01]Now, this was the commitment that was made for the United States, and we've seen that through continuation of wars, the uh sanctions policy, the embargo policy, uh and it's led to genocide. But even so, populations are growing. And where are they growing? In the global south, which is not infected with the pessimism of the Kissingerian Volcker types uh in their countries.

[00:05:33]And so, this is the different reality that confronted Donald Trump when he arrived in Beijing.

[00:05:40]That the Chinese are committed to not war, not cutthroat competition, but cooperative competition for the development of all nations.

[00:05:53]And this is based on a recognition that first of all, the existing economy, this era is over.

[00:06:00]The world economy is going through a transition from an imperial system to something different. Will that difference be an imperial system on steroids with war and chaos, or will it be one on based on peaceful cooperation?

[00:06:17]And the Chinese are starting with the idea that there is an alternative to war.

[00:06:24]And that alternative was emphasized by Helga Zepp-LaRouche as a new strategic and development architecture.

[00:06:32]And here's what she emphasized.

[00:06:34]We must take into account the interest of every single country, or it will not work.

[00:06:41]Now, neocons and neoliberals reject that. They say that's impossible. There are too many failed states.

[00:06:48]Uh there are too many poor people, too many uneducated people.

[00:06:53]We have to take care of our country first.

[00:06:56]Well, since when is building our country separate from seeking peaceful development of the rest of the world?

[00:07:07]Now, do they mean that cooperation in energy, transportation, trade, and so on is more costly than war?

[00:07:17]Well, think about the positive developments in the post-World War II period, especially in the reconstruction of Germany and Japan.

[00:07:26]We helped them rebuild their economy.

[00:07:29]And with marginal aid, the US did not contribute a lot of money to that.

[00:07:34]But with the aid that we did provide, they were able to generate credit to rebuild their countries.

[00:07:41]And that led to prosperity for them and for us. Trade between the United States, Germany, and Japan uh grew immensely as a result of the Marshall Plan and and US policy towards Japan.

[00:07:56]Now, this is the same idea of the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative.

[00:08:01]Win-win.

[00:08:03]Economic cooperation is good for both countries.

[00:08:07]So, compare that with the real cost of the war.

[00:08:11]The estimate that this Iran war has already cost $4 trillion in real terms for the US and the world economy.

[00:08:21]So, the preliminary assessment we have of the Trump-Xi meeting was that it was committed to economic cooperation.

[00:08:29]Uh the there's a a trade commission, for example, that's being set up to look into tariff policy.

[00:08:36]It's a 3-year framework.

[00:08:39]And then you can resolve disputes through cooperative dialogue.

[00:08:46]Now, Trump made interesting comments in his meetings after his meetings with Xi Jinping.

[00:08:52]He spoke of a US-China relationship that stretched back to the period of our colonial times, when Benjamin Franklin was printing works from Confucius in his almanac.

[00:09:07]And quoting the philosophical uh musings of Confucius.

[00:09:14]This is significant. This is a recognition by one of the most important founding fathers of the United States that a Chinese philosopher had things worthy to be said to help guide the new American republic.

[00:09:30]Now, in the keeping with this, as Trump discussed this, he spoke of his personal admiration of Xi Jinping and their personal friendship.

[00:09:41]Now, meanwhile, compare the potential with the cost of the war with Iran so far.

[00:09:49]And this is costing you. You may not know it, but it's costing you in terms of your household costs. And I'm not just talking about the increase in prices of gasoline.

[00:09:59]This is reflected throughout the whole economy.

[00:10:02]In April, for example, the consumer price index was up 3.8%.

[00:10:08]That's inflation.

[00:10:09]And that's larger than the 3.3% inflation in March, the month before.

[00:10:17]And as I said, it's not just gasoline.

[00:10:19]Uh but if you think you are feeling the pinch of inflation in your household purchases, you are.

[00:10:27]In April, fresh vegetable prices went up 3.9% in the United States. Ground beef, up 2.7%.

[00:10:36]Fish and seafood, 2.3%. Coffee, 2.3%.

[00:10:42]In other words, across-the-board increase in costs passed on from the cost of oil and and energy to the the transport sector, to the fertilizer sector for the farmer, and so on.

[00:10:57]This is the effect of an uncontrolled economic situation which is committed to war and committed to building up our country, protecting our country at the expense of others.

[00:11:11]This doesn't work.

[00:11:13]So, the question is, can we fix this?

[00:11:16]Well, there is no choice. We must.

[00:11:19]The danger of a spiral into another deepening depression will mean more war, more killing, more sanctions, more chaos.

[00:11:32]And the alternative?

[00:11:33]Dialogue. The alternative is reasonable discussion among creative human beings.

[00:11:41]And that requires a change in thinking.

[00:11:44]Not just for the leaders, because the leaders in in most of the Western countries are trapped in the zero-sum game of competition.

[00:11:54]But it requires a change in thinking in the population.

[00:11:57]Don't submit. Don't give in to the pessimism.

[00:12:01]Don't accept the idea that there's nothing that you can do.

[00:12:06]To make you accept this, they make you feel small.

[00:12:10]As though you don't know what's going on. As though something that happens in China has no effect on you.

[00:12:18]So, we have to begin a change in thinking now.

[00:12:24]And many of you have changed. I know it because I hear from you in your emails.

[00:12:29]So, this change can begin with your participation in the Zoom call of the Emergency EIR Roundtable today. That's the Executive Intelligence Review, where you'll hear from former heads of state, political leaders, business leaders, and most importantly from Helga Zepp-LaRouche, the founder of the Schiller Institute.

[00:12:52]We have a proposal. We have a program.

[00:12:55]And I it it reflects the potential that took place in the meetings between President Xi and President Trump that took place these last days in Beijing.

[00:13:07]So, make sure you're on the call today.

[00:13:10]Talk to people about it. If you can't be on it live, as I said, it's 11:00 a.m.

[00:13:15]uh Eastern Time. If you can't make it, it will be archived. And it will have a lot of discussion that will answer your questions, and hopefully provoke new questions from you.

[00:13:27]Because the way you learn is when you start questioning what you think you know and use that as a basis of making discoveries.

[00:13:35]So, thanks for joining me.

[00:13:37]Join us in a in a a couple hours from now with the EIR round table.