Jeffrey Sachs and Alexander Mercouris Discuss UK&USA-v-Russia Relations

12 June 2025, by Eric Zuesse. (All of my recent articles can be seen here.)

Jeffrey Sachs and Alexander Mercouris are two of the wisest, most knowledgeable, most honest, and best-intentioned, commentators in The West, regarding international affairs. A fascinating discussion between them on June 12th focused upon the present historical moment as being the most dangerous for the world ever since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, when one superpower, the Soviet Union, was about to install its nuclear missiles in a land, Cuba, close enough to the other’s, America’s, central command (in Washington DC), so as to pose the dire national-security danger to America, of a blitz decapitation of its central command. The present version is that UK-America are about to install its nuclear missiles in a land, Ukraine, close enough to the other’s, Russia’s, central command (in Moscow), so as to pose the dire national-security danger to Russia, of a blitz decapitation of Russia’s central command. I offer here that discussion and the transcript of a highlight from it:

https://theduran.com/dirty-war-second-front-and-south-caucasus-w-jeffrey-sachs-live/

“Dirty war, second front and South Caucasus w/ Jeffrey Sachs”

22:33

SACHS: Russia will be banished from uh involvement in the Middle East and so forth, so the war today is the same war

22:41

now MI6 and the CIA have been part of from the start and and I would say

22:48

if we really look at when the start is the start uh you you could date it to

22:54

1853 you could date it to uh the British expeditionary forces in Russia after

23:00

World War I and you can certainly date it to even the weeks uh after World War

23:06

II when the Soviet Union had been the the lead country and the main ally that

23:13

had smashed uh the uh German uh uh war.

23:20

Immediately Churchill turned to his war cabinet and his military advisers

23:27

and said "Well can we go to war with the with the Soviet Union?" Now uh this was

23:33

already in the summer of 1945, because the idea took hold

23:39

immediately in the UK and US security circles, this is OSS days even before the

23:47

CIA was established, but in the high command well our next war will be with

23:53

the Soviet Union. They were the allies that just lost 27 million people but immediately and I'm talking about June

24:01

July 1945 starting to think about the next war [being]

24:07

with the Soviet Union. What's amazing to me is how the end of the Soviet Union

24:14

also didn't change this almost at all. We now go on to Russia so it was without

24:21

missing a beat that the end of the Soviet Union the pretext of Bolsheviism

24:27

and communism as being the great threat. When that was gone, that also didn't

24:33

change the idea of MI6 and the CIA: now we need to dismantle Russia and lest

24:41

anyone think I'm kidding read Brzezinski's grand chessboard of 1997 where he opines

24:50

in his high-minded way that maybe Russia will divide into three countries, uh a

24:56

European Russia, a Siberian Russia, and an East Asian Russia, uh that could be in a

25:05

loose confederation. This is the hubris of the US and the UK for decades, and I'm

25:16

afraid I I'm actually even more afraid of MI6 [than CIA]. I

25:21

have to say, not in its power but in its recklessness. I mean you look at Starmer,

25:28

sorry I will say it, the guy's an idiot but he’s, all he is is a mouthpiece of

25:36

this deep state, and it's dangerous, and I found the attacks we've you've been

25:43

discussing them brilliantly uh for uh every day since they happened, but the

25:48

attacks on the strategic bombers, which is clearly an MI6 operation and probably

25:57

the CIA was pretty heavily involved in it also and certainly if they didn't know about it the whole place needs

26:04

cleaning out because if you can't figure that out in 18 months it is pathetic beyond belief but the recklessness of

26:11

going after the strategic triad of Russia whether successful not successful,

26:20

the whole idea of it is just an invitation to nuclear war like nothing

26:27

else, and there is the MI6 in its provocations and our western press stood

26:35

up and cheered how clever this is, and Ignatius cheered how clever this is, as

26:41

we take a step towards doom uh at the hands of these fools, the fools on our

26:47

side, I'm talking about. MERCOURIS: Absolutely — can I, can I just, say, one of the strange things

26:52

about the British obsession is that it never in the end works, we we just try

26:57

all of these things, and it fails, I mean I'm not going to discuss the Crimean War [but] just to say that it didn't turn out at

27:04

all well for Britain. SACHS: absolutely!

27:10

My difference of opinion from them is that whereas they see all this as being errors by “fools,” I do not, but instead as being intentional evils that are aimed at achieving what actually would be the realization of the plan for an all-encompassing global empire that Cecil Rhodes came up with in 1877, for the UK to retrieve (take back control over) the U.S., and then to use it as the global battering-ram for Britain ultimately to take over the entire world. As I documented there, Winston Churchill had been a protégé and follower of Rhodes, and — along with Truman’s own personal hero General Eisenhower — convinced the naive U.S. President Truman on 25 July 1945 that if the U.S. would not take over the entire world, then the Soviet Union would; and THIS is what started the Cold War, and started neoconservatism, and started the Military-Industrial Complex (MIC) — all focused on ultimately conquering Russia and any of its dependencies, or even any nations that aren’t hostile toward Russia. It wasn’t really done for authentic national-defense purposes, nor for ‘world peace’ (the claimed goal), nor even for ideological reasons (also as claimed), but for ultimate world-conquest, even at its very start. (This has been ESPECIALLY evident since 1991.) It has been cynical and not mere ‘errors’, right from its very start. So, I disagree with them on that. The historical turning-point was 25 July 1945, when Truman told Stalin that whereas Stalin would have no say-so over the countries that America had helped liberate from Hitler, Truman must have a say-so over the countries that the USSR had liberated from Hitler — and, of course, Stalin said no. Truman was stupid, and this assertion and demand by him might have been due partly to that, but he was also very manipulable; and in this as in many other things, he was surrounded by masterful manipulators, who shaped his Presidency. And, once Truman made up his mind on a matter, nothing would ever persuade him to change it. At that point, he was open ONLY to what ‘confirmed’ his existing belief.

Mercouris has no turning-point theory of what caused the Cold War (and the MIC, and neoconservatism), but Sachs does, and his theory is that it started in Britain at some unknown moment in the 1840s with Lord Palmerston supposedly going bats against Russia. However, Sachs just passes over, ignores entirely, that he is simply ignoring the more-basic question of When and why did America join Britain’s determination to conquer Russia? What’s missing from Sachs’s theory is the American side of this “Special Relationship,” and when and why it started.

Everybody knows that Churchill famously named it in his 5 March 1947 Fulton Missouri “Iron Curtain speech”, the “Special Relationship”:

A shadow has fallen upon the scenes so lately lighted by the Allied victory. Nobody knows what Soviet Russia and its Communist international organization intends to do in the immediate future, or what are the limits, if any, to their expansive and proselytizing tendencies. I have a strong admiration and regard for the valiant Russian people and for my wartime comrade, Marshal Stalin. There is deep sympathy and goodwill in Britain — and I doubt not here also — towards the peoples of all the Russians and a resolve to persevere through many differences and rebuffs in establishing lasting friendships. We understand the Russian need to be secure on her western frontiers by the removal of all possibility of German aggression. We welcome Russia to her rightful place among the leading nations of the world. We welcome her flag upon the seas. Above all, we welcome constant, frequent and growing contacts between the Russian people and our own people on both sides of the Atlantic. It is my duty however, for I am sure you would wish me to state the facts as I see them to you, to place before you certain facts about the present position in Europe.

From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the Continent. Behind that line lie all the capitals of the ancient states of Central and Eastern Europe. Warsaw, Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Belgrade, Bucharest and Sofia, all these famous cities and the populations around them lie in what I must call the Soviet sphere, and all are subject in one form or another, not only to Soviet influence but to a very high and, in many cases, increasing measure of control from Moscow. Athens alone — Greece with its immortal glories — is free to decide its future at an election under British, American and French observation. The Russian-dominated Polish Government has been encouraged to make enormous and wrongful inroads upon Germany, and mass expulsions of millions of Germans on a scale grievous and undreamed-of are now taking place. The Communist parties, which were very small in all these Eastern States of Europe, have been raised to pre-eminence and power far beyond their numbers and are seeking everywhere to obtain totalitarian control. Police governments are prevailing in nearly every case, and so far, except in Czechoslovakia, there is no true democracy. Turkey and Persia are both profoundly alarmed and disturbed at the claims which are being made upon them and at the pressure being exerted by the Moscow Government. An attempt is being made by the Russians in Berlin to build up a quasi-Communist party in their zone of Occupied Germany by showing special favors to groups of left-wing German leaders. At the end of the fighting last June, the American and British Armies withdrew westwards, in accordance with an earlier agreement, to a depth at some points of 150 miles upon a front of nearly four hundred miles, in order to allow our Russian allies to occupy this vast expanse of territory which the Western Democracies had conquered.

If now the Soviet Government tries, by separate action, to build up a pro-Communist Germany in their areas, this will cause new serious difficulties in the British and American zones, and will give the defeated Germans the power of putting themselves up to auction between the Soviets and the Western Democracies. Whatever conclusions may be drawn from these facts — and facts they are — this is certainly not the Liberated Europe we fought to build up. Nor is it one which contains the essentials of permanent peace.

The safety of the world requires a new unity in Europe, from which no nation should be permanently outcast. It is from the quarrels of the strong parent races in Europe that the world wars we have witnessed, or which occurred in former times, have sprung. Twice in our own lifetime we have seen the United States, against their wishes and their traditions, against arguments, the force of which it is impossible not to comprehend, drawn by irresistible forces, into these wars in time to secure the victory of the good cause, but only after frightful slaughter and devastation had occurred. Twice the United States has had to send several millions of its young men across the Atlantic to find the war; but now war can find any nation, wherever it may dwell between dusk and dawn. Surely we should work with conscious purpose for a grand pacification of Europe, within the structure of the United Nations and in accordance with our Charter. That I feel is an open cause of policy of very great importance.

In front of the iron curtain which lies across Europe are other causes for anxiety. In Italy the Communist Party is seriously hampered by having to support the Communist-trained Marshal Tito's claims to former Italian territory at the head of the Adriatic. Nevertheless the future of Italy hangs in the balance. Again one cannot imagine a regenerated Europe without a strong France. All my public life I have worked for a strong France and I never lost faith in her destiny, even in the darkest hours. I will not lose faith now. However, in a great number of countries, far from the Russian frontiers and throughout the world, Communist fifth columns are established and work in complete unity and absolute obedience to the directions they receive from the Communist center. Except in the British Commonwealth and in the United States where Communism is in its infancy, the Communist parties or fifth columns constitute a growing challenge and peril to Christian civilization. These are somber facts for anyone to have to recite on the morrow of a victory gained by so much splendid comradeship in arms and in the cause of freedom and democracy; but we should be most unwise not to face them squarely while time remains. …

Now, while still pursuing the method of realizing our overall strategic concept, I come to the crux of what I have traveled here to say. Neither the sure prevention of war, nor the continuous rise of world organization will be gained without what I have called the fraternal association of the English-speaking peoples. This means a special relationship between the British Commonwealth and Empire and the United States. This is no time for generalities, and I will venture to be precise. Fraternal association requires not only the growing friendship and mutual understanding between our two vast but kindred systems of society, but the continuance of the intimate relationship between our military advisers, leading to common study of potential dangers, the similarity of weapons and manuals of instructions, and to the interchange of officers and cadets at technical colleges. It should carry with it the continuance of the present facilities for mutual security by the joint use of all Naval and Air Force bases in the possession of either country all over the world. This would perhaps double the mobility of the American Navy and Air Force. It would greatly expand that of the British Empire Forces and it might well lead, if and as the world calms down, to important financial savings. Already we use together a large number of islands; more may well be entrusted to our joint care in the near future.

The United States has already a Permanent Defense Agreement with the Dominion of Canada, which is so devotedly attached to the British Commonwealth and Empire. This Agreement is more effective than many of those which have often been made under formal alliances. This principle should be extended to all British Commonwealths with full reciprocity. Thus, whatever happens, and thus only, shall we be secure ourselves and able to work together for the high and simple causes that are dear to us and bode no ill to any. Eventually there may come — I feel eventually there will come — the principle of common citizenship, but that we may be content to leave to destiny, whose outstretched arm many of us can already clearly see.

Here was Cecil Rhodes’s secret plan as first stated by him in 1877: the first version, of his will (as it became published finally in 1920):

“To and for the establishment, promotion and development of a Secret Society, the true aim and object whereof shall be for the extension of British rule throughout the world, the perfecting of a system of emigration from the United Kingdom, and of colonisation by British subjects of all lands where the means of livelihood are attainable by energy, labour and enterprise, and especially the occupation by British settlers of the entire Continent of Africa, the Holy Land, the Valley of the Euphrates, the Islands of Cyprus and Candia, the whole of South America, the Islands of the Pacific not heretofore possessed by Great Britain, the whole of the Malay Archipelago, the seaboard of China and Japan, the ultimate recovery of the United States of America as an integral part of the British Empire, the inauguration of a system of Colonial representation in the Imperial Parliament which may tend to weld together the disjointed members of the Empire and, finally, the foundation of so great a Power as to render wars impossible and promote the best interests of humanity.”

HERE you can see that in its broader context.

His final (1899) version was far more tactful, but expressed the same intent: “Whereas I consider that the education of young Colonists at one of the Universities in the United Kingdom is of great advantage to them for giving breadth to their views for their instruction in life and manners and for instilling into their minds the advantage to the Colonies as well as to the United Kingdom of the retention of the unity of the Empire.” (Note: Americans, etc., are still only “colonists.” Only Brits are colonizers.) As Rhodes’s close friend and confidant, W.T. Stead, wrote of the man, “Mr. Rhodes’s last Will and Testament reveals him to the world as the first distinguished British statesman whose Imperialism was that of Race and not that of Empire.” Rhodes’s will stated that “No Student shall be qualified or disqualified for election to a Scholarship on account of his race or religious opinions.” Rhodes would welcome a Black into the Empire’s future leadership, but only one who would be chosen by the rest of the Rhodesist aristocracy. He wanted the most competent people to be leading, and to be imposing the rule of, his all-encompassing British Empire. Rhodes’s often-declared racism was one of loyalty instead of genetics. To be part of the British “race” in his view, was to be loyal and subservient to the British Crown.

This (in stark contrast against FDR’s intensely ANTI-imperialist intention for the United Nations) was to be a dictatorial, not democratic (such as FDR had been planning), world government, ruled by the British aristocracy and its ‘allied’ (or vassal) aristocracies.

Though the idea of “the Special Relationship” was invented by Rhodes, he didn’t use that phrase for it. Only WW II made possible for U.S.-UK relations, which had historically consisted more of hostility and war against each other than friendship or alliance, to be widely viewed as being instead blood-brothers. Then, on 5 March 1946, the Rhodesist Churchill delivered his famous “Iron Curtain” speech at Fulton Missouri (and entering along with his sucker Harry Truman), which proclaimed proudly what had actually been Churchill’s early mentor’s vision for what Churchill — a master of propaganda — now called the “Special Relationship,” and he EVEN said “Eventually there may come — I feel eventually there will come — the principle of common citizenship,” he had the nerve to say that America should and would again be a part of the British Empire! (Nobody points this out.)

Britain has been America’s enemy ever since July 4th of 1776 and remains so till this very day, but after 25 July 1945, the U.S. Government ALSO has been — and still is —America’s enemy, because it became so captured, by Churchill and by Eisenhower, and by their unknowing stooge, Truman, (who institutionalized it).

Consequently, I do not accept Sachs’s hypothesis as to when Britain’s Cold War against Russia started, nor his non-hypothesis regarding the much more important question of when America’s Cold War against Russia started — nor Mercouris’s silence regarding BOTH issues, because unless at least AMERICA’S Cold War against Russia becomes truthfully understood from a historical standpoint, the start of the Cold War won’t be able to be truthfully understood. Furthermore, even in UKRAINE, the U.S. and UK Governments, after 25 July 1945, were working together to protect ‘former’ pro-Nazis in Ukraine, as potential assets to assist the UK/U.S. empire to ultimately conquer Russia. So, when the origins of Obama’s war in Ukraine are being discussed, understanding the reason for that — its preceding history — is important.

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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.