Judging Freedom - Prof. Jeffrey Sachs: Building BRICS Around the West

Episode Date: October 25, 2024

Prof. Jeffrey Sachs: Building BRICS Around the WestSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Thank you. Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Friday, October 25th, 2024. Professor Jeffrey Sachs joins us now. Professor Sachs. Thank you very much for your time. There's a great deal about which to discuss with you. Let. 10 are core BRICS members right now, and the other 26 are BRICS aspirants. They want to join the BRICS. The roundtable discussion among the leaders of these 36 countries encompassed 57% of the world representing more than half of the world. And it was a meeting, of course, in which none of the Western countries, meaning the United States, Canada, Britain, the European Union, Japan, Korea, Australia, New Zealand, we're there. So this is the rest of the world saying, we don't buy your sanctions, your bullying is the way they see it, your actions that are outside of UN. And so they're forming a very large global network as an alternative. And it's very meaningful, very important. What was notable for me in the outcome was not only the very strong show of goodwill among these 36 countries, there was little squabbling. They did their

business. It was a very congenial meeting. But these countries did not aim to overturn international law or the UN. The entire declaration, the Kazan Declaration named after the place where the meeting took place, Kazan, Russia, is all about making the United Nations system work. What these countries were saying was they don't like the United States and its so-called friends and allies operating outside of the UN system, overthrowing governments, putting on sanctions that are not legal by international standards, bullying countries, and so forth. So it wasn't to overturn the UN-based system. It was to say, behave, live within it. We're pledged to do so. We will cooperate among ourselves. And it was really tacitly saying to the U.S. and others, you can't get away with your making up the rules as you go along. We have international rules and processes, and you can't force us to play by your rules. What is the respective comparative wealth of the BRICS nations, whether it's a gross domestic product or gross national product?

You're the world-class economist. I'm hardly in that category. However you want to measure it, BRICS versus G7. I mean, there's no comparison, is there? Well, there are a lot of different measures. The G7 countries are still rich per person. So the high income world is the US and Canada, Europe, Britain, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Korea, Singapore, a few countries in the Middle East, and so on. That's the so-called high-income world. These BRICS countries, by and large, are middle-income countries. They don't have the same per capita income, but they're much more populous. And so in the aggregate, they are a larger output than the G7 countries. Take the US and China as a comparison. China and the US, when measured by

a common set of prices, what we call international prices. So you use the same pricing system to evaluate the US output and the Chinese output. China is a larger economy than the United States now, maybe 30% larger. But remember that the population of China is four times the United States. So the output per person in the U.S. is still more than three times China's level by most measures. But in the aggregate, China's enormous, and it's the lead trade partner with the most countries in the world actually now. It carries a great deal of weight. It's got a manufacturing production base that's probably roughly twice the size of U.S. production. And China has arrived at the cutting edge of technology. The idea that the United States is just so far ahead that China can't catch up is simply wrong. China's way ahead of the United States is just so far ahead that China can't catch up is simply wrong.

China's way ahead of the United States in certain areas, for instance, in the efficient, low-cost production of solar modules, of wind turbines, of fourth-generation nuclear power, of electric vehicles, of many things that the world really wants. And so in this sense, China's highly competitive, very large, tremendous industrial base. They've done an absolutely great job. When you look at the BRICS overall, by the same metric that I mentioned, international prices, the 10 BRICS countries have about 36% of world output, whereas the G7 countries, and remember that's the US and Canada, Britain, France, Italy, Germany, Japan, if I've got all of that right, 6, 4, 1, yes. So those seven, they're about 30% of world output. The BRICS-10 is about 36% of world output. The countries that were around the

table, the 10 plus the other 26, the 36 around the table, by my quick calculation, came to about 47% of world output and 57% of the world population. So very, very sizable, extremely important. And by the way, of course, we should understand this translates into military power, into technology, and so forth. The idea that the United States is just so far ahead militarily that it can get its way, that it can demand countries to do this or that, is a thing of the past, if it was ever true. But it's definitely not true today. The United States simply can't decide how the world's going to be. But people in Washington, in their real delusion, I would say, because they don't understand most of this, they don't get out enough to understand how the world's changing and how fast it's changing. They still believe that this is a US-led world. Of course, our president does. He really lives in the past, and he uses slogans from the 1990s, and he has led the United States into disasters, like the war in Ukraine, thinking it would be a pushover, that what's Russia? They

couldn't possibly compete with Ukraine if Ukraine is backed by the United States and more generally by NATO. Well, this turned out to be completely wrong. The idea that Israel can just bully its way to military dominance in the Middle East, clearly a thing of the past. Even with the U.S. backing, they can't win these wars. They won't win these wars. They won't win these wars. Israel is in an incredibly self-destructive mode right now. Of course, it's in an utterly destructive mode horrifically, but it's also self-destructive because it too is operating on the basis that it has military dominance, which it no longer has. This is how the world is changing.

Was there once a G8 and was the eighth member Russia? Indeed, in the 1990s. There was a time. It was the right time and the right idea. I was part of it then as a much younger economist. But in the late 80s and the early 1990s, President Mikhail Gorbachev and President Boris Yeltsin were absolutely clear plain. We want our country to be normal. We want it to be peaceful, integrated with the Western countries. There's no reason for a Cold War. That's all a thing of the past. I heard that to my face from President Boris Yeltsin. This was the absolute opportunity available to us, but we blew it terribly in the 1990s. Bush Sr. in his last year, when he had Cheney as his defense secretary and Wolfowitz as the deputy, they said, okay, now the U.S. runs the world. They just suffered from such arrogance that they couldn't take the deal of peace straight out. But in those early days, yeah, Russia joined the G7, become part of the G8, because that seemed to be the way things were going.

But what happened is that a combination of forces in the United States, the so-called neoconservatives, which were hell-bent on global domination by the United States, or what was once called full-spectrum dominance, or what the international relations people call hegemony. That's what they wanted. Then there was another group, equally nuts and got us into terrible trouble, and that was the arch-Zionists that said that Israel would be its own mini-hegemon in the Middle East. And Netanyahu's been at this for a long time, and he's really wrecked his country, and he's wrecking our country as well. Because starting in the mid-1990s, his idea was, well, we just have to overthrow every

country in the Middle East that doesn't like the United States. And this is what AIPAC and the Israel lobby convinced the United States to do. We fought trillions of dollars worth of wars at the behest of the Israel lobby, at the behest of Netanyahu. Netanyahu was the great cheerleader for the Iraq war. He was the great cheerleader for overthrowing Syria. He's been the cheerleader for a war with Iran that he's just desperate to have this coming week. And I mean it literally. But it would be a disaster for Israel and a disaster for the United States. And it could escalate into a World War III as well, because Iran was at the table and it has a very strong, close relationship with Russia, with China, with other countries right now. Did Iran join BRICS this week?

Yeah, of course. Iran is part of BRICS. It's now a core member of BRICS. So is the United Arab Emirates. So is Egypt. So is Ethiopia. Very significant countries. And who was there at the BRICS meeting, by the way,

our NATO ally? Turkey, President Erdogan. This is absolutely notable. We have treated Turkey so badly for so long, by the way. Turkey became an aspirant to join the European Union many decades ago. And Europe played games with Turkey for decades. Is it any surprise that Turkey is looking for other markets, other ways, with a much more dynamic part of the world? And this is another thing that I think is important to mention. We talked about relative size, but relative economic growth. The G7 countries are growing maybe 1% to 2% per year right now. Germany may be in an outright recession. Europe is in the doldrums. The BRICS countries, the core BRICS countries are growing on, about 5% right now, much, much faster than the West or the G7 countries. So other countries see not only this big size and the lack of bullying, but they also see fast economic growth. uh, now finance because China is providing significant finance, uh, to, uh, countries

to help them build infrastructure that they buy from China. It's a great for China's economy, but great for the recipient countries too. Whereas the United States Congress says, ah, we don't want to have anything to do with the rest of the world. That's, you know, waste of our money. Well, okay. So then you, you get the rest of the world. That's a waste of our money. Well, okay. So then you get the rest of the world joining the table in Kazan this week. You mentioned something I had not heard mentioned before, Professor Sachs, with respect to BRICS, and that is military. Before you reply, here's, and you just told us that Iran joined BRICS. Here's Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, not very happy with the Israelis. Earlier this week, cut number one.

Western politicians have been disgraced. Western policy has been exposed. They have failed. This is a major defeat. No one should speak of the Western civilization anymore. This is Western civilization. It doesn't care about taking money from its own people in all sorts of ways and sending it to kill small children, innocent offspring, destroy families, and martyr 10,000 children, leaving thousands orphaned. It doesn't matter to them. This is Western culture. Correct me if I have this wrong. He, and not the president of Iran, controls foreign and military policy? Well, President Pazeshkian was at the bricks.

He certainly has a say. I don't think any one person, even the Supreme Leader, has all the control. It's a collegial government, like any government, by the way. There's almost never such thing as one person in control. But yes. Unless you're Donald Trump in his second term, but we'll save that for another time. Exactly. We'll talk about that another time. But I think what's interesting is that what we were just listening to is actually the dominant view around the world right now. Where is Western civilization when Israel is massacring tens of thousands of people before our eyes,

blowing up the housing, the hospitals, the clinics, the infrastructure of Gaza, then now bombing indiscriminately Beirut. In fact, all parts of Lebanon, they were just bombing the port of Tyre. And Netanyahu is talking about expanding the war to Iran. Of course, he can't do it other than the United States getting into a war with Iran, which would be a complete disaster and a disaster for Israel, though it's the one that Netanyahu is egging on. But the point that I'm making is it is a pervasive view around the world that I am hearing every single day, that there are no Western values

because we see a genocide unfolding in Gaza. We see absolutely zero will of the U.S. government to rein in what Israel is doing, though everything that Israel is doing depends on the U.S. bombs, the U.S. weapon systems, the U.S. financing. This is a U.S. operation being carried out by Israel, but with complete complicity by the United States and silence by Europe. So what this means from a psychological point of view, in other words, soft power is a term that's sometimes used, is very, very important in this. And it's not just the Ayatollah saying these things. This is now the common parlance around the world. I'm asked all the time, what is your government doing? How can it stand by when Israel is committing these crimes?

It's an amazing question. It's so stark. It's such a profound failure of American politics that it is like this. And what I find completely amazing is that Netanyahu has been leading the United States into disaster after disaster after disaster. And he still shows up to Congress, which takes money from the Israel lobby, and he gets 50 standing ovations after the Iraq war, after all the wars that he has led us into, the massive deaths that he has caused, the massive loss of life that he's caused, the increasing instability that he's caused. He gets applause in the U.S. Congress because they are simply on the take. I want to spend just a few minutes with you on Ukraine.

I know both of these statements that I'm going to summarize will raise your blood pressure. Senator Graham, I could stop right there. Senator Graham wants the Ukrainians to lower their draft age to 18, this after they've lost more than 600,000 young men. Congressman Mike Turner, who's the head of the House Intelligence Committee, says if North Korean troops are on the ground, it's time for American troops to take them out. Now, these two people are lunatics, but might President Biden, might a President Harris, might a President Trump listen to them?

Well, the problem with all our presidents is that they listen to the CIA, the security state, whatever they say, things tend to go in a deep and consistent way towards continued war, continued escalation. We are the country of perpetual war. So politics is quite superficial in our country. There's a big war machine. It's always revving. It takes a president of competence and stature and high energy to stop wars. That's the main job of a president. It's very easy to go to war because you've got lots of people like the ones that you cited that are always for war. They want to sell military equipment. They're funded by the military industrial complex, by the arms contractors. They never saw war that they didn't like.

Lindsey Graham is simply a buffoon, in my opinion, and has been throughout his career. And he's been on the wrong side of every single foreign policy issue. His track record is, if we actually judged by how things go, how did it go, Lindsay, in Afghanistan? How did it go in Iraq? How did it go in Syria? How did it go in Libya? How did it go in Ukraine? All your wars have been trillions of dollars of waste and massive squandering of lives. And all you do, Lindsey Graham, is call for more war. Well, frankly, people like this are a disgrace, but they're a complete disservice to the American people. And I was just looking at an opinion survey just before we got on. A huge preponderance of young people in this country

want to cut off arms to Israel. Of course, this is the right answer. It should happen today. We need peace. And by the way, the road to peace is absolutely clear. As we've discussed, the road to peace has been set forward by the Palestinians, has been set forward by the Arab League, it's been set forward by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, it's been agreed to with Iran, it's been agreed to by overwhelming majorities of the UN General Assembly and the UN Security Council, and that's the state of Palestine. That's it. And so what are we fighting? We're fighting Netanyahu's absolute cruel and delusional attempt to prevent the Palestinians from having a state of their own.

That's what this is about. And he would take us to World War III for that completely disgusting and unworthy aim. Professor Sachs, a pleasure, my dear friend. Thank you for joining us. I know it's an inconvenient time for you where you are, but- It's always great to be with you. I appreciate it so much. And I hope you'll come back again. Of course. Jeff, these are such stimulating conversations. It's the you'll come back again. Of course, Jeff,

these are such stimulating conversations. It's the end of the day, the end of the week where you are in here, although it's much later where you are. But it's a joy to be with you. And I hope we can do it again next week. We will take care. We're finished for this week, but Monday, as usual, Alistair Crook at 8 in the morning, Ray McGovern at 10 in the morning, Larry Johnson at 11 in the morning. And if you're going to be in New York City or in the New York City area on Sunday, maybe you're going to President Trump's rally at Madison Square Garden, which is at 4 in the afternoon, and you're looking for a place to have brunch. I'm not selling the brunch or the restaurant. I am selling Scott Ritter, Jimmy Dore, your humble correspondent, Randy Credico, Danny Hyfong, Colonel Larry Wilkerson, Sergeant Major Dennis Fritz, and others will be there discussing the dangers of war and the loss of free speech coming in America. And please remember to like and subscribe. I looked this morning, we were up to about 467 or 468,000 subscriptions. Our goal, as you know, is 500,000 by Christmas.

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