LPAC—The importance of the progress in G7 member Italy, of China’s Belt and Road Initiative and Lyndon LaRouche’s "four economic laws," is shown by the fire it keeps drawing from geopolitical circles, not only in Europe and Washington but also in Asia. Again on the weekend such sources as The Diplomat (its motto: "Know the Asia Pacific") chose to single out Italy’s Undersecretary of State in the Economic Development Ministry Michele Geraci for attack, in a vain attempt to split Italy’s government.

The Diplomat says that its primary expertise is "Geopolitical trends throughout the Asia-Pacific." Geopolitics as invented by British Empire "thought leaders" has always meant the art of keeping other powers and potential economic powers at each other’s throats. The magazine’s March 14 "Italy’s Risky China Gamble" was a virtual echoed two days later in Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post, in claiming that Geraci, knowledgeable about and well-disposed to China, is leading astray a naive Italian government — which does not see the terrible dangers of great nations cooperating for economic development.

The magazine begins by piling lie upon panicky lie: "Claims that Italy has decided to sign an agreement for official participation in China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) led to a rebuke by the U.S. Trump administration, which in turn brought to surface divisions within Italy’s populist coalition government.

"As the first G7 country to sign a memorandum of understanding on the BRI, Italy’s participation would carry large symbolic weight for China. But this would hardly be enough to legitimize the BRI amid a global backlash against it and Beijing’s own struggles with piling debt and a slowing economy in the throes of a trade war with the United States. Instead, U.S. diplomats correctly warn that it would harm Italy’s own reputation."

Italy’s government is not divided on this step. That it is a step "of historic importance," was made clear by Helga Zepp-LaRouche at the March 13 conference "Italy on the New Silk Road" of the Movisol movement and the Lombardy Regional Government in Milan. It is opening up to a "new paradigm" of mutual economic and cultural benefit of major nations, which will benefit developing nations as well, particularly in Africa.

So the geopolitician takes aim: "The change of course is largely the work of Michele Geraci, undersecretary of state in the Ministry of Economic Development. Geraci, who has himself spent a decade in China, has largely sidelined the Ministry of Foreign Affairs by establishing his own China Task Force and by taking four trips to China in the second half of 2018 alone, including with Economy Minister Giovanni Tria and Deputy Prime Minister Luigi Di Maio."

Even more frightening to the geopoliticians is the history behind this historic move, as detailed by Liliana Gorini, chair of the LaRouche movement Movisol in Italy, to a webcast LaRouchePAC meeting in New York on March 16, "Win-Win Cooperation: Why the World Must Exonerate LaRouche".

The policy of the "World Land-Bridge" of infrastructure great projects, published and presented internationally by Helga Zepp-LaRouche’s Schiller Institute; a "New Bretton Woods" international credit system; cooperation with and credit to developing countries; Glass-Steagall bank separation: All these ideas of Lyndon LaRouche, and more, have been under discussion among Italy’s political, religious, and cultural leaders for decades. The force of LaRouche’s forecasts, writings, presentations and interventions there since the 1980s, are widely recognized and remembered.

And then there was the impact of the bitter austerity medicine doled out to the country, and many others in the European Union, by the EU’s London-centered geopolitical elite. So soon as Italy had a government not directly imposed by blackmail of London, Brussels and the European Central Bank, economic sanity would emerge.

Now add the potential of a bridge of ideas, through Italy’s Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, China’s President Xi Jinping — visiting Italy this week — and President Donald Trump, who already have a strong mutual respect and general friendship. Member of the European Parliament Marco Zanni, entrusted with foreign relations in European Parliament by Italy’s Lega party, spoke to LaRouchePAC’s weekly Friday webcast March 15 and noted that this possibility is now alive.