How The Ukraine War Could 'End Tomorrow’ If The US Wanted: Jeffrey Sachs Addresses Ron Paul’s DC Conference

Just the day after the historic Trump-Putin summit in Alaska to discuss finding peace in Ukraine, the famous economist and UN adviser Jeffrey Sachs made his first ever appearance before the Ron Paul Institute’s (RPI) annual conference in Washington DC. Sachs’ Saturday speech presented essentially a ’Blueprint for Peace’ – which was precisely the title and theme for this year’s event, attended by several hundreds of independent-minded people.

Daniel McAdams, Executive Director of RPI, had previewed in a media statement that „Professor Sachs has become one of the most courageous voices challenging the Washington foreign policy establishment.” Former Congressman from Texas Ron Paul also underscored that „We are facing a perfect storm of reckless foreign policy, unsustainable debt, and attacks on civil liberties” and „Professor Sachs brings the kind of intellectual rigor and moral courage we need to chart a different course.”

While President Trump and his top officials have been commenting on the incredible „complexity” and significant hurdles to achieving peace in Ukraine, Sachs in his Saturday speech demolished this notion, arguing that on the contrary it’s not so complicated at all – that the reality is raging wars from Ukraine to Gaza could be ended in a single day if Washington wanted to. The war can be „ended tomorrow” – or also would have never started, if the US simply but firmly declared NATO will not expand to Ukraine, Sachs at one point emphasized.

„It’s not so complicated actually to end these conflicts. It’s a little surprising how long it takes and how hard it is to to accomplish this, but it’s not so hard in substance because the underlying reasons for the conflicts that the United States is in perpetually are not sound reasons from the point of view of America’s interests, from the point of view of our security, from the point of view of our well‑being or our economy,” Sachs began by explaining.

„All of the conflicts that we are in and those that we could get in are misguided, misdirected, provoked by us to a very large extent and um… solvable. That’s the basic point. It really is not so complicated.”

This is a point which should resonate with the majority of war-weary populations in both America and Europe, who have seen billions siphoned from taxpayers into heavy arms shipments for Ukraine and Israel. Washington could cut off the weapons which help keep these hotspots raging, and could do it tomorrow while pressing hard for peace if it wanted to – as we at ZeroHedge have also long emphasized.

But Sachs pointed out that the establishment, from the military-industrial complex to the media to members of Trump’s own administration, remains stacked in favor of forever wars and is largely dead set against Trump – which means the US leader has a lot working not in his favor if he truly does want to strike a peace deal with Putin.

Sachs called out the mainstream media for wanting to slap a 'failure’ label on the summit from the beginning (or even before it began): „I was looking at all of the the banner headlines about the failure yesterday [Friday] in Alaska. The failure because we didn’t launch World War because the two presidents had a good meeting together, because they announced progress,” Sachs observed sarcastically.

„This is taken as failure in our media which of course is hawkish by the moment and manipulated by, controlled by, paid by, or simply aligned with the military‑industrial complex in the country. So, it’s extraordinarily hard to hear a word about peace in this country.”

Imagine you spent a half year trying to get Professor Jeffrey Sachs to speak at your conference. One of our greatest antiwar intellectuals. And finally in desperation you fire off a final email saying last invitation. And he responds. What an honor. pic.twitter.com/b27xeUxMHD

— Daniel McAdams (@DanielLMcAdams) August 17, 2025

Below is a breakdown of Sachs’ some 40-minute speech, with key themes, paraphrased takeaways, and direct quotes – compiled by ZeroHedge:

Sachs on Ron Paul & Independent Media

Dan, thank you. Thank you so much for being persistent [in inviting me here]. I’ll tell you the trick why it worked: he was persistent and extraordinarily polite. And it really worked because I said, „That’s a meeting I want to do everything I can to make.”

So, it is a little bit rushed today, but it’s an honor to be here – truly a special delight to be at a conference titled Blueprint for Peace. We don’t hear much about peace in this world anymore, strangely enough – unless it’s on Judge Napolitano’s show or from the Ron Paul Institute.

Eisenhower’s Warning: Can Trump Overcome?

I think the wisest words spoken since World War II were President Eisenhower’s farewell address on January 17, 1961. He said:

“In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.”

Eisenhower knew what he was talking about – as a Supreme Allied Commander, U.S. President, and president of Columbia University. He warned of a reality that already existed in 1961.

Can Trump overcome this?

Whether he has the skill or not, I don’t know. But if he were a communicator and had the guts, what he should do is stand up and explain to the American people that this was about NATO enlargement, but we’re not going to do it… That would be the end. But he can’t quite… he says it privately, I’m sure, but not publicly. Why? Because we’re still trapped. We’re trapped as Eisenhower told us we’re trapped. And all these think tanks up and down the East Coast are bought the same way. It’s all phony. Everything you hear about the data. There was a report recently about Russia’s casualties being x times that of Ukraine by one of the Washington think tanks. So I looked at the sourcing and it was absurd.

Literally the Man Who Saved the World

That reality nearly ended the world during the Cuban Missile Crisis. President Kennedy, under immense pressure from military advisors, resisted the push to escalate. If he had listened to them, we wouldn’t be here today.

Even after resolving the crisis diplomatically with Khrushchev, we nearly saw nuclear war because of a Soviet submarine that misunderstood a US provocation – dropping live grenades as a joke – and almost launched a nuclear torpedo. Sachs detailed how the world nearly ended in nuclear annihilation:

We nearly had the world end anyway because of a disabled soviet submarine that was out of communication. And when it began and it was in crisis and when it began to surface, some jackass in the US military was dropping live hand grenades as a joke rather than depth charges. They thought they were under attack. And it happened to be the one submarine in the squadron that had nuclear tipped torpedoes. And they were entered into the bay. And a man named Mr. [Vasili] Arkhipov, who was senior to the captain, countermanded the order and saved the world only to go back home, by the way, and be reprimanded and lived in obscurity. But literally the man who saved the world, saved the world within one second because US doctrine at the time was that any attack by a a nuclear atomic weapon would be met by the full force of the US nuclear armaments. And the estimation at the time was 700 million dead across the Soviet Union, China, Eastern Europe. But this is good reason to believe that all of humanity might have perished and we came within a second of that.

Kennedy Pursued Peace & Then Was Assassinated

A year later, Kennedy gave one of the greatest speeches in modern history on June 10, 1963 – his peace speech – praising the Soviet Union, speaking of shared humanity, and advocating for peace. It moved Khrushchev so deeply that five weeks later, the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty was signed.

And then, four months later, in my opinion, the CIA killed Kennedy for that and other “crimes” — like trying to make peace. From Sachs:

But Kennedy made peace by praising the Soviet Union at the height of the Cold War, talking about their valor, their culture, their scientific accomplishments, and the fact that both sides would perish in a conflict so both sides could be depended on to seek peace. And Khrushchev heard the speech immediately summoned Kennedy’s envoy Averell Harriman and said that’s the finest speech by a modern American president. I want to make peace with your boss. And five weeks later, the partial nuclear test-ban treaty was signed. And about four months after that, in my opinion, the CIA killed Kennedy for that and for other crimes of trying to make peace. Maybe that explains the military‑industrial complex as much as anything. Maybe our leaders are just afraid, they’re afraid to make peace.

Fear Among US Presidents

Maybe our leaders are just afraid – afraid to make peace, afraid to defy the military-industrial complex. Since Kennedy, perhaps no president has truly been independent. Nixon tried and may have paid the price. Others may be afraid, misinformed, or simply bought.

The Doomsday Clock: A Ticking Warning

The Doomsday Clock was introduced in 1947 to alert us to nuclear danger. At first, it was set to 7 minutes from midnight. After the Cold War ended in 1991, it was pushed back to 17 minutes.

But every U.S. president since – Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump, Biden – has moved it closer to midnight. Why? Because peace was possible in 1991, but the military-industrial complex decided it was time to dominate.

Amazing Story: Yeltsin Informing Sachs of End of USSR

I had a front-row seat. I worked with President Gorbachev and later with President Yeltsin to advocate for US financial assistance to stabilize Russia in the early ’90s. I was sure the U.S. would help. We didn’t.

Sachs recounts the following astounding story and series of events, as he was there in the room:

We can go to war anywhere we want. We can overthrow any government anywhere we want. I had a bit of a front row seat in those days because I fruitlessly was trying to get the United States to actually help the Soviet Union actively in 1990 and then to help Russia in 1991 and 1992 with financial assistance because of an urgent financial crisis that engulfed… a failed economic system. But when a system fails and a society is in distress I believe you help so that you don’t get into worse trouble so I had a front row seat. I was part of an effort as an adviser to President Gorbachev to try to enlist US support for financial stabilization in a very deep crisis.

I actually was in the Kremlin on December I think it’s December 13. I haven’t been able to absolutely confirm the specific date, but it was around December 13, 1991 when President Yeltsin walked across the room and sat in front of me. because I was a young kid but happened to be head of the delegation and he said, „Gentlemen – because it was all men – I want to tell you the Soviet Union is over.” That’s pretty interesting to hear that in the Kremlin. I kind of pinched myself and then it was my turn to speak and I said, „Mr. President, this is one of the greatest days in modern history and I am sure I am sure that my country will come to your assistance to give you help to help you stabilize because I know how extreme the financial crisis is.”

I’m a financial economist. I’ve helped stabilize a number of hyperinflations. You need some urgent help, even just a standstill on debt service payments because you don’t have foreign exchange reserves. This is a revolution. You need help to stabilize. But Mr. President, I’m sure that this will happen… So I thought I’m a pretty good economist, very convincing. Uh, and they’ll do the same. Nothing of the sort. Then I got blamed for the lack of stabilization in Russia by many people though it was exactly the opposite of what I had been saying because we refused to provide any help whatsoever. And honestly I could not quite figure it out. I knew that the people weren’t very clever but I still couldn’t figure out why. To summarize, the reason why is that the Cold War did not end in December 1991.

The Role of Netanyahu & US-Israel Policy

In 1996, another dangerous figure emerged: Benjamin Netanyahu. His vision was to dominate the Middle East with US support – no compromises, no peace, no division of land. Just take it all.

And so Netanyahu said, „We’re not going to make any compromises. It’s even a funny term if you know the history of Zionism that it’s a compromise: we come in, you should leave.” This is the basic summary, but not even we’ll divide the house. It was your house, we’ll divide the house. We’ll take 78%, you can have 22%. No. We’ll take 100% and there’s a lot of places you can move to. What are you complaining about? You ingrate. That’s the basis of the idea. And then the point is that a lot of people won’t like that. and there will be a militant reaction and then Netanyahu’s idea is you don’t fight the militants, you fight the governments that back them.

When Palestinians resisted, the plan was to go after the governments backing them. General Wesley Clark famously described the Pentagon’s post-9/11 plan: 7 wars in 5 years: Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Iran. We’ve fought in all of them…

Today, we witness mass killings in Gaza: 60,000 dead, including 18,000 children. Starving people are shot at while seeking food. Ministers boast of taking everything. And yet, not a single word of protest from our government. Why? The American public overwhelmingly opposes this, but our government doesn’t listen.

Illusion of Empire & the Monroe Doctrine

London may be worse than Washington. Britain still acts like it runs the world. MI6 is reckless. Starmer? Don’t get me started. They lost their empire 80 years ago, but they still act as if America is their junior partner in global mischief.

…The Monroe Doctrine of 1823 was a reciprocal statement: Europe, stay out of the Americas, and we’ll stay out of your internal affairs. That’s smart diplomacy, especially in a nuclear world.

Yet, we’ve violated that principle time and again – pushing NATO right up to Russia’s border, despite clear promises not to.

The Madness of 'Extending Russia’ Doctrine & Sachs Personally Warning Biden/Sullivan

The Ukraine war could have been avoided – by simply stating that NATO would not expand to Ukraine. Even Jake Sullivan privately told me it wouldn’t happen. But when I asked him to say it publicly to avoid war, he refused.

The war can be ended tomorrow if the US declares NATO will not expand to Ukraine. That’s all. It’s not about territory. Russia didn’t demand land – just neutrality. Even in Crimea, Russia sought a lease renewal, not annexation – until the U.S.-backed coup. This war is entirely provoked and entirely avoidable.

We will, as the Rand Corporation wrote in 2019 in one of the most absurd, dangerous, ridiculous exemplars of American foreign policy, we will extend you. 'Extending Russia’: a document of a think tank. How to annoy Russia in 27 different ways. Is this really what we pay them for? How to provoke the other nuclear superpower with 6,000 nuclear weapons and then wonder why the hand of the doomsday clock is 89 seconds to midnight? These people are crazy. Honestly, it’s very very dangerous. …Let me just say that all the major conflicts can be ended straightforwardly. The casus belli of the Ukraine war is NATO enlargement, and US coup operations all over Ukraine. Even the New York Times reported that one a couple of months ago.

More on the warning directly delivered to Jake Sullivan while proxy war in Ukraine unfolded:

And incidentally, I’ll share with you just one moment. In 2021, the war could have been avoided easily by President Biden saying to President Putin, „NATO will not expand to Ukraine.” And I will say so. And I called Jake Sullivan. He teaches at Harvard. It’s all consistent… after you fail in Washington. And I said, „Jake, avoid a war. Stop NATO enlargement. It’s ridiculous. It’s useless. Would you like it on the Rio Grand in Mexico – a Russian military base?” Sullivan responded, „Jeff, we have an open door policy for NATO.”

…Give me a break. Open door policy. I repeated the Monroe Doctrine to no effect and I said, „Jake, stop the NATO enlargement.” He said to me, „Jeff, NATO’s not going to enlarge to Ukraine.” I said, „Jake, we’re going to have a war over something that’s not going to happen. Why don’t you say so?” He said to me, „Don’t worry, there’s not going to be a war.” Honestly, these people are not clever. They’re not clever. What they’re doing makes no sense. They don’t know what they’re doing. We don’t know when Biden checked out. Maybe already then. But in any event, they’re not smart. They’re getting us into trouble. So, we could make peace in Ukraine. Yesterday [Friday] was a hint of it.

Meanwhile…

Just 4 hours ago – Fox News posts an interview with US Sec. of State Marco Rubio who repeats the exact same justification for Ukraine to defacto join NATO or a NATO-like alliance that has been used for DECADES and which led to this whole conflict in the first place…

…the… pic.twitter.com/XirMk79JD6

— Brian Berletic (@BrianJBerletic) August 19, 2025

On the Madness of Preparing for War with China

The most dangerous idea today? Preparing for war with China. It’s madness. China hasn’t invaded anyone in 2,000 years, with the exception of a one-month border clash with Vietnam in 1979 and defensive actions during the Korean War.

Even in Taiwan, conflict would only arise because the U.S. is unilaterally arming it – against diplomatic agreements. We’re turning Taiwan into Ukraine. And the consequences could be far worse.

A Blueprint for Peace: Structural Reforms Needed

1. End CIA covert operations. Intelligence is necessary – regime change is not.

2. Depoliticize the intelligence agencies.

3. Close overseas military bases. They waste resources and create enemies.

4. Aggressively seek diplomacy. We need diplomats, not bombers.

5. Educate the public. The American people must understand our real interests.

Sachs described, „First, it was already recognized by President Truman in 1963 publicly, soon after Kennedy’s assassination – and already known before that, that the biggest mistake we made in 1947 was to give the CIA two jobs: one, intelligence, which we need, and two, covert operations, which is absolutely deadly for our security and for world peace. We should end all CIA covert operations. Period.

A Final Plea

All of these conflicts – Ukraine, Gaza, potential war with China – can be resolved quickly, if we tell the truth, act with courage, and demand accountability. Our government must stop listening to the war profiteers and start listening to the people.

We need brave leaders, honest media, and informed citizens. That’s how peace begins.