Steve Bannon

“The globalization project is over”

Steve Bannon is considered the prophet of anti-globalization. He encouraged US President Trump to follow the path of "economic nationalism" and to confront China. With Wuhan at the epicenter of a disastrous pandemic Bannon pledges to “dedicate my life” to make sure the Chinese leadership is “held accountable” for the damage done.

26.03.2020 By Urs Gehriger

As chief strategist to the US President, Steve Bannon encouraged Donald Trump to take on China. After the outbreak of the corona pandemic in Wuhan, he steps up his criticism of the Chinese Communist Party. Bannon is convinced that even if the worst is over in a few months, “there will be 10 to 20 years of carnage”. After we get through this, “China should be immediately cut off by the world.”



For a long time, you have been an outspoken critic of the so-called “Davos Man” and the globalization of economy and politics. Steve Bannon, do you see in the current crisis the collapse of the world order that you have long been condemning?

The order of the Chinese Communist Party is now under assault. The CCP has basically co-opted the international rules-based order for their own use; through ‘One Belt One Road’, through ‘Made in China 2025’ (a strategic plan to produce higher-value products and services), through Huawei. Those three converge and make them the dominant economic hegemony of the 21st century.

Is this hegemony now challenged because of the corona pandemic?

The CCP has suppressed the information about the Coronavirus until mid January. So, we lost two months since the outbreak that could have stopped this. A study from the Southampton University shows that 95% of the economic and financial capital markets destruction, and also a large part of the death rate, could have been stopped, if the Chinese Communist Party had put severe measures in place three weeks earlier. So the CCP is 100% responsible that they allowed this to happen.

They are no different than Hitler and Gaddafi. They're just a group of gangsters. They are refusing to share any of the real information with the world, including the World Health Organization from Geneva.

First China kept the real impact of the coronavirus secret. It claimed it wasn't spreading among humans, and then it cracked down on medical warnings. Chinese authorities waited for a month after the first case to notify the World Health Organization. Did they steal precious time for the West to understand what's going on and to take precautions and react?

I would calculate it as two months. I think when the story truly comes out, it’s going to realize it was mid-November. They didn’t really get the World Health Organization involved until about mid-January.

Wuhan is 40% larger than New York City. It has 14 million people. They literally quarantined an entire city that size and went door to door to ascertain who had the infection. They did things on the quarantines and the shutdown that the West is just physically incapable of doing. We don't really have the ability in London, Paris, Berlin, Rome, or New York City or Washington DC to literally go door to door. We just don't have resources, even if we called in the army, it's almost impossible for us to do that. They had the ability because they have totalitarian control. That's what made this huge event.

In those 60 days where they suppressed the information, the virus got out of control. We don't move today, I know from at least some of our sources in China that there's many far more sick and there're many, many more deaths than they essentially reported.

Since the corona crisis hit Europe, each country started to look out for itself. The nation states are back in charge. What is the future of the EU?

What we're seeing in Europe is the collapse of the European Union. Why? Because the European Union and everything that stands for open borders not really helping these countries out, is coming to highlight this crisis. Europe literally is on fire with this virus. I believe that Italy as a country is going to collapse. What I mean by that, I believe the banking system is going to collapse. I think the medical system is going to collapse. I think with it, the government is going to collapse. I think they're going to have major cultural social problems.

What was the biggest mistake, failure to close the borders?

We've seen that the failure to lock down their borders, the failure to have borders; it hurt France, it hurt Spain, in hurt Germany, everywhere across the board. The EU not being there to help countries get on top of this when countries reach out for support, shows you that the EU will not exist after this crisis like it existed beforehand. Because I think every nation, even the ones that were huge European Union supporters, realized that the policies are wrong in that people didn't come to their aid when they needed them. I got to tell you, my heart goes out to the European people, to the Italian people. At the end of this pandemic, even if it comes about shortly in the next three, four or five months, there's 10 to 20 years of carnage that we're going to have to work ourselves through. Economic carnage, financial carnage, and the health system carnage and personal carnage. So this is going to leave a deep scar on the world.

You have been promoting economic nationalism as an antithesis of globalism. As chief strategist to the President you advised Donald Trump to follow this course. Are we seeing the dawning of a new era of economic nationalism?

You're saying that is economic nationalism, I say it is nationalism, which I think is a healthy thing. The nation-state is the basic unit of governance to give the citizen the best protections and the most rights and also the most obligations. So that's what we’ve got to get back to. We're not talking about states that are warring with each other, we're talking about states that look after their citizens. If Italy had acted more like a nation-state, if France had acted more like a nation-state, if Spain had had acted more of a nation-state; if there had been more nationalists in their leaders, this problem would not have been as bad as it was allowed to metastasize.

The globalization project is over. The party of Davos has been shredded with this pandemic. They're guilty of being an accomplice to the Chinese Communist Party in having this pandemic infect mankind.

Should we bring back manufacturing and production back to our nation-states? And if yes, what kind of production should we bring back?

It's different for each country, but I think you've definitely got to bring back what gives you the health in national security. I think countries have been too flippant to think that the country is there to provide an economy, not that the country is there to provide the fulfillment and prosperity of its citizens.

I can tell you right now, if the United States was to bring back our manufacturing and to bring back all of the production of these basic drugs and other medical equipment and also the supply chain from China, that's going to be huge. It's going to be a huge part of the focus, I think politically, going forward.

What has to happen immediately after we get through this?

Well, first off, China should be immediately cut off by the world.

Cutting off 1,4 billion people?

This is not about the Chinese people. The Chinese people are among the most decent, hard working people on earth. This is about the Chinese Communist Party. To me, the Chinese Communist Party has to be held accountable at the UN, all of their finances have got to be cut off by the City of London and Wall Street, and also in Switzerland. All of their bank accounts should be frozen. Every executive and person at the CCP, all of their country bank accounts should be frozen, all their personal bank accounts should be frozen. Every person must commit to bring back the entire supply chain from China.

What do you hope to gain from this?

The Chinese Communist Party is not a friend of European countries. It wants to be the master of European countries. If you want freedom and economic opportunities for your people, then you've got to stand up to the Chinese Communist Party.



Steve Bannon, 66, was chief strategist to President Donald Trump. In recent months he has been broadcasting the daily radio show and podcast "War Room" https://pandemic.warroom.org/