Webcast dialog med Helga Zepp-LaRouche og Larry C. Johnson:
Krig eller fred i balance – topmødet i Alaska.
13. august 2025

På engelsk:
HELGA ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Hello Larry Johnson, I’m happy to greet you for our discussion on a very important topic. Larry Johnson, for those who don’t know, is a cofounder of the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS), a longtime CIA analyst and expert, and very active observer of strategic events today. So I’m very happy to welcome you today.

LARRY C. JOHNSON: Thank you for the invitation to be with you. Normally we don’t have a chance to chat, just one-on-one like this.

ZEPP-LAROUCHE: As I said, the whole world has been looking at the upcoming summit in Anchorage, Alaska, this coming Friday, and I would like to discuss this with you today, because it is of the highest strategic importance what comes out of it. Because, on the one side, you know, when President Trump came into office, there were a lot of expectations that he would make good on all of his election promises to end the Ukraine war in 24 hours, to normalize relations with Russia. And now, more than half a year later, a lot of hopes had somehow been put in question because of—also, one has to say, in all fairness, because of an enormous effort by some people to prevent Trump from accomplishing what he claimed he wanted to do: Namely, the so-called “Coalition of the Willing” in Europe who want to prolong the war in Ukraine, with all kinds of arguments.

Let me just preface our discussion with a short description of what we are trying to do, because we are not looking at this event, just as passive observers: Because as the fates sort of gave us the chance that this summit is taking place in Alaska, naturally, what this brings to mind is a campaign which we were engaged in for decades, one can say, namely, that the possibility to connect Alaska with Russia via the Bering Strait, which is only a short distance of less than 100 km, and we have been promoting to build a tunnel or a bridge, or maybe both—a corridor connecting the Eurasian landmass with the Americas. This was a very favorite project by my late husband, Lyndon LaRouche, and we did a lot about that: We participated in discussions in Russia about it. And naturally, I issued, therefore, a call to President Trump and President Putin that they should not only end the Ukraine war in this discussion, or at least start to discuss how to end it, but they should also, in a positive way, put this vision for the future on the agenda, with the promise to build the Bering Strait corridor.

Now, this is an enormously important topic, and already, the initial responses to my open letter to Trump and Putin were quite interesting: We had positive responses from Russia, from Mexico, from Brazil. And also in the past, many countries had expressed interest to participate in such a project. Because the Bering Strait corridor would potentially open up the vast areas, not only of Alaska oil and gas, and rare earth assets to be explored, but also open up the Far East and Siberia for development. Much of it is under permanent frost conditions, but you find there, all elements of the Periodic Table, and therefore, this would be a vast resource, not only for Russia, but also for every country that would want to invest in this. And this was a topic in the Vladivostok Economic Forum many times.

So, this is a very interesting prospect, and before we go into more economic aspects of it, what is your take on this perspective?

JOHNSON: Well, you know, I had never really thought about it until actually I heard it discussed within your organization. And it’s one of those sort of out-of-the-box thinking kind of ideas, because, if for no other reasons, to put the United States and Russia working together on something, to build something together rather than destroy each other, is just—it brings with it, I’ll call it a “positive karma.” You know, it’s the kind of thing, you know, inevitably, when you put people working together on a project, particularly on something of that magnitude, they can’t help but end up developing a respect for each other. And one of the greatest challenges I think we face right now, at least from the standpoint of the West, is this inexplicable hatred of Russia, this Russophobia. And yet, we have had joint projects in space, where the United States was virtually dependent on Russia for more than 20 years to ferry its astronauts to and from the Space Station. Yet, despite the cooperation of that, it was largely kept out of sight.

So, while I think it’s an unlikely outcome of the meeting this Friday, it would be remarkable if they did emerge from that meeting, and say, “You know what? We’ve agreed that we’re going to begin working on a plan to either build a tunnel or build a bridge, or build some combination of the two, to join our two lands.” So, I think you’re to be commended for at least having that vision and being able to support it to your own actions, in writing to the leaders.

ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Well, you know, that when President Xi Jinping put the New Silk Road on the agenda in 2013, we updated all our development projects which we had worked on over the decades: the Africa development plan, the Eurasian Land-Bridge, the plan to develop Latin America with Operation Juárez, where we had worked López Portillo on. And so, all these projects we had worked on for, really, decades, we put them together and we called it “The New Silk Road Becomes the World Land-Bridge.” And in it, you have the idea that if you look at the longer development of mankind, infrastructure developed from the coastal areas to the interior of the continents, and eventually grew more and more to the inside of the continents, so the World Land-Bridge would be basically the last phase of that, whereby you would integrate all continents through bridges and tunnels, to become, indeed, World Land-Bridge, so that soon, you could go by rail, by fast train, all around the world. And what this Bering Strait project would do, you could soon, maybe in a few years, maybe five years, ten years, maybe twenty years, but not more, you could travel by fast train from the southern tip of Argentina and Chile, all the way up through the Americas, Latin America, Central America, North America; and then cross through the Bering Strait into the Eurasian Land-Bridge. And that would then go from Europe, you could build (and that is also on the agenda) a tunnel through the Strait of Gibraltar, and now the Bridge of Messina from Italy is back on the agenda, with a corridor or tunnel to North Africa, so you could travel all the way to the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa. And naturally, another line would go through India, through Indonesia with a mixture of tunnels and bridges, so eventually you would connect the whole world. And that is very much associated with the economic basis for the kind of new paradigm of thinking, which I think is the only way how we will avoid to end up in a geopolitical confrontation between the nuclear superpowers. And by building these bridges and tunnels, you end up with a new era of mankind, which, if we are reasonable will come anyway.

So we have now the choice of either going to a nuclear extinction, by trying to prevent the emergence of a new system, or we make the jump and say, “We are part of the one humanity, and why don’t we make that transition now?” So I think the more people can start thinking about that, the more it can actually catch fire.

JOHNSON: Yes, I think it’s a very bold vision.

You know, what bothers me, is I’m not sure who’s driving the ship or driving the car when it comes to foreign policy, and particularly in the United States. This recent signing of a peace agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan, so-called “peace agreement” that was orchestrated by Donald Trump, or it’s presented as if it’s a Trump initiative: It makes absolutely no sense. Because, you’re wondering, who is behind the scenes organizing and prioritizing some of these things? Because a year ago, if you talked to Donald Trump about Armenia and Azerbaijan, he wouldn’t even know what you’re talking about! He couldn’t find it on a map.

So, when I step back and look at this, this is an effort to extend U.S. colonial power, and it’s both an attack on Russia and an attack on Iran. And I raise that in the context of the vision you’re presenting of this interconnection of the different continents, is not based on confrontation, it’s based on cooperation. And yet there is this force that’s out there, that is constantly promoting confrontation, destruction, and death. And so, in a sense, your project is a push-back against that.

ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Well, just today, probably as we are talking here, there is still this virtual meeting going on in the Chancellor office, of Chancellor Merz in Berlin. Zelenskyy [cross talk 13:20] … is [inaudable] there and I think they will have online Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance. But, basically, they’re trying to sabotage the Anchorage meeting before it takes place, by convincing Trump to agree to their conditions. And those conditions are: absolutely, a ceasefire first, no other agreements, no territorial swaps; and assurance that Ukraine will join NATO. And these demands are the reason for the war! I mean, the reason why the war is taking place in the first place is because of the NATO expansion to the East, and the Russians have made a zillion times clear that that is a red line for them, because it’s the reverse Cuban Missile Crisis, because it brings offensive weapons systems close to their border with a warning time of a few minutes. So, for the Europeans to keep pushing this—I must say, to the honor of the Europeans, it’s not all of them. It’s the British, the French, the Germans, the Polish, and Scandinavians, and Baltic countries, but it’s not, emphatically, the East Europeans, it’s not Hungary, it’s not the South Europeans. But in any case, it’s that so-called “Coalition of the Willing.”

And behind that, I have been asking myself that question also: Why is it? And I think they are just freaked out about losing control of a system which is emerging, trying to end colonialism, the BRICS countries: You know, the BRICS have always said, they are not an anti-Western bloc, they don’t want to compete with NATO; they are open if the United States and European nations would say “we want to join them,” they would immediately welcome them. But I think it is being tied to an oligarchical outlook, and I think the leading role in that is definitely Great Britain.

What do you think?

JOHNSON: Well, before responding to that, can you explain—it appears there’s a complete disconnect between the majority of the German people and the current government, with the current government pursuing this aggressive posture towards Russia. Whereas, it strikes me that if the actual voice of the people was expressed, they wouldn’t be seeking confrontation, they would be seeking cooperation. Is that correct?

ZEPP-LAROUCHE: The reason, Larry, is that Merz only has 29% approval rating, and that, after only a few months being in office, which is abysmal. The AfD [Alternative for Germany] is now leading in the polls, with 26%, and the CDU-CSU only 24%. And I can only say, from our own action with segments of the population, people are freaked out in Germany, in ways I think the rest of the world does not even comprehend yet, because the German economy is in a free fall! I see that we are going into weeks of social explosion, because when you take the economic bottom out of the German system, all the social programs cannot be financed any more. And, therefore, I think, we are in a very short-term phase, and that’s why I think an initiative like the Bering Strait would send a signal of hope—also to the population in Germany—if it’s voiced strongly enough that it cannot be overturned. You know, I think that would really make a difference.

JOHNSON: Well, yes, Germany’s gone through that, let’s call it the “green phase,” where it was obsessed with green energy, wind power, solar power. And you know, I spent a lot of time in Germany, in a 20-year period, when I was working with the U.S. military. And the idea of solar power as an effective alternative for producing energy in Germany, particularly when you get into the months of October, November, December, January and February, night comes pretty early and the Sun comes up pretty late. But the fact that Germany has sort of rolled over on this whole energy issue, when, allowing the destruction of the Nord Stream pipeline, cutting itself off from cheap natural gas and petroleum that was provided by Russia, it’s almost like it’s committing suicide economically! And I’ve been shocked that nobody stood up to scream, “Stop! We can’t be doing this.”

ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Well, I think it’s because the mainstream media are promoting this, one could say, the oligarchical line of NATO, the European Union, von der Leyen; so there is a big disconnect between the mainstream media and those people who believe that that is true what they say, and increasingly, a larger segment of the population who feels completely left without leadership, left in the dark. And concerning the alternative energies, Merz, or the new government made a promise in the coalition papers which they signed, that they would make Germany a key place for artificial intelligence and digitalization: But they don’t have the energy, they don’t have the grids! So I think we are in for a big awakening.

And the only problem is, if you think back that the Russians are now targetting Germany, because of what Merz is pushing, the Taurus; and they just signed a treaty with the British called the Kensington Treaty, by which Germany and Great Britain committed themselves that they will build long-range missiles, even longer range than the Taurus, against Russia. So all of that has led to a situation, where the Russians are now talking about Germany as the “Fourth Reich,” and all of Europe as the “Fourth Reich.”

And that should really ring the alarm bells for anybody who knows anything about history, because, if you think how deep in the conscience of Russia is their experience of the Second World War, what they call the “Great Patriotic War,” in which Germany, naturally, played a very unwholesome role. And for them to now say that the present-day Germany is the “Fourth Reich,” and that they take that into their planning accordingly, anybody who thinks that through means that any more actions like the Taurus, or any such deployments, will make Germany a prime target in what could become the beginning of a large war. And that is something which I’m trying to cope with, because I cannot understand the historic amnesia going on in Germany! Because I was born in the post-war period, but I remember what my relatives were telling me about how bombed-out the German cities were, what happened during the war, the horror of the bombing nights, where people had to go into the cellar every second night because of the bomb attacks—and that seems to be all erased!

And what do you, as an American, think about all of this?

JOHNSON: I would first note that the people responsible for bombing German cities and killing German civilians with those bombs, were England and the United States, not Russia. To my knowledge, Russia did not have a campaign of dropping tons of bombs on German cities. I mean, they were fighting the ground war, in particular.

But this brings up, really, this broader issue of the hypocrisy of the West, when it comes to using civilians as cannon fodder, that, on the one hand, we want to criticize and accuse Russia, today, of recklessly killing civilians, yet, when you look at the actual numbers, yeah, there have been some actual civilians who have died, but Russia has gone out of its way to avoid killing civilians. Whereas the West stands by silently, while Israel carries out a genocide, murdering, the minimal number is 60,000, and the more likely number could be up around 200,000 to 250,000. And the world stands largely mute against that!

So, what I see at the heart, this struggle, this is not a war between Russia and Ukraine: This really is—and it’s not really an economic struggle between Russia and the West. I think there’s also, if you will, a spiritual dimension to it, a moral dimension to it, because the West, the history of colonialism going back now five centuries, has been one of pillaging, exploitation, death, not one that’s built on empowering people to realize their abilities.

And that’s what I see coming out of, if you will, BRICS, sort of a new vision of how people around the world can interact. And I know that’s been at the heart of your movement, trying to promote that kind of vision that is based upon building, not destroying.

ZEPP-LAROUCHE: I’m of the deepest conviction that there is only one way how we can avoid World War III: If we cannot get the West, that is the powers behind the military-industrial complex of both sides of the Atlantic, because the absurd aspect is that now all the military firms in Germany, their stocks go up and they say they want to solve the problem of huge job losses, and bankruptcies of firms, by rearming Europe, which is really threatening to become a self-fulfilling prophecy leading to war: The only way how we can, in my view, avoid that this will end sooner or later, be it over the Ukraine crisis or some escalation in the Middle East, or even a war in the Pacific, ending up in World War III, would be that we really have to draw the line and say that the Western countries of Europe, United States and others aligned with them, that they should stop this geopolitical effort to contain Russia, contain China, and start to reach out and cooperate! Because it would be so easy! I have had enough discussions with people in China, in Russia, in India, and other countries from the Global South, there would not be one minute’s hesitation, to welcome this! And I think that the only thing the BRICS countries should do better than they are doing, is to make that once again very clear, so that the effort by the mainstream media, and the warhawks to portray them as a threat, would be countered by them making a more positive message and invitation to the West. Because, I’m absolutely certain that that is the only way how we will avoid the annihilation of all of mankind.

JOHNSON: No, yeah, I agree with that. One of the reasons—you know, people now consider me a “pro-Russian puppet.” But if you look at the experience of Russia since the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the depth of despair that seized Russia in the 1990s, with the two periods of hyperinflation, that were akin to what Germany experienced in the Weimar Republic in the 1920s, and the number of suicides; the decline in life expectancy particularly among men; the complete collapse of the middle class, and the poverty that ensued; and then, if you were positioned then, and you wanted to say, “Look, let me tell you what Russia’s going to be like in 2025, let me tell you that it’s going to be the fourth largest economy in the world, let me tell you that it’s going to have full employment; let me tell you that the cities are beautiful, they’re clean, they’re safe; that public transportation actually works; that the stores are filled with everything that people could want or need. And, that even though it is a Christian nation, it is founded on Christianity that dates back more than 1,000 years in the Russian experience, nonetheless, they welcome and embrace, people of other faiths, and live in peace with them.” Now, some may accuse me of being incredibly naïve, but I can only tell you, that’s what I have seen!

In fact, just thinking today, something that had dawned upon me—I hadn’t really appreciated it: The West, we’re very much oriented towards a hierarchical, pyramid system, that there’s always sort of this person at the top, who controls and directs, whether it’s the Catholic Church, or the Pope, or the heads of the banks, Jamie Dimon with JPMorgan Chase; or the President. One of the curious things that struck me about the Russian Orthodox Church and the Orthodox Church in general, is, it’s not hierarchical. Yes, they have senior clerics, but it’s not a power structure, in the same way that, say, the Catholic Church is a power structure, where you’ve got these cardinals who select the Pope, etc. And what I’ve seen in terms of Russia’s interaction, like when I attended the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, they really have perfected the art of treating other people from other countries with respect! They’re not patronizing it. There’s no condescending manner. It is one built on respect, and the people, whether they were from Africa, or from other Asian countries, or from Latin America, they sense that! They realize that, and they respond! It’s such a positive thing. And that is what, I think, actually, Russia has to offer to the world, a vision of how to do that, without becoming a slave to an ideology.

ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Some people in the West have a hard time of understanding why the countries of the Global South did not buy the NATO narrative on why the Ukraine war occurred. And it has a lot to do with what you were just saying, because the experience of the countries of Africa, Asia and Latin America, with Russia, but also with China, is exactly what you are describing: That they are being treated with respect, and they also remember who helped them in their anti-colonial fight, earlier.

So, I think people should reflect about that, and not take the high ground, sitting on a high horse and looking down on other people, because the whole world is right now not going to take this any longer. And I think we really have to make an effort to convince—I don’t know what else we should be doing, rather than talking about it like on programs, organizing conferences, having as many webcasts as we can; interaction. But I think we are really in this window of history, where either we cause this change to occur, or the window will close!

Now, that is why, I think we have a great opportunity just in front of us, not only the upcoming Anchorage meeting between Putin and Trump, but just two weeks later, there will be another great occasion, which is the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War in the Pacific. And there, in Beijing, you will have an even on September 3rd, with a huge military parade, where Putin will participate, and naturally, Xi Jinping; Lula will go, Modi will go. And I have issued an appeal to the three Presidents, President Xi Jinping, President Trump and President Putin, that they should absolutely make sure that President Trump is invited, that President Trump should go, and in that historic setting, where the end of World War II in the Pacific is being thought about: And in the West, the role of China in bringing the Second World War to an end is much underestimated and not mentioned. But the fight against Japanese militarism was as important as the fight against the Nazis in Europe, and the Italian Fascists.

So, I think that that that setting, having the whole world look moment, remembering the enormous implication of what World War II really was, making that conscious again, I think that could also be—if the Anchorage meeting is a first step, if there would be a meeting of the three Presidents in the context of the other BRICS leaders there, that would be such an historic opportunity, that I think President Trump, under no circumstances, should miss that. Because he could really earn the Nobel Peace Prize, which he seems to want so badly, if he would do that. Because it could really be the beginning of a new era of mankind.

I have issued a call, and if you, the listeners, and you, naturally, Larry, if you agree, please sign that call, because we want to make that heard all over the world as loudly as we can.

JOHNSON: Yes. In fact, Trump missed a tremendous opportunity, had he attended the May 9th celebration, commemoration of the victory over Nazi Germany in Moscow. Again, he could have been there with Xi Jinping, and with Putin—he missed that.

I think you’re exactly right, that this is an opportunity that he should embrace.

But the United States has created an entire mythology surrounding World War II, that places the United States at the center of that. And that we’re the ones that “won the war.” We are the ones that were victimized the most. What the average American doesn’t understand is that between China and Russia, or the Soviet Union, those two countries alone, accounted for about 80% of the fatalities that occurred in World War II: I made it between 47 and 55 million just between Russia and China! Staggering numbers! You know, the United States doesn’t have anything in its experience to compare with that, to begin to even comprehend what that means.

And I told this story before, but I was in Moscow in March, with Judge Napolitano, and we were having lunch with five other Russians, and I asked them at the time, I said, “How many of you had a direct family member, father, grandfather, uncle, that died in the Great Patriotic War?” and every single one of them raised their hand! Every single one. Whereas, I turned to the judge and said, “Hey, Judge, did you have any family members perish in World War II?” “No!” Not for him; not for me! No even distant relative. And that’s the difference.

The Russians and the Chinese, I think, understand the sacrifice of blood, and how terrible that cost is, which is why they’ve actually been more reluctant to engage in war, and I would argue, it’s that lack of having paid a terrible price in human loss, that the West has been so eager to embrace war, and to engage in it!

ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Well, that obviously is not the case for Germany, because, Germany was very—you know, the Dresden bombing. I met several people who lived through the Dresden bombing, and that’s why it’s all the more incomprehensible that people like Merz would be such warhawks right now. And I always thought that given the fact that the German unification took place only a few decades after the end of that World War, given the fact that the Russians had such an incredible loss, that it was really incredibly generous of them to agree to the terms of the German unification, whereby Germany was allowed to be part of NATO, all of the unified Germany, with one condition: That there would be no foreign troops deployed on the territory of the former G.D.R. And that is being violated right now: You have in Rostock, which is on the Baltic Sea, you have now a headquarter which was formerly only German, but in reality it’s rotating NATO troops all the time.

So, I think that the sacrifice of the Russians in the Second World War, and then, their generosity in terms of the German reunification, makes the behavior of the present leadership in Germany all the more despicable, really. Because it is as if they have no historic memory. I mean, the Holocaust has been discussed many, many times, and it is well-integrated into the German consciousness, the guilt feeling and everything; but they leave out, what was the guilt towards Russia! And that is why this whole history—I really think we need, probably in all countries of the world, it would be very valuable to re-study, what happened, how did it come to the First World War? How did it come to the Second World War? What were the real motives behind it? Because I think the official narrative of all of these wars is quite painted, to get across a certain version. But if you think about who helped to bring Hitler to power? It was Montagu Norman from the Bank of England; it was Averell Harriman; it was Prescott Bush—so I think a lot of addition, it would be very valuable to understand.

And going back to the question you asked earlier, of who is driving this evil? Who is always trying to pursue it? I mean, like in the Potsdam Declaration, you had while they were talking about the reorganization of Germany, politically and geographically, Churchill was commissioning and overseeing the Operation Unthinkable, which was for a preemptive attack against the Russia, and Truman had already given the order to drop the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki! And these bombs were politically, completely unnecessary, because, as now becomes clear, the Japanese had already indicated that they wanted to surrender; they were in negotiations with the Vatican about it. So the killing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was a political message to the Soviet Union, rather than a punishment of the Japanese.

So I think we really need historians, who go to the sources, who go to the archives, and have an unbiased, real research of what actually happened in all of this. Because I think this historic record must be set straight, if you want to avoid future catastrophes.

JOHNSON: I must confess my ignorance previously, but thanks to a friend, Ryan Dawson, who published what Dwight David Eisenhower said about the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. What Douglas MacArthur said about it. What Hap Arnold said about it: He was Army Air Corps, involved with a lot of the bombings that took place in Germany and Japan. And what even Curtiss LeMay, whose son later described as crazed—but all of them, all of them said the bombings were completely unnecessary, not needed to win the war. Whereas I had been raised and propagandized for 60 years to believe otherwise. So you’re exactly right.

And we’ll have to see, now, what comes out of the history of this Friday. I think Donald Trump is looking for a way to exit—at least, I hope he’s looking for a way to exit the Ukraine war. Russia is not going to surrender, and I think the most likely outcome is that Trump and Putin will agree, that the United States will recognize the four new republics of Russia: Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson, and Zaporozhye, along with Crimea. That Russia, Putin will say we’ll withdraw from Dnepropetrovsk, Sumy, Poltava, Kharkiv. That’ll be the offer, and then, if you will, the de-NATO-ization of Ukraine. And that’ll be presented to Ukraine, and it’ll be rejected. But at that point, Trump will say, “Hey, we put a legitimate offer. If Ukraine now is refusing to find a peace,” and Russia will press on with its military campaign, which really appears to be on the verge of breaking the entire defensive line of Ukraine. So, I think we could actually see, as some in the general staff of Russia predicted, an end to this war within two to three months.

ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Well, I think that the majority of the population in Ukraine, right now, is in favor of ending the war, because it simply is so unbearable. That I’m hopeful, because the head of the Russian sovereign wealth fund, Kirill Dmitriev, he actually came out in favor of the Bering Strait, and he has been a proponent of the Bering Strait, building of the tunnel and the bridge corridor, because he looks at it, obviously, from the standpoint of the incredible economic potential, which would open up if a decision would be made. And my hope would be that there are enough people around Trump, and Trump himself, who is always described as a developer and a real estate knowledgeable person, that he would see the economic potential. So, I think the best thing we can do is to spread the idea of how that could be a game-changer as far as possible: Today we have Wednesday, so if we would get this around in the next two days to as many circles as possible, maybe we can create an environment to reverse what the British like to do, “flooding the zone” around Trump with bad ideas—that we flood the zone with positive ideas: And let’s just try to do that!

JOHNSON: I think that’s a great idea. I’ll do what I can.

ZEPP-LAROUCHE: We will put the links under the broadcast. We have two old pamphlets in German and in English from 2007, when this issue was already big on the agenda. And people are welcome to download it and distribute it as far as possible. And let’s try our best.

So, thank you very much for your very insightful knowledge, and hope to talk to you soon on this channel.

JOHNSON: It’s an honor, a privilege, and pleasure to be with you and have this intimate chat with you, Helga. Thanks so much!

ZEPP-LAROUCHE: Till soon! Bye-bye.