In an era when a global nuclear war between the Soviet Union and the United States was a distinct possibility, the prospects of world peace seemed remote if not naive. At the height of the Cold War, however, the American head of state, President John F. Kennedy, delivered an improbable speech on 'a strategy of peace' at American University in Washington, DC..
In his relatively brief address to the graduating class of 1963, Kennedy touched on timeless truths with candor, grace and sound reasoning. Moreover, Kennedy challenged 'conventional wisdom' (a term coined by the late economist John Kenneth Galbraith) by not only declaring peace a virtuous aim but also portraying peace as a realizable ambition. Indeed, many in the Pentagon must have been stupefied by Kennedy's idealistic words only months after the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Bay of Pigs fiasco.
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Nearly half a century later, Kennedy's remarks at American University ought to rightly be considered a masterpiece of oratory and largely relevant to events in the 21st century. As such, excerpts from his speech appear below (in bold) with an analysis of the text.
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'I have chosen this time and place to discuss a topic on which ignorance too often abounds and the truth too rarely perceived. And that is the most important topic on earth: peace.'
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Why did Kennedy choose American University as the 'time and place' to discuss peace? First, American University was launched under the administration and aegis of President Woodrow Wilson and his administration. After four years of horrific carnage on European soil and a pandemic flu outbreak that cost millions of lives worldwide, the tragedy of WWI was compounded by Wilson's inability to dissuade the victors from imposing heavy reparations on Germany or create a viable League of Nations with the power to enforce treaties and coerce belligerent nations to put aside their plans for conquest. The American people, who remained fretful about losing sovereignty to an international organization, rejected entry into the League and thereby rendered the forerunner to the UN feckless. Since the demise of the post-war peace in 1919, all attempts by the American government to erect a framework for a stable world order had fallen short due to various internal and external factors by the time of Kennedy's election in 1960. Hence, Kennedy was boldly taking up the idealistic cause of his failed predecessor by reviving the idea of a comprehensive peace. The students in the audience, mostly all under age 25, were a perfect target for his new thinking based on expanding what was possible in both human and foreign affairs.
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'Not merely for Americans but peace for all men and women, not merely peace in our time but peace in all time'
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Less than a year after being on the brink of nuclear war, Kennedy's statement on a 'peace in all time' seemed naive then and may seem naive now in an age of globalized terrorism. As JFK once said, 'Mankind must put an end to war before war puts and end to mankind.' Clearly, Kennedy believed a lasting peace essential to the survival of the human race. Mere diplomatic agreements between nations were no longer sufficient in a modern era defined by weapons capable of annihilating the world. The First Peloponnesian War had been concluded with the signing of the Thirty Years Peace in 446 BC, but Athens and Sparta reneged on the agreement only 13 years later as fighting erupted once again. In the nuclear world of 1963, the time of war as an extension of diplomacy and vice versa had run its course. The world could simply not afford another war, and Kennedy undoubtedly shared the same view of Albert Einstein that World War III would be the end of civilization itself. Hence, a comprehensive and permanent peace was not an option - it was the only option for America and the world.
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'First examine our attitude toward peace itself. Too many of us think it is impossible. Too many think it is unreal. But that is a dangerous, defeatist belief. It leads to the conclusion that war is inevitable, that mankind is doomed, that we are gripped by forces that we cannot control. We need not accept that view. Our problems are man-made. Therefore, they can be solved by man.'
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Most governments, including the American government, accept the realist notion that 'anarchy' exists beyond its borders. Nations and individuals lie in wait to attack in a world defined by a struggle for resources and power. The International Relations paradigm of realism (whose most famous exponent was a legendary academician at the University of Chicago) had its golden age in The Cold War and appeared again in a more aggressive strain during the presidency of George W. Bush. In short, realists take a dim view of the designs of non-democratic nations and ascribe their actions to pure self-interest. To them, everything is a zero-sum game.
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If Iran, for example, brings a nuclear plant online, it is a 'loss' for the US and the world. In response, the US must take countermeasures to eliminate the threat. While realism is a formidable methodology, its undiluted form leads to foreign policy disaster (i.e. Vietnam), and it needs to be counterbalanced with idealism. Idealists indeed have several salient points. In fact, a great majority of people desire peace around the world. Despite its saber-rattling government, the people of Iran desire peace with not only the US but with Israel as well. Hence, idealism is necessary to remind the world that peace is not only hoped by the world but is also in the interests of both peoples and nations. Reiterating a line from perhaps the greatest American president, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Kennedy rightly remained confident in the ability of man to untangle his own problems through persistence and reason.
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In the 21st century, conventional wisdom says that neither world peace nor an end to poverty is ever possible. Most people, indeed, remain quite pessimistic with regard to the idea of a future of peace and prosperity for all. As war and poverty have existed since the beginning of time, only a myopic person at best or a fool at worst could ever believe in such a utopian outcome. An idealist would respond by noting the triumph of a band of rag-tag farmers over the mighty armies of the British Empire in 1783, the equality of women and blacks, mass education for much of the world, space missions to the moon and Mars and the elections of Nelson Mandela and Barack Obama as presidents of their nations after decades and centuries of apartheid and slavery respectively - all of which were largely dismissed as impossible by naysayers. Besides, should the world simply be resigned to doing nothing as the ice caps melt under a climate change caused by the CO2 output from an antiquated and unjust economic system? Of course not. An idealist does not believe in a panacea or expect heaven on earth but rather challenges the fatalism inherent in a worldview that only focuses on threats and potential threats to security.
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The human race can never allow itself to be resigned to a fate that does not exist. Mankind can make his (and her) own destiny. Kennedy's speech for a 'peace in all time' is a timeless call for both debate and action on the means necessary to give hope to the hopeless and to provide a secure future for our children and our children's children.
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Beyond mere oratory, the American University address symbolizes the ideal of a democratic republic still struggling for 'a more perfect union' and a more perfect world.
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(Photo: Kennedy at American University 10 June 1963. Click to enlarge)
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J Roquen