The current Academic Year this marks the second occasion on what john hopkins has been privileged to welcome our chief executive to this campus. Ladies and gentlemen, i present the president of the united states. [cheers and applause] senator rooster, senator tidings, member of the congressional allegation, members of the faculty are john hopkins to embody, my fellow americans. Last week, 17 nations send their views to sound too dozen countries, having an interest in Southeast Asia. We are joining those 17 countries and stating our american policy tonight which we believe will contribute towards peace in this area of the world. I have come here to review, once again, with my own people, the views of the american government. Tonight, americans and asians are dying for a world where each people may choose its own path to change. This is the principal in which our ancestors fought in the valleys of pennsylvania. A principle in which our son fight tonight in the jungles of vietnam. Vietnam is far away from this campus. We have no territory there, nor do we see kenny. The worst dirty and brutal, and difficult. Some 400 young men born into an america that is bursting with opportunity and promise have ended their lives in vietnams soviet. Why must knee take this pay for road . Why messes nation hazard its ease and interests, and its power for the sake of a people so far away or . We fight because he must fight if we are to live in a world where every country can shape its own destiny and only in such a world will our own create and finally be secure. This kind of a world will never be built by bombs or bullets. Yet the infirmities of man are such that force most often purge proceed reason and the waste of war and the works of peace. We wish that this were not so. We must do with the world as it is. If it is ever to be as we wish. The world as it is in asia is not a serene or peaceful place. The first reality is that North Vietnam has attacked the independent nation of South Vietnam. Its object is total conquest. Of course some of the people of South Vietnam are participating in attack of their own government. Turned men and supplies orders and arms, going a constant stream from north to south. This support is the heartbeat of the war. It is a war of unparalleled reality. Several farmers are the targets of assassination and kidnapping. Women and children are strangled in the night because their men are loyal to their government. How plus villages are ravaged by ethnic attacks. Largescale rates are conducted on towns. Terror strikes in the heart of the cities. The confuse nature of this conflict cannot mask the fact that it is the new face of an old enemy. Over this war and all of asia is another reality. The deepening shadow of communist times the rulers in annoy are urged on by the king. This is a regime which has destroyed freedom and tibet which has attacked india and has been condemned by the United Nations in career. It is a nation which is helping the forces of violence and almost every continent. The contest in vietnam is part of a wider pattern of aggressive purposes. Why are these realities our concern . Why are we in South Vietnam . We are there because we have a promise to keep. Since 1954, every american president has offered support to the people of South Vietnam. We have helped to build, and help to defend. The, over many years we have made a National Place to the help south ian man defended independence. I intend to keep that promise. [cheers and applause] to this honor that pledge, to abandon the brave nation and to the terror would be in unforgivable wrong. We are there to strengthen world order, around the globe from berlin to thailand. Our peoples whose wellbeing rests in part on the believe that they can count on us if they are attacked. To leave vietnam to its fate, would shake the confidence of all these people and the value of an american commitment. And, in the value of americas word. The result would be increased unrest and instability. Even wider war. We were there because theyre great states in the balance. Lebanon think for a moment that retreat from vietnam would bring an end to conflict. The battle would be renewed in one country and then another. The censure lesson out our time is that the appetite of aggression is never satisfied. To withdraw from one battlefield means only to prepare for the next. We must say, in Southeast Asia as we did in europe, in the words of the bible, hitherto shalt thou come, but no further. There are those who say all our effort there will be futile, that chinas power is such that it is bound to dominate all Southeast Asia. But there is no end to that argument until all the nations of asia are swallowed up. There are those who wonder why we have a responsibility there. We have it there for the same reason we have a responsibility for the defense of europe. World war ii was fought in both europe and asia and when it ended, we found ourselves with continued responsibility for the defense of freedom. Our objective is the independence of South Vietnam and its freedom from attack. We want nothing for ourselves, only that the people of South Vietnam be allowed to draw their own country in their own way. We will do everything necessary to reach that objective and we will do only what is absolutely necessary. In recent months, attacks on South Vietnam were stepped up. Thus, it became necessary for us to increase our response and make attacks by air. This is not a change of purpose, it is a change in what we believe that purpose requires. We do this in order to slow down aggressive aggression. We do this to increase the confidence of the brave people of South Vietnam who have bravely borne this brutal battle for so many years with summary casualties. We do this to convince the leaders of North Vietnam and all who seek to share their conquest. Of a very simple fact. We will not be defeated. [applause] we will not grow tired. We will not withdraw openly. We know that era tax alone will not accomplish all these purposes. It is our best and powerful judgment that they are a necessary part of the surest road to peace. We hope peace will come quickly, but that is in the hands of others besides ourselves and we must be prepared for a long and continued conflict. It will require patience as well as avery. The will to endure as well as the will to exist. I wish it were possible to convince others with words with what we now find necessary with what we find necessary to say with guns and planes. Hostilities are futile and our resources are equal to any challenge. Because we fight for values and we fight for principles rather than territory or colonies. Our patients and our determinations once this is clear, it should be clear that the only path for a reasonable man is half of peaceful settlement. [cheers and applause] such as these demands and independent South Vietnam, securely guaranteed unable to shape his own relationships to all others. Free from outside interference, tied to no alliance, a military base for no country. These are the settlement. We will never be second in the search for such a peaceful settlement in vietnam. [cheers and applause] there may be many ways to this kind of peace. A discussion or negotiation of the governors concern. In large groups arent small ones and the reaffirmation of old agreements or the strengthening of new ones. We have stated this position over and over again 50 times and more to friends and foe alike and we remain ready with this purpose for unconditional discussions. [applause] and until that right and necessary day of peace, we will try to keep conflict from spreading. We have no desire to see thousands die in battle, asians or americans. We have no desire to have that. These people have dealt with toil and sacrifice. We will use our power with restraint and with all the wisdom that we can command. But we will use it. This war, like most wars is filled with terrible irony. For what do the people of North Vietnam want . They want their neighbors what they want, their neighbors also desire. Food for their hunger, held for their bodies, a chance to learn, progress for their country and and and to the bondage of material misery. And they would find all of these things far more readily in Peaceful Association with others and in the endless course of battle. These countries of Southeast Asia are homes for millions of impoverished people. Each day, these people rise at dawn and struggle through the night to wrestle existence from the soil. They are often wracked by disease, plague by hunger, and death comes at the early age of 40. Stability and peace do not come easy in such a land. Neither independent store Human Dignity will ever be one by arms alone. It also requires the work of peace. The American People have helped generously in times past in these words and now there must be a much more massive effort to improve the life of man in that conflict torn corner of our world. [applause] the first [cheers and applause] step is for the countries of Southeast Asia to associate themselves in a greatly expanded, cooperative effort for development. We would hope North Vietnam would take its place just as soon as peaceful cooperation is possible. The United Nations is already actively engaged in development in this area and as far back as 1961, i conferred with our authorities with connection to their work there and i would hope tonight the secretary general the United Nations could use the prestige of his great office and his deep knowledge of asia to initiate as soon as possible the countries of that area a planned cooperation and increased development. [cheers and applause] ask the congress to join in a billiondollar American Investment in this effort as soon as it is underway. [cheers and applause] i would hope that all because theyre industrialized countries, including the soviet union, will join in this effort to replace despair with hope and terror with progress. The task is nothing less than to enrich the hopes and existence of more than 100 million people. There is much to be done. The vast me kong river can provide food, water and power on a scale to dwarf even our own pga. The wonders of modern medicine can be spread through villages where thousands die every year from lack of care. Schools can be established to train people in the skills that are needed to manage the process of development. These objectives and more are within reach of a cooperative and determined effort. I also intend to expand and speed up the program to make available our services to assist in feeding and clothing the needy and asian. [cheers and applause] we should not allow people to go hungry and whereas for all of our houses overflows in abundance of wheat, and corn, and dress, and gotten. [cheers and applause], i will very shortly name is special team of outstanding patriotic americans. This email be headed by mr. Eugene black the very able to former president of the an areas that are still ripped by conflict of course will not be easy piece will be necessary for our final success but we cannot and must not wait for peace to begin this job. This will be a disorderly planted for a long time in asia as an else for the forces of the modern world are shaking new ways and operating ancient civilizations. There will be turbulence and struggle and even violence great social change as we see in our own country now does not always come without conflict we must also expect that nations will on occasion be in dispute with us. It may be because we are rich, and powerful or because we have made some mistakes or because they honestly fear our intentions however no nation need ever fear that we desire their land or to impose our will or to dictate their institutions have. ,. ,. Her whole existence most men have lived in poverty threatened by hunger. But we dream of a world where all are fed and charged with hope and we will help to make it so. The ordinary women and men of North Freedom south in, angina and russia and they are brave people. They are filled with the same proportions of hate and fear of love and hope. Most of them want the same things for themselves and their families. Most of them do not want their sons to ever die in battle. Or to see their homes of the homes of others destroyed. Will this can be their world yet. And has the knowledge before always denied to make this planet serve the real needs of the people. I know this will not be easy i know how difficult it is for a reason to guide passion and love to master hey. The complexities of this world to peer inconsistent answers. But the Simple Truths are there just the same. We must all try to follow them at the best we can. We often say how impressive power is but i do not find it impressive at all but i do not find an impressive it all the guns. The bombs, the rockets in the warships are all symbols of human failure. They are necessary symbols. They protect what we cherish, but they are witness to human folly. A dam built across a great river is impressive. In the countryside where i was born and where i lived, i had seen the night illuminated in the kitchens warm and the homes heated where once the cheerless night and ceaseless cold held sway. All of this happened because electricity came to our area along the humming wires of the rea. Electrification of the countryside, that is impressive. A rich harvest in a hungry land is impressive. The site of healthy children in a classroom is impressive. These, not mighty arms are the achievements which the american nation believes to be impressive. And if we are steadfast, the time may come when all other nations will also find it so. Every night before i turn out the lights to sleep, i ask myself this question have i done everything i can do to unite this country . Have i done everything i can to help unite the world . To try to bring peace and hope to all the peoples of the world. Have i done enough . Ask yourselves that question in your home and in this hall tonight. Have we, each of us, all done all we could . Have we done enough . We may well be living in the time foretold many years ago, when it was said i call heaven and earth to record this day against you. That i have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Therefore, choose light that both thou and thou seed may live. This generation, the world must choose. Destroy or build, kill or aid, hate or understand. We can do all these things on a scale never dreamed of before. We will choose life. And so doing, we will prevail over the enemies within man and over the natural enemies of all mankind. To dr. Eisenhower, mr. Garland, and this great institution, john hopkins i thank you for this opportunity to convey my thoughts to you and to the American People. Good night