I grew up in a farming and ranching area. I know how farmers behave. I never saw a tenant farmer who could be counted upon to reach his full potential knowing that all he does finally goes to the landlord.

I have seen some fairly eloquent agricultural extension agents in my day. I have never seen one who could persuade a man to grow two bales of cotton where only one grew before, unless that man who was doing the growing felt that he would get at least part of one of them.

Nor is social justice merely a matter of a good land tenure system. It is work at fair wages with the protection of free bargaining and a government that is honest and reasonably efficient and puts the tax money to proper use; and it is education and food and health care for those who, as children, are not able to assert their own rights in their own society. It consists, perhaps most of all, in simply knowing that the ladder upward is not so crowded that there will be no room for you.

Our foreign policy, in America, like our domestic policy, is all those things from education, to jobs, to health, to justice, to equality for all people.

Once, here in Denver, it seemed a very long way downhill to our shores. And it seemed a greater distance yet to foreign lands. In those days the problems of foreign policy, no doubt, seemed very remote. Meanwhile, one has always been told, the men and women who inhabit these mountains have never been lacking in pride in themselves. So there was much to keep their attention here at home.

We saw it in your streets and on your lawns and in your homes today.

Now the ocean is close-and London, Paris, Moscow, and Tokyo are only a few hours beyond. Just a few minutes for Jim Webb. Denver has become a center of active discussion on foreign issues, that the rest of the world watches. Denver has become a place with a keen sense of the problems and policies which these impose upon your generation and upon my generation.

But from my remarks this afternoon, you will see that you have another advantage. You are also very strategically situated in relation to the United States. That is an even

greater source of wisdom on foreign policy. We are a great and liberal and progressive democracy up to our frontiers. And we are the same beyond. Let us never imagine for a moment that Americans can wear one face in Denver and Des Moines and Seattle and Brooklyn and another in Paris and Mexico City and Karachi and Saigon. Nor, may I say, do we have a different face for Moscow or for Peking or for Hanoi.

I am very happy that you students and this illustrious faculty would ask me to come here today, and I am very glad to see the site on which we will work with you in building your new Space-Science Building. It was my intention to speak at length on the subject of space science, but when I learned so many of your students were to be here this afternoon, I chose instead to speak on a subject that is one-third science, one-third art, and one-third hope the subject of foreign policy. In that we are all students; we are all still learning.

Thank you, and God bless you all.

Document I-7

Address by the Secretary of State (Rusk) Before the George C. Marshall Memorial Dinner of the Association of the United States Army, Washington, October 12, 1966 (Excerpt) 40

"In Organizing a Reliable Peace, the First Essential Is To Eliminate Aggression"

In organizing a reliable peace, the first essential is to eliminate aggression-preferably by deterring it but, if it occurs, by repelling it. That was the lesson seared in the minds of those who drafted the Charter of the United Nations while the fires of the most destructive war in history still raged.

The paramount obligation of all members of the United Nations is to take effective collective action to pre

40 Department of State Bulletin, Oct. 31, 1966, pp. 658-663.

capacity of the South Vietnamese to handle. We and others are there because of aggression from the Northan aggression which the other side has repeatedly escalated and now includes many regiments of the regular army of North Viet-Nam. And we shall leave when these invaders and arms from the North go home.

Of course there are differences between Greece and Viet-Nam-and differences between Hitler and the militant Communist imperialists. But superficial differences should not be allowed to obscure the heart of the matter, which is aggression.

And, let me emphasize, we had better not forget the ghastly mistakes which led to the Second World War. For, there won't be any opportunity to apply any lessons after a third world war. We had better remember what we know and see to it that a third world war does not occur.

At the same time, we must take care not to use more force than is necessary. Now, as in previous conflicts and crises during the last two decades, there are those who want to go all out-apply maximum power and get it over with. That would be a perilous course, which conceivably could escalate into the thermonuclear exchange which no rational man could want. Prudence dictates that we use enough force to achieve the essential purpose of deterring or repelling aggression. That has been the practice of all four of our postwar Presidents. That is the road which offers the best hope of reaching a reliable peace.

For we can never forget that our objective is a secure peace. We want nothing else from anybody, anywhere in the world.

President Johnson has made clear, again and again, our desire for a peaceful settlement in Viet-Nam. To that end we have made every conceivable suggestion compatible with the right of the South Vietnamese to live under governments and institutions of their own choice.

We do not regard as final public and negative reactions from the other side to our latest proposals. We hope for a more considered reply, whether through public or private channels. If there is uncertainty about the meaning of our proposals, the way to clear it up is through discussion-and we are quite ready to engage in such dis

cussion. We are animated by the conviction that a common interest exists on which peace can be built in Southeast Asia and that sincere discussion will reveal where that common interest lies. This being so, it seems all the more tragic that the suffering and destruction of war should be further prolonged.

We will not turn our backs on the fate of Southeast Asia. But neither can we nor would we wish to-impose our will on this area.

It follows that peace in Southeast Asia must be an organized peace-one which enlists the cooperation of many nations.

Document I-8

Reply Made by the Secretary of State (Rusk) to a Question Asked at a News Conference, December 21, 1966 (Excerpts)

46

A Brief Review of the Main Developments During 1966

I think that during this past year we have seen continuing increase of contacts between the East and West as far as Eastern Europe is concerned. . . .

There seems to be an interest in trying to keep these East-West divisions under control and to try to find points of agreement if possible, whether in the arms field or in the trade field, or cultural exchanges, or whatever. I would hope that that represents a trend which will continue and that we can begin to see some reduction of tension on a more permanent basis between these two great systems of states.

I think out in Asia we know now that South Viet-Nam is not going to be overrun by force by North VietNam. And we see a recovery of confidence and hope among the free nations of Asia.

48 Department of State Bulletin, Jan. 9, 1967, p. 47.

47

I think this past year has seen a very exciting demonstration of the intention of the free nations of Asia to get on with their jobs, not only nationally but in groups, in cooperation with each other. We have had such dramatic developments as the founding of the Asian Development Bank and the formation of the ASPAC [Asian and Pacific Council] group that recently met in Seoul, Korea.48 We have a feeling that free Asia is on the move. They are demonstrating a capacity to move ahead economically and socially and with more competence in the political field. Those are all very much to the good.

See post, doc. IX-11.

See post, doc. IX-6.

We have been encouraged by the performance of the Alliance for Progress and the discussions which have been anticipating the meeting of the foreign ministers in February and a meeting of the heads of government in April here in this hemisphere. I think in the broadest terms the general trends have been in a constructive and promising direction.

The most significant failure in 1966 has been the failure to find a means to bring this Vietnamese problem to the conference table or to a peaceful solution. And I would hope very much that the year 1967 would be a time when that will become possible.