ADDI S OF VIQE-PRESIDENT HUBERT H. HUPHIREY
AT PRIME MINISTER'S LUNCHEON
Canberra 19th February, 1966
Mr. Prime Minister and the 111inisters of the Government of
Australia; my good friend Mr. Calwell, the Leader of the Opposition,
but great Australian, great citizen, my friend that has been
conversing with me during these moments of our luncheon; the great
presiding officer of the Senate of the Australian Parliament, Sir
Alister Mc½ ullin, we've settled most of the problems over here; my
esteemed friend, the Ambassador of the United States, 11Mr. Clark, and
of course all of the many good friends that we have that are here
from other nations; your Excellencies the Ambassadors and Ministers,
Ladies and Gentlemen:
I must say first of all that I have been touched by the references
to the Vice-Presidency. I have been told and I was aware of
the fact that this is the second time in ten years that Australia has
been visited by a Vice-President, which shows the gentle nature of the
American public and the great consideration that we have for your -: ellbeing
here. You can only take one of these Vice-Presidents about
every decade. I also have been reinded as to the uncertainties of
the political future of the Vice-Presidency and I've been well aware
of it, and I've been making the most of every day that I have.
I can't help but say, since the other visitor from the office of the
Vice-Presidency was Mr. Richard 111N. i xon, that I have always patterned
mj life and tried to emulate a gentleman by the name of Richard IA.
Johnson Vice-President under van Buren. And I want you to know that
Van Buren was a Democrat; the only partisan reference that I shall
feel free to make.
Mr. Prime Minister you have mentioned so rmany things here that
I would like to cornent upon that i'm afraid that you've touched the
favourite nerve cell in my body, namely the talking cell. You
ought to be waare of that. But I've been told by Ambassador Clark,
and by you, Sir, and others, that in Australia you just get up and
give forth as much and as long as you want. So lean back my friends
and start to enjoy what you haven't intended.
First I want to say to Ambassador Clark that we're very proud
of his work here. lie's been entertaining a host of visitors from
the United States, and he's been able to manage Congressmen and
Senators better than he did the Speaker of the House of Representatives
or the Presiding Officer of the Senate, and they've come in substantial
numbers. Time and Life and Newsweek have arrived to be able to guide
you in matters of foreign ane, domestic policy; and I understand that
Ford and General Motors have made their appearance or will. And
you will even have my good friend George Moore of the First National
City Bank of New York.
With this combination, plus the Vice-President once in every
ten years, you ought to be able to survive. In fact I think you'll
do well even if we hadn't have come. But the fact is that we're
very, very pleased that we've received the kind of gracious, warm,
friendly, home-like reception that you have accorded us.
Mr. Prime Minister, ou mentioned that I had some resoonsibilities
in the field of Space. Well isn't it good to come and see friends
who are with you both in heaven and earth. And you are here in
Australia. I recall one of the first flights in our Gemini programme.
We Americans listened on the radio to the broadcast of how the citizens
of Perth were turning on their lights so that the Astronaut ight know
that he was over friendly territory in Australia. We never had any
doubt about that even if your lights Were out we knew that there
would be a friend waiting for us with a warm hand of friendship.
I must say that our relationships have made us feel like
brothers and sisters. And today you went the extra mile I just
can't tell you how much I've appreciated everything that has
happened. Last night when ve set foot on your precious soil and
I lo6ked about it seemed like the sunset, in the great Mid-West as
I would say if I were not under some constraints, but as I wo. uld
say, as it were, in South-Western Texas.
One can't say in Australia that it was a miniature because this
country is so big. This is one of the few countries that mke the
Texan feel like that he has an inferiority complex. You gave us a
beautiful, beautiful entrance to your lovely and dynamic country and
then this morning as I awakened and looked out and felt the crisp air
I knew then it was almost like 1 nnesota, my State. And then when
I came from the Parliament Building just after the noon hcur and
I looked out front and there were the placards and amateur sign
painters and all the demonstrators, I said; " 4hat this Prime Minister
,-ill do to make me feel at home:" I just can't properly and
adequately express my profound. gratitu e to him for this feeling of
ease and adjustment that you give me as I stand on foreign shores.
But I want you to know that my investigation indicates that while you
went to great lengths to get that demonstration No. 1, it is not as
large as we can produce at Berkeley. And, No. 2, the Leader was
from America. One of our exports. We do it up well and the exchange
programme continues.
Next time vwe find a group of protestors in America I am going
to ask if there is an Australian, and if there isn't, why, we are
going to have to call off the protest. We believe in quid pro quo
you laow, " fifty-fifty".
Now in all seriousness, I do rant to say to all of our good
friends here, the High Conrnissioners that represent members of the
Commonwealth, to our friends of the Press of Australia and other areas,
to the good citizens of this great country, and to my fellow: Americans,
that it is a very re-assuring and gratifying and energizing experience
to be able to exchange viewers with the Government people such as I've
met here today in Australia.
We have been able to talk frankly, candidly, expressing our
points of view 7-ithout any fear or without any concern as to their
being properly understood and accepted as the honest expressions of
people with an integrity and sincerity of purpose. And I can say
that in every free country we have opposition and it is the opposition
which in a very real sense keeps us on course. Opposition in a
democracy is as vital, may I say, as the seasons in a full year.
And to Mr. Calwell, the Leader of the Opposition, may I express
to you my personal thanks for your gracious remarks and for your
presence here at this luncheon.
I hadn't quite known ", hat I should say to you today, and I've
decided that the best thing to do would be to talk to you as friend
and neighbour. Last evening after having had the opportunity to go
to the Ambassador's residence to unpack our cases and to just settle
down, we placed a telephone call to a great anad distinguished
statesman, not only of Australia but of the world, Sir Robert Menzies,
and ve had a delightful hour and a half with this remarkable nan.
Sir Robert is a friend not only of the people of Australia and
a leader in this great nation but he is a friend and leader for all
of us. He has come to our country, the United States, on repeated
occasions and he is accepted as a brother, almost as a fellow citizen.
Yet he is so devoted to his own Australia that he would not want anyone
to dilute his patriotic devotion to his own citizenship by even
a remark that might be misunderstood or misinterpreted. \ Ve respect
his judgment. We admire his patriotism, his courage, and we enjoy
his wit. President Johnson considers him one of his close friends.
And may I say to the distinguished new Prime Minister, Mr.
Holt, that we look upon you, Sir, as a continuing friend. As one of
whose counsel and advice we welcome and whose friendship we, too,
cherish. And ve know that in the days ahead that the Prime Minister
of Australia this Prime Minister will have in the hearts of the
American people that abundance of affection and respect which was so
evident for Sir Robert Menzies.
So we feel at home, and I want to talk to you now as just
neighbours. Australia, as the Prime Minister has so well noted, has
been with us in peace and war, and we with Australia and Australians.
Our sons and men have come here to meet you and marry your daughters
and sisters. Our nations believe in parliamentary democracy.
We have common ideals and in a very real sense common traditions.
But our traditions and our ideals are not unique to ourselves. This
principle and this belief in human dignity is no monopoly of Americans
or Australians or the English. There are people of every race creed
and nationality that believe in human dignity. And there are people
of every region of this world and of every race, and every ethnic
group, and of every persuasion, that believe in freedom. And
I believe that most of mankind longs for peace.
So that we have many things in common. And when we speak of
consultation amongst ourselves Australians and Americans, the
United Kingdom, and New Zealand. We do not speak of that consultation
as an exclusive club. But rather we speak of it as one of the
approaches to be of help to others, and to broaden that great community
of free men and free nations so that we can work together in common
cause and common purpose.
The great need today of the freedom-loving peoples of this
world is to recognize, No. 1, the problems that confront us, and agree
upon those problems; and No. 2, the necessity of united purpose and
the united effort in meeting those problems.
A great American statesman and a great human being, Dr. Benjamin
Franklin, once said that " We either hang together or we hang separately."
And I might say that those words of wisdom, colloquial as they were
have a universal application. And all through Asia and Africa and
Europe, Latin America, North America, South America, wherever you go,
free men and free nations and those who aspire to freedom had better
rec nize that there are powerful forces arrayed against them. That
there are difficult problems that yet beset mankind the problems that
we spoke of here of poverty, of illiteracy, of disease, of despair,
of hopelessness, of frustration that these are the common problems
of most of mankind. and that we should unite in a common effort to
overcome them.
We should also recognize that the forces of tyrrany which are
at work in the world today, while different in their methodology, are
no different in their purpose than all of history. Tyrants are
tyrants. Despots are despots. The method, however, and the
strategy and the tactics of the 20th century tyranny are far more
sophisticated far more complicated than those that mankind has
known in other cent ries.
And it is because of this compleity of both the problems
and the opposition, or the enemy, that we sometimes fall apart;
that we sometimes have differences even though there need be
none. It's because . we haven't as yet quite understood individually
and collectively how best to approach this new set of
circumstances that confronts us.
President Johnson asked me to journey to Asia, South East
Asia, and the sub-continent, and then down under to Australia and
New Zealand. Not to tell people what to think, but to let you
know that we're thinking about in our country and to try to find
some common denominators, and to share in your wisdom, your
observations, and to give you some of our observations and our
considerations on these problems that affect our world. And
I have reported today to this government, as I have to others,
on the observations that w-e have made on this journey.
This distinguished American statesman that is with us
one of our seasoned diplomats a great public servant Governor
Averell Harriman, Ambassador-at-Large for the President of the
United States we have reported what we have witnessed in Vietnam,
in Thailand, in Laos, in Pakistan, in India and we have shared
views and thoughts with the leaders of your government.
And how happy I am today to say that we see these things
very much the same way. When I listened to the Prime Minister
in his remarks, I said, tthealtl', s what I want to say." This
is what I tried to say. But how well he said it.
In my visit this morning with the Ministers and the Prime
Minister I believe that I expressed about as clearly and w-ith as
much articulation as I am capable of, .1what was said here today
and what I hope now to be able to say to you.
First of all let me say this: we must look upon Southeast
Asia and the sub-continent as regions. We cannot afford
to direct our energies toward individual nation-states if the
problems of those nation-states were unconnected with other
nation states. South-east Asia was looked upon by President Johnson in
his memorable address at John Hopkins back in April as a region
for economic development regional economic development.
I submit that it is also a region in the conflict which is
now under way. In that region we are fighting two wars and we're
allies in those two wars. The Australians and the Americans,
the New Zealanders and the Koreans, standing alongside of our
good friends, the people of South Vietnam, -ho are bearing the
brunt of the battle. Who have been pummelled, who have been
attacked, who have been abused, whose leaders have been assassinated,
who have been the victims of terror and subversion and
propaganda the likes of which few people have ever been able to
withstand or to take.
Let me say that we all owe a debt of respect to the people
of South Vietnam. For years they have been under merciless attack
not conventional war not with the rules of war as civilised
nations have known them, but a new form of war the wars of
National Liberation they call them from Peking. What a play
on words: How the communists have destroyed the meaning of words.
They speak of liberation when they mean oppression. They
speak of a people's republic when they have no regard for the people
and no definition or understanding of the world republic. They
speak of the people's democracies and there is not a single
democratic thought or institution thatTs been developed. The
communists have polluted and adulterated the meaning of words that
decent humanity has known for centuries.
I think it is about time that we understood that fact. They
not only fight us with weapons; they not only use every conceivable
device that is known for the purpose of human destruction; they
destroy the meaning of language. They destroy the meaning of the
precious word. Words like " freedom". Words like " democracy".
' Words like " liberty". Words like " justice". These are words of
the spirit. These are precious words.
The communists not only destroy the village and the hamlet in
South Vietnam he not only attacks established government and tries
to discredit it in nation after nation. He destroys the very
meaning of life as one interprets it in the written word and the
spoken word. So we have a newr war that we battle that we fight. We're
really trying to save the moaning of our language. We are trying
to save the legal definition of our constitutions. We're trying to
protect if you please the territory and the geography of our land.
But above all we are trying to save a way of life.
Not the way of life in terms of the past but a way to approach
life where mankind can be liberated from disease and from poverty,
and from hunger.
We are the revolutionists not the communists. Wie are the
liberators not the communists. We are the agents of justice and
reform not the communists. I for one don't intend to let them
get by with claiming the honours that are due to the people that are
in this room and other people around this world that believe in
freedom and justice and independence.
So, we find ourselves in conflict today in Vietnam. But
. may I say quite frankly that we've also faced other dangers. The
conxmunists would like us out of Berlin. And isn't it interesting
that the very same people who advocate that we stand firm in Berlin,
deep in the land of communist control, in an area that is militarily
difficult to defend the very same people who would pledge all of
our resources, as we said in our Declaration of Independence, our
lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honour the very same people
who say we must stand firm in Berlin regardless of the cost, can
turn around and advocate that you forget Vietnam?
I guess they may feel that somehow or other, whatever is
going on in Vietnam, that the Viet Cong, represents a sort of an
international reform movement. Frustrated social workers who
believe in human progress:
Well lot mo assure you that that is not the Viet Cong. There
may be those in the Viet Cong that are the victims of frustration
and bitterness over the iany years of colonialism and the lack of
opportunity and justice in Vietnam. But the Viet Cong is no social
reformdo-gooder outfit. It is made up of a hard corps of
disciplined warriors, backed by Hanoi and backed by Peking. Just
exactly, mpy I say, as East Berlin is backed by the Soviet Union.
So we have met the menaco of couniasm before. We mot it in
Berlin and we didn't flinch. And because we didn't there's peace
in Europe. We have met the nnace of com. munism in Greece. And some people
said it was just a little civil war. But isn't it interesting that
when Yugoslavia broke with the Soviet Union, or Marshal Tito broke
with Stalin, closed the border then the lifeline from Moscow to
Belgrade into the hills and the mountains of Greece when that lifeline
was chocked off that the Greek Civil War came to an end?
It wasn't a civil war as such. To be sure, there were Greeks
involved. But it was one that was : master-minded in those days from
Moscow, it was supplied from Belgrade, and it was fought on the plains
and the mountains of Greece.
Harry S. Truman, President of the United States, was the author
of the Greek-Turkish Aid Programe. General Van Fleet from the
United States xvent to Greece. W'e met the communist threat in Greece
and by the strange developments of international politics over which
we had no control the supply line and the efforts of the communist
powers were cut off and the Greek Civil War ended.
People say that you should be careful of these comparisons
because they don't alrays add up the same. That's true. There are
details that are different. But the fundamentals are the same.
We met coimmunist power in Korea. We did not seek a battlefield
in Korea. In fact we have said that we had no interest in
Korea, or little interest. And that was the warning. That was the
alert. The communist forces from the North struck South Korea,
violating every international pledge and every international
agreement. And we met the communist power in Korea.
We met it in Berlin. We met it in Korea. We met it when
Mr. IKhrushchev tried to put his missiles in Cuba, and now wre are
meeting it in Vietnam.
It's different this time. A new communist force. A very
militant communist force. An aggressive militant regime in Peking.
It has no regard for international law. It speaks with disdain of
even its commnunist associates. It has little or no regard for
standards for international conduct.
What you see in Vietnam today is not a civil war, but you see
the projection of a massive international communist doctrine at work
wars of national liberation being tested in the test tube of Vietnam.
The pilot project of cormmunist strategy. Peking to Hanoi bo the
rice paddies and the mountains and the valleys of Vietnam.
And we have to meet it. We didn't choose the battlefield.
We never will choose a battlefield. We can't as free people. We do
not believe in attack. We do not believe in aggression. We do
not believe in preventive war. We cannot select the time or the day
or the enemy or place. It is impossible. We simply have to meet
the attack where it comes.
Now the lessons of history teach us and surely Australians
have known it more than almost any others because even though you are
far removed from many areas of the world you were among the first to
recognize that the trouble in North Africa was your danger. The
trouble in Korea thousands of miles away was your trouble. You have
not failed to understand international responsibility and international interdopendence.
And so today, Australia finds herself in Vietnam.
Not only because of Australia, but because it understands that
aggression unckecked is aggression unleashed. It understands that
te aggressor's appetite is insatiable. It understands that
aggression if left without being stopped can become a pattern of
international conduct. And there will be no little nations left.
The powerful will consume the small and the w; eak.
So the United States of America and others, our good friends
here in Australia, stand shoulder to shoulder. Not because there is
an immediate threat to Australia. Not because of an immediate threat
to the United States. In our lifetime we could maybe forget this and
be buried in the knowledge that nothing had hit us as yet. But men
in public life have a greater obligation than to think about the
immediate. You must take a look at the future.
And if there is any one lesson in history that should have
been drilled into the minds of contemporaries it is this that you
can never let the aggressor have his way. If he has his way then
there is no way for free people except the way of despair and
destruction. So, my message to you today is the old simple message that we
must work together and we must work together not only militarily, but
we must work together in the good works of mankind. We're not
warriors. My country does not want to be known as a nation of
warriors. We want to be known as a nation of healers, of educators,
of engineers, of builders. We w-ant to be known as strong in spirit,
not in flesh. We want to be known as a nation whose wealth and
power is not for luxury or self-indulgence, but rather for service
and for protection for the weak.
That is the purpose of power, and that is the -purpose of wealth.
We're blessed in our country with wealt' and with power. And I think
that the real tribute to the United States of America and to Australia
is that with our high standards of living we seek not to keep it just
for ourselves. We ve abandoned selfishness and indulgence, and self
indulgence. And we have recognised that there is a brotherhood that
needs us and we need them. So we engage in the good works and that
was the purpose of the Honolulu Conference.
President Johnson went to Honolulu to revie. w, indeed, the
military situation, but more importantly he went there to work with
the leaders of South Vietnami in designing a social revolution for
South Vietnam. To heli rebuild the villages and the hamlets that
had been systematically decimated and destroyed by the Viet Cong
the communists. To give the people hope the politics of hope.
To lift their sights from the battlefields to the construction of
new homes and villages and schools and hospitals. And it is in this
part of the war, this other way, against man's ancient enemies that
we need a great deal of help.
Everywhere I have been I have found Australia. I found Australia
in India. I found Australia in the Colombo Plan in the Colombo Plan
countries. I found Australia in Pakistan. I found Australia in
Vietnam. I found Australia in the generous contribution to the Asian
Bank. We have found Australian docLors and hospitals in Vietnam.
' ie found Australian soldiers on the battlefield.
And, may I say to you Australians ve are proud of you-proud
of you as friends and allies. You imake our hearts grateful and warm
and lad because this is real international responsibility. This is
the real strength of a nation.
The strength of a nation is not in its armament alone. The
strength of a nation is in its people and their purpose. And, you
have demonstrated that strength of people and purpose.
Now I come away from this tour with what I said this morning
was restrained optimism.
I cannot say that all is going well because all is not going
well. But, I can say in Australia that in the year 1942, in the year
1941, you could not say that things were going well either, but you
did not quit. As a matter of fact anyone that was looking at the
realities of the time in 1940, just the sheer dark realities, would
have said we are whipped.
The difference was in spirit and determination. The English
did not have a chance after Dunkirk logistically, in equipment and
supplies, but they had a chance because they refused to give up.
The Australiarsdid not have much of a chance either after Pearl
Harbour, but you did not give up. And we did not have much of a one
either but ve did not give up.
So, to the doubters and we have plenty to those who feel
somehow or other that this struglo in Vietnamo cannot be won I say
to you it can: What is m. ore important I say to you it must.
You cannot afford to lose it, because the first time that Free
Nations lose a con. test with militant coim1munist aggression, the first
time you retreat, the first time that you fold up your tents, the
first time that a people are sold out on that day no one will over
believe free men again.
If I seei to be overly enthusiastic a I'm sometimes accused,
may I say that I have history on my side. History on the side of
human spirit. History on the side of people w ho love freedom.
If you love it enough and if you stay united; if free nations
will understand across this whole underbelly of Asia, and throughout
the : orld, that there are poweful forces that would destroy every
institution in which you and I believe, those powerful forces that work
the free nations : ill understand that we have a coi7mmon cuse, and we
have a coimmon purpose; that we need each other those forces of evil
and destruction cannot win.
The Indians in India have tasted communist aggression across
their borders in the movement of armies from Communist China.
The Thai are tasting infiltration and subversion now as even
I speak to you.
The Laotians have been plagued by the Pathet Lao now fortified
the North Vietnamese regulars.
And Vietnam has been going through fire and devastation for
years. lWhat more do we need to tell us that there is a great effort
being made on the part of the Cormunist Chinese to exert its influence
and its power and its control over the rice fields, the grea. t natural
resources of the sub-continent, and South-east Asia, and the people
thereof? Either direct control by conquest or control by fear and
terror. And yet, this force need not win and it : ill not win and I will
tell you why. Because the United States of America, in concert with
its allies, will not let it win.
And this is why freedom loving people everiyhere have a stake
in South Vietnam.
Maybe your contribution will only be a laboratory; maybe it will
only be a Doctor, maybe it Jill only be a few people to help with the
refugees. But in South Vietnam there ought to be on the part of
freedom loving people some symbol of the unity of free nations on the
part of every nation that loves freedom. If that symbolic unity is
there, mark my words that Communism, the communist juggernaut, will
be halted just as it wlas in wejt Europe when free nations banded
together when 1IATA was designed, when the Marshal Plan went into
action, when UN. Pii was applied, when one operation after another was
brought to bear to unite the people to rebuild a continent and to
revitalize nations. And it did not bring on a world war it saved
a world from a world war.
I conclude in this thought: Many people have said what we want
is peace. May I say to you that the President of the United States
is a man who believes in peace with a passion politically,
spiritually, morally.
But we wanted peace in 1939, in 1940 and in 1941. We did not
fight Hitler for conquest or Tojo, nor did you. You fought in
World War II for peace.
We arc not fighting in Vietnam for conquest or for territories.
We are fighting there for peace and we are prepared for peace. We
have offered peace negotiations for peace, and conferences for
peace. We have offered economic assistance to friend and foe alike
if there be peace. We have been rebuked. We shall pursue the
course for peace. We shall not be restrained because Hanoi and
Peking have arrogantly cast aside our offers of peace. We shall
pursue peace relentlessly and we shall also pursue the enemy relentlessly
because I happen to believe that you will gain peace when the
enemy finds out that he cannot gain his objectives by brutality and
force. And as soon as it is crvstil clear that force is not to
achieve the objective, then the hope of peace is all the better.
Until that day peace will be elusive if not impossible. So
may I thank you once again, our comrades in arms and our comrades in
peace in Australia. Thank you for what you are. Thank you for what
you've been. Thank you for what you will be, because your leadership
in the Pacific, your leadership in the Indian Ocean area, and your
leadership in Asia, is vital and may I urge upon you to work diligently,
ceaselessly with those of like mind, wherever they may be, try to find
the paths of peace and make those paths of peace the paths of the
hearts of men. Thank you.