Lend Me Your Ears: Great Speeches in History (24 page)

Despite these grievous losses, our resolve is not weakened….

It was eight weeks ago today that information reached us that the Argentine fleet was sailing towards the Falklands.

Eight thousand miles away…. At that stage there were only two ways of trying to stop it—through President Reagan, whose appeal to Argentina was rebuffed, and the United Nations, whose plea was also rejected.

There were those who said we should have accepted the Argentine invasion as a fait accompli. But whenever the rule of force as distinct from the rule of law is seen to succeed, the world moves a step closer to anarchy.

The older generation in this country and generations before them have made sacrifices so that we could be a free society and belong to a community of nations which seeks to resolve disputes by civilized means.

Today it falls to us to bear the same responsibility.

What has happened since that day, eight weeks ago, is a matter of
history—the history of a nation which rose instinctively to the needs of the occasion.

For decades, the peoples of those islands had enjoyed peace—with freedom, with justice, with democracy.

That peace was shattered by a wanton act of armed aggression by Argentina in blatant violation of international law. And everything that has happened since has stemmed from that invasion by the military dictatorship of Argentina.

We want that peace restored. But we want it with the same freedom, justice, and democracy that the islanders previously enjoyed.

For seven weeks we sought a peaceful solution by diplomatic means—through the good offices of our close friend and ally the United States; through the unremitting efforts of the secretary-general of the United Nations…. We worked tirelessly for a peaceful solution. But when there is no response of substance from the other side, there comes a point when it is no longer possible to trust the good faith of those with whom one is negotiating.

Playing for time is not working for a peaceful solution. Wasting time is not
willing
a peaceful solution. It is simply leaving the aggressor with the fruits of his aggression.

It would be a betrayal of our fighting men and of the islanders if
we
continued merely to talk, when talk alone was getting nowhere.

And so, seven weeks to the day after the invasion, we moved to recover by force what was taken from us by force. It cannot be said too often: we are the victims; they are the aggressors.

As always, we came to military action reluctantly.

But when territory which has been British for almost 150 years is seized and occupied; when not only British land but British citizens are in the power of an aggressor—then we have to restore our rights and the rights of the Falkland Islanders.

There have been a handful of questioning voices raised here at home. I would like to answer them. It has been suggested that the size of the Falkland Islands and the comparatively small number of its inhabitants—some eighteen hundred men, women, and children—should somehow affect our reaction to what has happened to them.

To those—not many—who speak lightly of a few islanders beyond the seas and who ask the question “Are they worth fighting for?” let me say this: right and wrong are not measured by a head count of those to whom that wrong has been done. That would not be principle but expediency.

And the Falklanders, remember, are not strangers. They are our own
people. As the prime minister of New Zealand, Bob Muldoon, put it in his usual straightforward way, “With the Falkland Islanders, it is family.”

When their land was invaded and their homes were overrun, they naturally turned to us for help, and we, their fellow citizens, eight thousand miles away in our much larger island, could not and did not beg to be excused.

We sent our men and our ships with all speed, hoping against hope that we would not have to use them in battle but prepared to do so if all attempts at a peaceful solution failed. When those attempts failed, we could not sail by on the other side.

And let me add this. If we, the British, were to shrug our shoulders at what has happened in the South Atlantic and acquiesce in the illegal seizure of those faraway islands, it would be a clear signal to those with similar designs on the territory of others to follow in the footsteps of aggression.

Surely we, of all people, have learned the lesson of history: that to appease an aggressor is to invite aggression elsewhere, and on an ever-increasing scale.

Other voices—again only a few—have accused us of clinging to colonialism or even imperialism. Let me remind those who advance that argument that the British have a record second to none of leading colony after colony to freedom and independence. We cling not to colonialism but self-determination.

Still others—again only a few—say we must not put at risk our investments and interests in Latin America; that trade and commerce are too important to us to put in jeopardy some of the valuable markets of the world.

But what would the islanders, under the heel of the invader, say to that?

What kind of people would we be if, enjoying the birthright of freedom ourselves, we abandoned British citizens for the sake of commercial gain?

Now we are present in strength on the Falkland Islands.

Our purpose is to repossess them. We shall carry on until that purpose is accomplished.

When the invader has left, there will be much to do—rebuilding, restoring homes and farms, and, above all, renewing the confidence of the people in their future.

Their wishes will need time to crystallize and, of course, will depend in some measure on what we and others are prepared to do to develop the untapped resources and safeguard the islands’ future.

Madam Chairman, our cause is just.

It is the cause of freedom and the rule of law.

It is the cause of support for the weak against aggression by the strong. Let us, then, draw together in the name, not of jingoism, but of justice.

And let our nation, as it has so often in the past, remind itself—and the world:

The lawn of the White House in Washington was the scene of the signing of a peace agreement, secretly negotiated in Oslo, between the government of Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization. President Bill Clinton introduced Prime Minister Rabin and PLO Chairman Yasir Arafat with a biblical allusion: “We must realize the prophecy of Isaiah, that the cry of violence shall no more be heard in your land, nor wrack nor ruin within your borders.”

Rabin made a momentary show of reluctance to shake the former terrorist’s
hand, then did so. The former general’s short speech, drafted by his veteran spokesman Eitan Haber, hewed to the style of a plain soldier. The audience on the lawn, including this anthologist, noted the strength modified by pain in the delivery. Rabin spoke directly to his former enemies, addressing them not as “Palestinian Arabs” but giving them the status of a people: “Let me say to you, the Palestinians…” He was also speaking to his own people, many of whom were ambivalent about or opposed to the ultimate direction of the “peace process.” As a soldier turned peacemaker, he evoked the Book of Ecclesiastes 3:1–8 to dramatize the reason for his new direction: “To everything there is a season… A time to love and a time to hate, a time of war and a time of peace.”

Especially powerful to the Jews listening to him on the lawn and around the world on September 13, 1993, was his conclusion, spoken in Hebrew. What he described as “words taken from the prayer recited by Jews daily” were from the Kaddish, which are also spoken in a Mourners’ Kaddish at graveside and repeated by the bereaved in remembrance of the dead. The prayer makes no mention of death; rather, it affirms faith in God even in the midst of death. As the speaker buried the past, his choice of Hebrew words remembered its bloodshed.

After Prime Minister Rabin’s assassination by an Israeli fanatic two years after this speech, the memory of that prayer was especially poignant, and all television obituaries included his exhortation “Enough!”

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PRESIDENT OF THE
United States, your excellencies, ladies and gentlemen: This signing of the Israeli-Palestinian declaration of principle here today—it’s not so easy—neither for myself as a soldier in Israel’s war nor for the people of Israel, not to the Jewish people in the diaspora, who are watching us now with great hope mixed with apprehension. It is certainly not easy for the families of the victims of the war’s violence, terror, whose pain will never heal, for the many thousands who defended our lives in their own and have even sacrificed their lives for our own. For them this ceremony has come too late.

Today on the eve of an opportunity, opportunity for peace and perhaps end of violence and war, we remember each and every one of them with everlasting love. We have come from Jerusalem, the ancient and eternal capital of the Jewish people. We have come from an anguished and grieving land. We have come from a people, a home, a family that has not known a single year, not a single month, in which mothers have not
wept for their sons. We have come to try and put an end to the hostilities so that our children, our children’s children, will no longer experience the painful cost of war: violence and terror. We have come to secure their lives and to ease the soul and the painful memories of the past—to hope and pray for peace.

Let me say to you, the Palestinians, we are destined to live together on the same soil in the same land. We, the soldiers who have returned from battles stained with blood; we who have seen our relatives and friends killed before our eyes; we who have attended their funerals and cannot look in the eyes of their parents; we who have come from a land where parents bury their children; we who have fought against you, the Palestinians—we say to you today, in a loud and a clear voice: enough of blood and tears. Enough!

We have no desire for revenge. We harbor no hatred towards you. We, like you, are people—people who want to build a home. To plant a tree. To love—live side by side with you. In dignity. In empathy. As human beings. As free men. We are today giving peace a chance—and saying to you and saying again to you: enough. Let us pray that a day will come when we all will say farewell to the arms. We wish to open a new chapter in the sad book of our lives together—a chapter of mutual recognition, of good neighborliness, of mutual respect, of understanding. We hope to embark on a new era in the history of the Middle East. Today here in Washington at the White House, we will begin a new reckoning in the relations between peoples, between parents tired of war, between children who will not know war.

President of the United States, ladies and gentlemen, our inner strength, our high moral values, have been the right for thousands of years, from the book of the books. In one of which, we read: “To everything there is a season and a time to every purpose under heaven: a time to be born and a time to die… a time to kill and a time to heal… a time to weep and a time to laugh… a time to love and a time to hate, a time of war and a time of peace.” Ladies and gentlemen, the time for peace has come.

In two days the Jewish people will celebrate the beginning of a new year. I believe, I hope, I pray that the new year will bring a message of redemption for all peoples—a good year for you, for all of you; a good year for Israelis and Palestinians; a good year for all the peoples of the Middle East; a good year for our American friends who so want peace and are helping to achieve it.

For presidents and members of previous administrations, especially for you, President Clinton, and your staff, for all citizens of the world, may
peace come to all your homes. In the Jewish tradition it is customary to conclude our prayers with the word
Amen
. With your permission, men of peace, I shall conclude with the words taken from the prayer recited by Jews daily, and whoever of you who volunteer, I would ask the entire audience to join me in saying Amen. [Speaking in Hebrew.] May He who brings peace to His universe bring peace to us and to all Israel. Amen.

If we can accept Thucydides’ recollected account of the funeral oration of Pericles, we can stretch further from accuracy to accept William Shakespeare’s version, in his play
Julius Caesar
, of a speech by Mark Antony referred to by historians Plutarch and Dion Cassius.

The technique of the speaker is to seem to agree with what has been said before—in this case by Brutus, tool and front of the conspirators, who had told the crowd of Caesar, “As he was ambitious, I slew him.” But the dramatist plants the seeds of doubt by acting against the words, at first subtly imputing dishonor while appearing to concede honor in the previous speaker, and later savaging him with increasing sarcasm overlaying “honorable.”

The speaker poses (falsely, as the playwright shows the audience) as “a plain blunt man” without “the power of speech to stir men’s blood,” who can “only speak right on.” Of course, the murdered man’s friend speaks obliquely, pulling from his listeners the mutinous calls he professes not to make himself, closing with an egregious bribe. This mostly fictional speech about a factual conqueror is a playwright’s lesson in how politicians can manipulate mobs.

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