JFK’s greatest speech was not his inauguration speech but one he made in June 1963 at the American University in Washington. In what is now known as his ‘peace speech’ JFK presented the possibility of a world that could leave the Cold War behind. In one important passage he rejected the kind of America that we repeatedly see today:
‘What kind of peace do I mean? What kind of peace do we seek? Not a Pax Americana enforced on the world by American weapons of war. Not the peace of the grave or the security of the slave. I am talking about genuine peace, the kind of peace that makes life on earth worth living, the kind that enables men and nations to grow and to hope and to build a better life for their children--not merely peace for Americans but peace for all men and women--not merely peace in our time but peace for all time.’
He continued:
‘For, in the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children's future. And we are all mortal.’
This speech was anathema to the corporations who made billions from maintaining the Cold War, the CIA and the Pentagon generals whose very existence depended on ensuring that American remained on a permanent war footing.
Sixty three years later and we are seeing the brutal reality of that ‘Pax Americana’ as Trump tears up the rule book, abducts heads of state, steals their country’s resources and bombs hated independent nations to destruction.
JFK’s peace speech was virtually ignored by the American media. Most Americans never heard it at the time and were never given the chance to dwell on what JFK was asking. But JFK’s formidable enemies heard it alright and the threat it represented to their military empire.
Six months later, President Kennedy was brutally assassinated in broad daylight - a public execution carried out with those same American weapons of war that he had hoped to silence. The Pax Americana today is uglier and more lawless than ever, now bombing and murdering the people of Iran with impunity. When Iran goes the way of Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Gaza, the American weapons of war will move on to another nation state - a never-ending cycle of murderous violence, death and destruction. It’s what most of us have experienced our entire lives.
JFK was either incredibly naive or he was a hero for seeking an impossible dream. He had his faults but he was a true statesman, articulate, erudite and visionary. But he turned out to be a truly dangerous threat to the American defence establishment: a rebel in his way, a free thinker and a one-off. Sixty three years since his death and the world has Donald Trump in The White House. Somewhere along the way western civilisation took a wrong turning.
@POTUS@CIA@SecretService
Joshua Block is currently on the Phone with the U.S embassy could be facing 10 years to life in prison for threatening multiple Japanese people with bloody murder
Everyone is so surprised whenever Affleck is revealed to be quite intelligent. Why did you think there were so many candid shots of him out there looking miserable?