Real Peace by Richard Nixon

Author:Richard Nixon [Nixon, Richard]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

NATO AND JAPAN

In considering the role the United States and Soviet Union must play, we must always bear in mind that other nations, particularly those of Western Europe and Japan, must be part of any effective effort to build a real peace. After all, the struggle between East and West for 35 years has in large part been a struggle over the fate of Europe and Asia.

Given the Soviets’ ambitions and strength, Europe cannot have peace and freedom without the United States. But by the same token the U.S. cannot build a lasting peace without Europe. As Franklin Roosevelt said to his war-weary people in 1945, “We have learned that we cannot live alone, in peace.” We learned that lesson from lighting the bloodiest war in history, and it is even more true today.

The U.S. is linked with its European allies on a variety of levels. We are largely a composite of European peoples and European ideals. We share values, faiths, and cultural and philosophical heritages with Europe. But what links us most fundamentally is our reverence for liberty, and we realize that the greatest evil of Soviet totalitarianism is that it smothers liberty. Our military alliances and our close economic and cultural relationships are expressions both of our common heritage and our mutual awareness of a common external threat.

That is why Japan, while an Asian rather than a European nation, is as central to the Western alliance as any NATO member. Strategically, along with China it holds the eastern ramparts. Economically, its might is indispensable if we are to have an effective Western economic policy. And practically, it has much to gain from an alliance with the West because it has just as much to lose as the U.S. and the Europeans from further Soviet advances.

The postwar Japanese economic miracle was the result of an unprecedented synthesis of East and West. Japanese creativity, drive, and skill, channelled through Western systems of government and free enterprise, made Japan one of the economic giants of the modern world. The Japanese have reaped the rewards of liberty, and not surprisingly they have shown a growing willingness to defend what they have built.

Americans sometimes have a certain messianic, “We’ll save the world” attitude. We believe in our system and way of life and are eager to share both with the rest of the world. Woodrow Wilson did not call on the American people to fight in World War I just to save America but to serve the greater goal of making the world safe for democracy. We have always been confident that the sheer rightness of our ideals will win out in the end.

We believe the American ideal is still the world’s best hope. But the economic and military power of the United States in the world is not as commanding as it once was. After World War II the U.S. economy accounted for more than half of the world’s industrial production. The figure is now less than a third—in part because with

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