This is our first meeting in the new home of the United Nations. We join in our congratulations and gratitude to all of those who have had a part in the completion of this work. The result of their efforts is an enduring symbol of accomplishment and of aspiration.
59. We meet here to take up our labours to bring together and to harmonize the hopes and desires of the peoples of the United Nations. This is a never-ending task for each Assembly in its turn.
60. This year marks the seventh anniversary of the ratification of the Charter. These seven years have demonstrated that the role of the United Nations in the community of nations is an essential one, and one that will continue to increase in influence and importance in the years ahead.
61. The importance and influence of the United Nations is reflected in the problems that come before it. They indicate the powerful currents which make our period in history one of turbulence and change. Many of these problems will be with us for years to come. We cannot shy away from them even if we wished to do so. Our task is to face them squarely and realistically, with good faith and good sense, in the light of our joint and several responsibilities under the Charter.
62. Moreover, there is an interdependence between these problems. Each is made more difficult of solution by the existence of the others. We cannot solve them all at once. But we can solve some; we can chip away at others; and we can use all the resources of the United Nations to prepare the way for more effective co-operation between nations.
63. One of the most important of these resources is the General Assembly. There is no more representative or more influential international institution than the one in which we are now participating. The Charter entrusts the Assembly with a wide variety of tasks and with an equal variety of methods which it can employ.
64. Three groups of problems lie before us: first, those that concern security, secondly, those that relate to the fulfilment of national and individual aspirations and, thirdly, those that have to do with the economic progress of both individuals and communities.
65. The chief lesson of our experience in the field of collective security is that the solidarity of the nations which support the Charter is absolutely essential. The alternative to this solidarity is the disintegration of the United Nations and the triumph of lawlessness in the world. The programme which started in 1950 with the “Uniting for Peace” resolution [377 (V)] constitutes General Assembly recognition that Members of the United Nations must, by virtue of that membership, stand together and act together for the maintenance of peace. To make this work, wholehearted co-operation is essential. The institution of the United Nations can be no stronger than its Members. It is the governments and the peoples of all Member nations who have the responsibility to be physically prepared and to be morally resolute to concert their strength for the cause of peace.
66. This responsibility to co-operate must be reflected not only in readiness to participate in action undertaken by the United Nations itself, but also in other ways recognized and sanctioned by the Charter, Regional and collective self-defence arrangements, entered into and developed in accordance with the Charter, are an integral part of a universal collective security system. When individual strength and collective strength are all dedicated to the cause of peace and the purposes of the Charter, the structure of security becomes a reality.
67. The Secretary-General put this matter forcefully in his report to this Assembly. “The final test of effective collective security”, he said, “will always be that a sufficient number of Member Governments are firmly committed in their policies to join in resisting armed aggression wherever it occurs and that they have at their disposal military power strong enough to strike back with punishing effect against any aggressor nation”.
68. This is the lesson of the past seven years. It would be folly for us to lose sight of it.
69. It is in Korea that our whole structure of collective security is meeting its supreme test. It will stand or fall upon what we do there. The United Nations fight in Korea is the fight of every nation and every individual who values freedom. Had our nerve failed at the time of this ruthless act of aggression, these new buildings in which we meet today might already be the empty husks of our defeated hopes for this Organization. Had Korea been allowed to fall to the aggressor, the words of John Donne would have applied to each one of us: “Never send to know for whom the bell tolls; “It tools for thee…” Had the Republic of Korea been allowed to fall to the aggressor, the representatives to these assemblies would now be looking to their left and to their right and asking which would be the next victim on the aggressor’s list.
70. Korea is a test, not only of our courage at the initial moment of decision, but even more of the firmness of our will, the endurance of our courage. The aggressor, having defied the United Nations and lost, having found himself pushed back behind his initial line of attack, now counts for victory upon those of faint heart who would grow weary of the struggle.
71. There are moments in history when determined will through dark hours has brought victory. My country’s trials came at the very outset of its history. The darkest moment for the United Nations’ in Korea came at Pusan. We met and overcame that trial and now face the test of staying power. Ours must be the determination and the will to sustain this crucial test. I will not pretend that the burden is light. My countrymen, like those of many of you, regard with anxiety and grief its human cost. But to the question: How long shall this be? We must answer: We shall fight on as long as is necessary to stop the aggression and to restore peace and security to Korea. We shall stop fighting when an armistice on just terms has been achieved. And we shall not allow faintheartedness or recklessness to defeat our cause, which is to defend peace.
72. We must convince the aggressor that continued fighting in Korea will cost him more than he can gain. This means the training and commitment of troops; it means food, clothing, material, money. I urge every Member of the United Nations to look to its responsibility to support the common action in Korea, and to participate in the reconstruction of that unhappy land.
73. The United Nations went into Korea to repel aggression and to restore peace and security. Aggression has been stopped. But despite patient and sincere efforts of United Nations negotiators, the Communists have so far rejected reasonable terms for an armistice. This Assembly will have the opportunity to review the record of the armistice negotiations, which have been proceeding over the past fifteen months. The record shows that the United Nations representatives have been patient, flexible and resourceful, always defending the principles of the Charter. We shall have an opportunity, by action at this Assembly, to demonstrate to the aggressor that we are united in purpose and firm in resolve; that we are as one in desire for a just peace and in determination to achieve it.
74. No consideration of security can overlook the importance of the work which has been done since our last Assembly in the field of disarmament. For, even though we ate no closer to a universal agreement, the Disarmament Commission set up last year [resolution 502 (VÏ)] has shown that the obstacle to disarmament is not technical, but is a matter of will Practical methods are at hand by which the possibility of aggressive warfare can be reduced "and ultimately erased.
75. Those practical methods are not based on the fallacious idea that our safety will be assured by piecemeal pledges not to use this weapon or that weapon. All Members of the United Nations have made a solemn commitment to "refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any State, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations”, This commitment is a pledge against any aggression, in any form or with any weapon, against the use of armed force “save in the common interest”. On behalf of my Government, I reaffirm this pledge.
76. We can make that pledge absolutely specific. We will not commit aggression with rifles or machine-guns or tanks. We will not commit aggression with atomic bombs or any other kind of bombs. We will not commit aggression with chemical weapons or bacterial weapons, which we have been falsely and slanderously accused of using. We will not commit aggression with any weapons of by any means. We reaffirm for all the world to hear that, pursuant to our solemn commitment under the Charter, we pledge not just that we will avoid the use of one weapon or another but that we will not permit the use of any form of force contrary to the Charter. We reaffirm our Charter obligations to settle "international disputes by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security and justice are not endangered”.
77. Nations committed under the Charter not to use force to impose their will on other nations should not have to maintain huge armaments to protect themselves from one another. The maintenance of huge armaments itself constitutes a danger to peace. But disarmament cannot be achieved unilaterally. It cannot be achieved by denunciation in a battle of epithets. It can be achieved only by international agreements under effective safeguards which will protect law abiding States from the hazards of violations and evasions. Until all States With substantial armaments are willing to co-operate in effective, guaranteed disarmament, the free, law-abiding nations of the world must arm and remain armed in self-defence. But we will continue to work to achieve the fourth of the four freedoms of President Roosevelt — freedom from fear.
78. The United States, with other members of the Disarmament Commission, has sought to outline a comprehensive disarmament programme with a view to reducing the possibility and the fear of war [DC/10, DC/12, DC/15). The programme seeks not only the elimination of all major weapons of mass destruction, including atomic and bacterial weapons, but the elimination of large mass armies. The programme calls for a reduction of well over 50 per cent in the armed forces of the United States and the Soviet Union and for comparable limitation on the armed forces of all other States. The programme provides for the effective control of atomic energy to ensure its use for peaceful purposes only. It provides effective safeguards to ensure an open world with no secret armies and no secret weapons.
79. In submitting this programme, we gave outlines, not details. We did not insist that ours were the only proposals that could carry out the General Assembly resolution. We submitted them for discussion and genuine negotiation. Out of negotiation, conducted in good faith, the purposes of the General Assembly resolution could be achieved and the maximum reduction of all armed forces and armaments consistent with the avoidance of any imbalance of power dangerous to international peace in any part of the world can be made. The United States is ready to carry out such a programme. We shall continue earnestly and in good faith to induce others to join us towards that end, we shall apply all the ingenuity and resourcefulness we can muster. If other States do the same, we can succeed.
80. The second group of issues which lies before us comprises those which grow out of the legitimate aspirations of dependent peoples for a determining voice in their own affairs.
81. It is important to note at the outset that these matters are not issues in the sense that anyone disputes the right of a dependent people to ultimate self-government. That right is enshrined in the Charter, and the obligation to help fulfil that right rests with each of us, including each of the administering States, These States recognize that the peoples under their control must some day determine their own destinies. These States are working towards that end, just as the dependent peoples are preparing themselves for the responsibilities of self-government.
82. This is, I think, illustrated by the following facts. Of the 800 million people in the free world who were in the dependent category ten years ago, some 600 million have already attained full independence. In this period a dozen new nations have emerged, and most of them are now playing an important role in the United Nations. Furthermore, rapid progress has been made towards self-government for the 200 million others who still remain in varying stages of dependency. What these facts suggest is that the differences confronting us are not differences of purpose; they are differences of method and of timing and they can be solved through wise statesmanship.
83. Over 175 years ago, the American people asserted and established their right to their own national life. Surely we can and do understand, the similar aspirations of other peoples. Indeed, our record establishes this far more conclusively than any assertion that I could make. Our own experience and responsibilities have also taught us the necessity for wisdom and understanding between administering Powers and dependent peoples. For it requires understanding on both sides to solve the complicated problems which arise in preparing a people for a stable and viable self-government in the complex world of today. The result of this kind of understanding is reflected in the presence among us in this great Assembly of our colleagues from the Philippines, India, Pakistan, Burma and Indonesia. And there is a place in this Assembly for others.
84. But, in the nature of things, it is not enough that the States comprising the United Nations should agree on the abstract principle of self-determination and the desirability of the evolution of dependent peoples towards self-government. For we are concerned with specific situations involving the aspirations of present and future generations. In examining these situations, it will inevitably appear to some that the process of fulfilling those aspirations is too long, too tortuous. By the same token, it will seem to others that the transfer of powers is going forward at too rapid a rate — that people are being called upon to govern themselves before they have attained adequate political experience, and before there exists a sound economic, social and educational basis for lasting self- government.
85. If the sole question were whether it was going too fast or too slowly, the answer undoubtedly in most cases would be to try to find some accommodation between these two sides. This would not, of course, wholly satisfy either one. But this is the way things have to be done in reconciling conflicting views. But in many situations this is not the only point. There is another point, which is very often lost sight of in the assertions of absolutes in regard to the right to self-rule. The fact we are apt to overlook is the deep economic interdependence between the parties. It would be utterly destructive to the interests of both if the solution were made on the basis of theoretical absolutes. If people can harmonize their views and then work either a little faster or a little more slowly together, then their mutual dependence becomes a factor which helps to bring the matter to solution,
86. This fact is reflected in the evolution of formerly non-self-governing peoples. While some have chosen to move towards complete independence, many others have chosen an independent position within a commonwealth or union, and still others have chosen to identify themselves in some other form of association with another State or group of States.
87. What is the proper role of the United Nations in these matters? When specific disagreements arise as to the adequacy of the progress being made by a dependent people towards self-government, the responsibility for settling such matters lies in the first instance with those immediately concerned. This is not to say that the United Nations is without responsibility to assist in the achievement of peaceful solutions. On the contrary, the United Nations would be derelict in its duty if it failed to be concerned with the rate of progress towards the Charter goals being made by those States — including the United States — which hold in trust the futures of dependent peoples.
88. But it follows from what I have said before that the role to be played by the General Assembly should, in most situations of this kind, be one of accommodation. These are not cases in which it is the function of the General Assembly to impose settlements upon the parties involved. Here it is rather the primary function of the United Nations to create an atmosphere favourable to settlements which accord with Charter principles but which should be worked out by the parties directly concerned.
89. Various articles of the Charter employ different terms to indicate the type of action which the General Assembly may take — it may “discuss”, it may “consider”, it may “recommend”, or it may “decide”. As we review our seven years of experience, it sometimes seems that we have felt that we are bound to “recommend” whenever we “consider” or “discuss”. But the Charter does not assume this, nor should we do so. We must always seek solutions, but not necessarily resolutions. Calm and dispassionate consideration and discussion may in such matters as these be the General Assembly’s most useful contribution towards a solution.
90. The United Nations has a twofold interest in encouraging and assisting peaceful and orderly transition towards self-government. First, it serves to assure that the aspirations of the people involved will find constructive and genuine fulfilment. Secondly, it represents the general interest of the rest of the world in peaceful settlements and orderly progress — all, that is, except those who are more interested in the exploitation of differences than in genuine solutions.
91. The unfortunate fact is that we cannot approach this problem, or indeed any other problem before this General Assembly, without being mindful of the events that are taking place in another part of the world. There, whole nations have been swallowed up and submerged by a new colonialism. Others have been reduced to a state of servile dependence. The tragic events behind this dark boundary not only are in stark contrast with the evolutionary process towards self-government which we have been discussing; but they are so fraught with danger to all of us that we can never afford to forget them.
92. I have touched briefly upon the role of the United Nations with respect to the conflicts which arise in the evolution of dependent peoples towards full self-government. But much of what I have said is equally applicable, in my judgment, to other problems of great moment and great delicacy with which the General Assembly is currently confronted.
93. I refer particularly to the role to be played by the United Nations — and especially the General Assembly — in the promotion of those individual human rights recognized by the Charter.
94. Our starting point is the Charter obligation assumed by all of us, as individual States and as participants in the work of the United Nations, to promote the fundamental rights of those within our jurisdictions.
95. To carry out this obligation faithfully means several things. It means, first of all, that we must look facts in the face. It means that we must examine our own conduct and that of other States with candour and that we cannot condone deeds which do not square with the articles of democratic faith embodied in our Charter, I venture to suggest that in the field of human rights no State represented here is wholly without fault; in our closets each of us can find the skeletons of racial, religious and class discrimination. If this is so, it neither justifies being sanctimonious about our neighbours’ faults nor being tolerant of violations of Charter obligations. We must approach these problems soberly and without hypocrisy, mindful of our human weaknesses, but unremitting in our determination to fulfil our promises.
96. If our first job is to be honest about the facts, our second job is to be honest about the remedies available to us. The teachings of Confucius and Mohammed, of Moses, of Buddha and of Christ, will not gain instant and universal acceptance merely because they are echoed in our official pronouncements,
97. But the fact that we are limited in what we can accomplish does not mean that we can abdicate the field. On the contrary, we would betray the basic tenets of human decency if we came to regard the human rights provisions of the Charter as pious hopes which feed the eye but starve the spirit. To give reality to the Charter provisions, we must concentrate upon doing those things which are in the realm of practical statesmanship.
98. Our aim in this most delicate of fields must be the aim provided in the Charter itself. By Chapter IX, all Members pledge themselves to take joint and separate action in co-operation with the United Nations to promote, among other things, universal respect for, and observance of, human rights and fundamental freedoms for all, without distinction as to race, sex, language or religion. Our actions must be responsive to that pledge. We must work with patience and with honesty towards the achievement of the Charter goals.
99. Finally, I turn to a third group of problems before this session of the General Assembly, problems that have to do with the improvement of living conditions. In looking back over the record of the past seven years, it is in this field of economic co-operation that we find the most hopeful and promising aspect of the work of the United Nations.
100. The beginnings that have been made in this work of economic and social co-operation through the United Nations are greatly encouraging to all who have participated in it. This is a new force in international relations. It expresses a growing sense of international responsibility for the needs and hopes of individual human beings. Behind this work lies a growing awareness that, in the twentieth century, international cooperation must mean not only treaties and conferences, but people of many nations working alongside each other to grow more food, to wipe out illiteracy and disease, to increase production and trade.
101. The key to economic progress, to the expanding world economy for which we are all striving, is found in co-operative action to enable the world to increase its output of agricultural and industrial products. This is the heart of the matter. We are only beginning to appreciate the tremendous possibilities of the less developed areas for this kind of expansion-only beginning to realize them as we create the basic economic facilities, particularly power and transport.
102. As the technical assistance programmes of the United Nations and its agencies continue to work their transformations in the economic and social fields, I am confident that we shall see an acceleration of private investment, both domestic and foreign. This is a process that may take many years of work, but in no other field of action, I believe, shall we find that our efforts have so multiple an effect as in the field of technical assistance.
103. There is no greater challenge to our ingenuity than that which is to be found in the stark contract between present levels of production of food and industrial products, and the knowledge available to us by which that production could be multiplied many times over.
104. The tragedy is that, in spite of tremendous progress in agricultural science, over half the world's people still suffer from malnutrition and many live on the verge of starvation. Despite progress in food production in many parts of the world, the fact is that the world food output is increasing at a slower rate than is the world population, and the world today has less food per person than it had before the Second World War.
105. There are several active programmes in this field that are deserving of more widespread attention and support. A good beginning has been made by the members of the Food and Agriculture Organization, who have pledged themselves to increase agricultural production in their countries over the next five years, so that there will be an increase of food production over population growth amounting to 1 or 2 per cent each year.
106. At this session of the General Assembly, we shall have an opportunity to review some of the promising work that has been done by Member Governments and the agencies of the United Nations in the vital field of land reform. This is, in my opinion, central to the whole problem of increasing food supply.
107. Two years ago, before this body, I expressed the conviction that common efforts to apply existing knowledge to the use and ownership of land could have a tremendous effect in relieving the misery and suffering of millions of people. I spoke of the “vast opportunity” that “awaits us to bring, by such means as the United Nations has been developing, new hope to millions whose most urgent needs are for food, for land and for human dignity”. Since that time, much progress has been made in dealing with this problem, this opportunity. Programmes of land reform have been launched in a number of countries in Asia and the Near East — programmes which are already bringing new hope to the people of these lands. Universities and governments have co-operated in regional seminars for the exchange of information on land use and tenure. We shall, I believe, find great encouragement in hearing the reports of this progress.
108. This Assembly will also have an opportunity to consider the steps that have been taken to stimulate increased productivity in other fields. It is clear from the report submitted by the Secretary-General to the Economic and Social Council [E/2265] that methods are available by which marked increases in productivity could be achieved immediately. These methods would differ greatly from country to country according to local conditions, but the essential fact is that considerable increases can be achieved by the countries themselves through technical assistance and better utilization of existing tools and equipment.
109. Increases in productivity by such methods can result — and indeed in many places they have resulted — in direct and immediate improvements in standards of living. And, as I have remarked before, the best guarantee of increased investment, both public and private, is such increased productivity. It is imperative, of course, that such increased output be fairly distributed in the form of better incomes for workers and lower prices to consumers.
110. These activities demonstrate the vitality and inventiveness with which many nations are working together to improve living standards, even now, in the midst of world tensions.
111. It is tragic that forces should exist in the world whose concept of their own interests requires them to hinder and obstruct international action by all the rest of the world towards better conditions of living.
112. There are some schools of thought which doubt the capacity of free nations to meet the problems of a changing world without falling into economic catastrophe. To them I would say that such expectations are based upon an analysis which events have shown to be faulty — and, at best, out of date. The free nations reject any notion that man is incapable of influencing events; that he is a helpless puppet in the face of determining forces; that crisis is inevitable.
113. The record, I think, will bear me out when I say that the economies of the free nations have shown great capacity for growth and adaptation. It will show that despite the burdens we have inherited from the First and Second World Wars, despite the burdens we are now assuming to avert a third such catastrophe, the free nations have not been inhibited by doctrine or dogma from adaptability and ingenuity in meeting their economic problems. As a result, and despite the dire prophecies to the contrary, there has been a long-term rise in living standards among the industrially advanced nations. And this rise has been accompanied by an ever broader distribution of income. In the United States, for example, the real income in terms of purchasing power of the average citizen has risen at least 40 per cent since 1929. And this improvement, reflected in higher living standards, has been greatest among people in the middle and lower parts of the income scale.
114. The record will also show that the free nations have learned a great deal since the depression of the 1930’s, and that this learning has been applied in a whole series of measures which offer protection against a recurrence of that experience. We have built into our economies a series of stabilizers to protect our living standards and to encourage the productivity which makes them possible. Our social security programmes, price supports against severe declines in farm incomes, bank deposit insurance, modernized flexible banking and credit policies, as well as the tremendous accumulated demand for housing and public works — all of these are but a few of the stabilizers which would operate to counterbalance any substantial changes in economic conditions.
115. So much for the ability of the free economies to handle their domestic problems with skill and flexibility. But what of their ability to work together in coping with forces that threaten economic stability? Here too, I think, the post-war record will show that the free nations are able to get together to create machinery to solve mutual economic problems. Consider the instruments that have been developed just in recent years to meet problems of international co-operation — such instruments as the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the International Monetary Fund, the regional economic commissions for Europe, Asia and Latin America, the General Agreements on Tariffs and Trade, the Schuman Plan, and many others.
116. These instruments, together with many other works, have been put together in the face of the tremendous burdens we have inherited from previous wars, and also in the face of the burdens we now bear to prevent future wars. We look forward with confidence to the opportunities for further growth and expansion which will open to us and to all free nations whenever the threat to our freedom and independence subsides and we can safely release our great creative energies from the burden of armaments. We all have a transcending common interest — in this interdependent world — in expanding freedom and increased well-being. We all have much to gain by co-operating together to advance this common interest in “better standards of life, in larger freedom”,
117. Our differing ways of life may impel us to pursue our objectives in various ways. But if we have confidence in our own particular ways, we should be willing to submit them to the test of experience. We should be willing to be judged by the results of our works rather than by the prowess of our arms.
118. Let us, then, work together to banish force and the threat of force as an instrument of national or ideological policy. Let us, in this interdependent world, share freedom with all men and all nations. Let us vie with one another, not in the arts of war, but in the ways of peace, in the ways of building a world of expanding freedom and increased well-being for all mankind.