Before I embark on the submissions which I hope to make to the General Assembly, may I ask the President’s indulgence for two very brief preliminary observations.
37. In the first place, I want to pay my tribute and that of my country to the memory of the distinguished statesman who was one of the authors of our Charter. Jan Smuts was a great man, a wise man, a good man, and the world is the poorer for his passing. As our New Zealand Maoris put it, drawing their imagery from the great trees of the forest, “Another totara has fallen”. Such is life, such is death.
38. Secondly, I wish to tender to the President my warmest felicitations on his election to a post which must be amongst the most onerous and responsible which the world has to offer today. I am altogether sure, and I am certain that the Assembly is altogether sure, that he will not only maintain the high traditions established by his distinguished predecessors, but will add lustre to his own name, to the name of his great country, and to this Assembly.
39. It has become the practice at these sessions of the General Assembly for representatives to come to this rostrum, in the course of the general debate, to expound and expand upon the merits and the successes — all of them real, all of them incontestable — of the United Nations. I have nothing to say against this practice, commendable and laudable at the proper time. Wholeheartedly my government and my country support any and every endeavour that tends, even in the smallest degree, towards an increase in human welfare or in human happiness; and there is a great temptation, to which I am just as susceptible as any other representative, to dwell upon the progress already achieved and the vital importance of the United Nations to the world. But I intend to resist that temptation. To follow such a course in the present circumstances, I suggest with all earnestness, would be nothing more than whistling in the dark, pretending to ourselves that all is well when all is not well, or that all will be well when all will not be well unless, by our own forethought, by our own exertions, by our own sacrifices, we see to it that all must be well.
40. This is, of all times, a time for a clear and honest survey of the crisis with which this Organization and the whole free world are menaced. There is no room now in our councils for those who shut their eyes to the facts because the facts are unpleasant — who, with their heads buried in the sand, pretend that realities do not exist because they will not see them.
41. The facts of today are stark and inescapable. There is a great crisis in the affairs of man. It could be the greatest crisis in history which confronts us today. Let us face it as serious and sober men, conscious alike of our responsibilities and the magnitude of our past and of our peril. Let us never lose sight of the fact that the successes of the United Nations, however high their value to mankind — and I would be among the first to laud them — are secondary only, and that all that has been achieved will fall to the ground unless the United Nations has greater success than its predecessor the League of Nations, and succeeds in its one essential function of preserving the peace of the world. Let us I see to it that history does not record this session of the General Assembly as fiddling while Korea burned.
42. There can be little doubt as to what is indeed happening in the world today. Surely it is clear to every thinking man and woman, wherever men and women have free access to the facts, that what mankind is facing today, not for the first time or perhaps the hundredth time in man’s chequered history, is a determined and menacing attack on liberty,, on order and on justice, another attempt to impose upon an agonized world the yoke of servitude which it was confidently hoped man was escaping for all time. There is, of course, nothing new in this, even to us who live today. We defeated and survived one such attempt, gravely menacing in its threat, a quarter of a century ago, and it is but a short five years since another terrifying attack on civilization was beaten back at incalculable cost in blood, in agony and in treasure.
43. The only thing that is surprising is the recrudescence of the same threat — in a different shape, in a different guise, but the same threat — within such a short period. What we are to decide at this session of the General Assembly is nothing less than this: whether this great Organization, in its present form or in such altered form as it may be possible to achieve, can justify the hopes entrusted to it by mankind. That is the question.
44. The United Nations is facing its first real test as an instrument of collective security, and upon how it meets that test depend not only the lives and happiness of men and women throughout the world as far as the mind can reach, but indeed, in very truth, the fate of civilization itself.
45. Can anyone still doubt that there are vast and powerful forces in the world today deterred by no moral considerations, who will not shrink from embarking even on a world war if and when they think it is to their advantage? If there be any lingering, reluctant doubts in the minds of those who perhaps cannot yet convince themselves of the existence of evil, that the world does today face a tremendous raid, an organized and long-planned attack on all that is right, all that is good and helpful for the future, then surely the performance of the Security Council in the month of August must have been decisive proof of evil intention.
46. What is one to say, what can anyone say, of the fantastic allegation by the Soviet Union that it was the South Koreans who committed aggression and the North Koreans, from the very first moment in occupation of South Korean territory, who were the victims? It is preposterous, monstrous, and so palpably far from the truth as to be indicative of nothing but bad faith and painfully reminiscent of the Nazi technique with which we had become so familiar in the 1930’s. The freedom-loving world has given its judgment on this flagrant aggression. This judgment was contained in the resolutions of the Security Council, endorsed as they have been by fifty-three Members of this Organization and by the indignant voices of men and women the free world over.
47. What then, we must ask ourselves — and we must ask ourselves at this meeting — are we to do? What is it that lies within our power to do to uphold and defend this moral judgment of mankind? That leads me to a point upon which I have in the past frequently addressed this Assembly, and to which, in present circumstances, I make no apology at all for returning. There have been vast numbers of good, honest people who have held the view that the peace of this world can be maintained by words alone, that goodwill and good intentions are enough, and that to avoid war and the risk of war it is sufficient if right-thinking men and women behave sensibly and decently, if we all declare our love of peace and our determination to keep it, if whenever disputes arise we immediately agree to meet around a table and discuss matters, if we would but seek agreement. Then, these simple people say, war will not arise.
48. That, of course, is nonsense — childish nonsense and most dangerous nonsense. Just as it takes two to make a quarrel, it takes two to make an agreement. What, I ask, are we to do with people who will not accept any settlement except on terms that mean loss of liberty, if not of life, to all who disagree? And if agreement is interpreted by one party as equivalent to surrender, then who is for agreement? It would be a barren and bitter agreement that abandoned freedom, human rights and human dignity. And who can seek agreement with an antagonist who indicates by every act his contempt for agreement? Could there possibly have been a more consistent, more determined effort to apply reason and to avoid force than in this very case of Korea? Ever since the problem arose there have been patient, continuous, insistent attempts on the one side to find a solution by reasonable discussions, and equally consistent refusal by the other to discuss the matter in any way or on any terms except those laid down by that side. The matter has been before the United Nations, before this General Assembly, many, many times, and on every single occasion the General Assembly has attached major importance to the aspect of conciliation, discussion and adjustment.
49. Time and time again all concerned were urged to come together to discuss and agree upon the best solution for everyone. A United Nations commission, designed for just that purpose, was established by the General Assembly and has constantly and all the time been available in Korea to both sides for discussion and mediation. To those, if any there be, who still hanker after mediation, conciliation, discussion, I say that all these have been offered and urged during all the years that this dispute has existed. They have consistently and contemptuously been refused, and at this point there is no case whatever to be made for conciliation now that open and armed aggression has occurred. Discussion was the last thing that one side wanted. Aggression and oppression were the objectives of these people. And what is the use of talking of reason to people who will not listen to reason but who worship only power?
50. It is worth while to pause here and note that despite the fond and pathetic belief of so many that reason and good intentions are enough in this world, this was not the basis upon which the United Nations was established. Those who believe that words and words alone are adequate to keep the peace were not among the authors of the Charter of this Organization, which is based on the conviction — obviously and demonstrably and inescapably the conviction, if one looks either to the history of the past or the menace of the future — that words are not enough, that if we wish to maintain peace throughout the world we must police and enforce that peace. Indeed, the proposition is so simple that one wonders how any could ever have doubted this regrettable but obvious necessity.
51. Peace and order cannot be preserved by words alone. Peace and order cannot be preserved without force, even in the most civilized communities in the world. Crime and disorder cannot be restrained in New York or in Washington or in London or in Ottawa, or even in Moscow, without force. Although as one grows older, one becomes more and more impervious to surprise, I am constantly astonished that those who so stridently and, in my view, so stupidly renounce the necessity for force in restraining international crime have never adopted or, indeed, suggested the parallel course of renouncing it in municipal or national affairs, in the relations of men with men. In fact, as we all very well know, the very basis of law and order, even in the most civilized communities in the world today, is force. Each good citizen accepts, and gladly accepts, the fact that the rights of every human being are maintained and his duties enforced by the forcible action of the state to which he belongs.
52. Similarly, there can be no permanent peace throughout the world unless the same principles are made to apply to the nations which are members of our international community as have been found essential for the maintenance of peace and order and justice among individual human beings. And these are three: firstly, a means of establishing and amending the law which is to apply; secondly, a judicial process for interpreting and applying that law; and thirdly — and this is the point of my remarks — an effective, automatic and inescapable means of enforcing that law.
53. The first law for international conduct which must be implemented is the law already established outlawing war as an instrument of national policy. You will not attain that international peace for which the hearts of all good citizens yearn, until you have instituted in the international arena an effective means by which lawless force will always be met and defeated by lawful force. It is as simple as that, and the organization contemplated by our Charter was intended to achieve that very purpose. Why then did it fail to do so? Obviously — and I regret once more having to return very briefly to an aspect which I have laboured from this rostrum on many occasions — because of the veto. The plain and simple fact is that while you can have your choice between a one-Power veto, on the one hand, which preserves your sovereignty, or alternatively, on the other hand, an effective system of collective security, you cannot have both. The two are mutually exclusive and contradictory.
54. There never has been nor does there exist today any more enthusiastic supporter of the principles of the United Nations than New Zealand. My Government and I myself, in season and out of season, have expounded those principles; I have affirmed their validity and necessity and urged the devoted support of this Organization on all within reach of my modest voice. But I have never attempted to hide my belief that while there is very much that the United Nations, even with its present limitations, can do to improve the lot of mankind, it cannot, while ham-strung by the veto, hope effectively to carry out the primary object for which it was established: to preserve and, if necessary, enforce the peace of the world. I think that after much soul-searching and second thought there is a very wide and general agreement with that statement of the position, and the recent action of the Security Council calling upon all Members of the United Nations actively and by force to repel aggression in South Korea has been received by right-thinking people almost with a sense of relief, as bringing into the transactions of the United Nations a sense of reality which many felt had been lacking in the past.
55. If there were any validity in the criticism that I and many others have been making as to the stultifying effect of the veto, how then, people are entitled to ask and they are asking, did this come about? The answer is perfectly simple. It came about by accident. The Soviet Union, for a totally extraneous reason, chose to absent itself from the Security Council and continued so to absent itself until that Council had passed its entirely laudable and justified resolution and consequently had brought into play, to the limit and extent that they could be brought into play, the very central provisions of the Charter. The forcible repression of aggression flows indeed from the very heart of our Organization as the very core and centre of the Charter.
56. What do I mean when I make the reservation that the Organization has brought those provisions into play so far as the circumstances allowed? I mean this: that it was intended in San Francisco that the United Nations should have at its instant disposal to meet just such situations as this, just such treacherous attacks as are characteristic of the actions of any aggressor, an armed force belonging to the United Nations, at the disposal of the United Nations, ready and able to meet any aggressor on behalf of the United Nations anywhere, at any time.
57. Then why has such a force not been prepared in the five years of the Organization’s existence? The answer again is: because of the veto, because one of the five permanent members of the Security Council — of course, always the same one — was determined not to permit the principles laid down at San Francisco to be applied. What, in effect, it amounts to is this: that, by a combination of circumstances quite unexpected and quite unlikely to be repeated, the Security Council has by chance been enabled to play its contemplated part as the guardian of world peace — though with inescapable restrictions which add incalculably to the difficulty of its task — and today lawless force is at last being resisted by lawful force. But let us bear this fact in mind — it may become in the highest degree pertinent in the near future: had it not been for the fact that the Soviet Union, for devious and extraneous purposes of its own, had voluntarily absented itself from the Security Council, that Council could have done none of the things that it has done; none of the resolutions on Korea could have been adopted over the Soviet Union veto. The fact that the system is now operating, even to the extent it is, does not prove that the United Nations can act effectively under the Charter as it exists at present. It does prove something, but something quite significantly different: it proves that the Security Council can act if the Soviet Union is absent.
58. This is indeed an imperfect world; in parts it is a wicked world. I am one of those who believe that the problem we have to solve is essentially a moral problem, that if we do not solve this problem upon the moral plane we shall not solve it at all. With every other decent man and woman in this world, I deplore — it is to me a matter of constant heart-searching — the fact that, in our combined effort to resist and defeat the wrong, innocent people are suffering, bleeding, dying. I wish that that were not the price we must pay for; order and decency and justice in this world. But, in the; upward progress of the human race from the mire to the empyrean, it appears to be inevitable that suffering on this earth, so far as our limited understanding enables us to see, should fall, without apparent reason, on the just and the unjust, the innocent and the guilty. And who are we, men of years speaking in a situation of comparative safety, to urge that others should fight in Korea — and wherever else the need may arise — even though the fight is, as undoubtedly it is, for right and justice? I am painfully conscious of the fact that, throughout history, it has been the old people who have urged the young to fight, to suffer, to die. But I have no doubt at all as to the clarity and the inevitability of the line of thought which tells me that it is not only right and proper but vital that the right should be defended and the wrong defeated, even if this involves, as involve it must, hardship, suffering and misery to many. The dilemma is there, and is plain for all to see. Each must choose his course according to his conscience. For myself I have no doubts. I say that it was good that the Security Council, by the accident of the absence of the Soviet Union, was able to do its duty. I congratulate the members of the Security Council on their courage and their determination, on the rapidity with which they acted, and, in particular, I extend to this great Republic, whose guests we are today, my very warm appreciation, and that of my country, for the wise, courageous and instant lead that it gave to the world of freedom.
59. The United States has proved to all who care to hear that it is still possible for a great Power at once and unerringly to choose the path of honour, the path of right — at once to set its feet upon that path with faith and in the confident knowledge that it will be supported by countless millions who hold the same ideals, the same beliefs. And the immediate response of the United Kingdom — indeed, of so many nations of the free world — has proved that there is indeed hope for mankind and for the eternal principles of right and justice. Our special gratitude — and let us not forget it for one moment — is due to those United States combat troops who, in South Korea, have held the ramparts of civilization against overwhelming odds.
60. To me the fact that action has been taken as it has, is the most encouraging thing that has happened in my lifetime. Of course, the road has been and will be hard. Of course, the United Nations was not ready because the Soviet Union, by its veto, saw to it that it could not be ready. Of course, the United States was not ready. Nor were any of the nations of the British Commonwealth or of any other freedom-loving country, because to us aggression is abhorrent and unthinkable, and because we have preferred — with much greater credit to our hearts than to our heads — to devote our resources to increasing amenities for our people rather than to meeting a threat which seemed to us to be so grotesquely evil as to be incredible. We know better now.
61. The aggressor chose — as he always will choose — his time and place. He enjoyed the initial advantage of any aggressor, which is enormous and which, perhaps, grows more so as weapons — the lethal effect of which is global and, apparently, unlimited — become available to the evildoers as well as to the guardians of good. But the step we have taken is a fundamental step. We have now accepted the necessity of armed and collective resistance to aggression, and we have brought to this body that sense of stern reality which it has so often lacked in the past.
62. I do not profess to foresee with any certainty the outcome of this great adventure on behalf of right and law and the decency of man. But I do see with complete clarity that it had to be undertaken if we, were not to make a farce of the Charter, to betray our manhood and to surrender our hope for the future. And I see this also — that having once put our hands to the plough we must inevitably continue right to the end of the furrow, however stony and however intractable the ground. Having once undertaken to vindicate the majesty of the law, to defeat by armed force an armed attack on peace, we must not falter. We must see this thing through to the end.
63. There must be no appeasement of the evildoer, no temporizing with the international criminal, no weakening of our present high resolve by well-meant but dangerous and impracticable proposals to talk things over with those who are flaunting the will of mankind. There is no bridge between good and evil, no middle ground between right and wrong, and it is surely clear that, having named the aggressor — and having rightly named the aggressor — having taken up arms against this gross infringement of international law and order, we would not be justified, morally or logically, to enter into discussions or negotiations of any kind whatsoever with the international criminal — indeed we cannot afford to do so — until he is back whence he came.
64. One realizes the superficial attraction of pleas for conciliation, for discussion, for negotiation, for getting round a table, for sweet reasonableness in every way, but, surely, there comes a time when the usefulness of words and reason is past. Nobody suggests, nobody can suggest, the wisdom of negotiations between the victim of a hold-up and his attacker. Nobody suggests, a round table conference with a burglar, especially when the burglar is caught redhanded in the act. Nobody suggests discussions with a criminal in mid-crime. It would be condoning, indeed encouraging crime, if we. were stupid enough to enter into negotiations with the international aggressor before justice and law have been vindicated by his expulsion from the country he has attacked and invaded.
65. Indeed, as I see it, one certain way of ensuring the inevitability of world conflict would be to show weakness or hesitation at this critical moment in world history. It has been said recently by a member of the United States delegation — and I hope I am quoting him correctly, because I am in full concurrence with what I believe he said — that, if we make ourselves strong enough, quickly enough, we may escape a third world war.
66. Nobody can, and, indeed, I think nobody does deny the dangers of the situation with which we are at present confronted. Nobody can doubt that there is grave peril, either as the direct result of this Korean incident or for more general and fundamental reasons, that we will find ourselves embroiled in a world conflict. It will not be of our seeking. It will be forced upon us. If it comes to us, it will come to us as it came in Korea — as defenders against attack and in no other way.
67. It has been truly said, that, today, the road of peace is the road of courage. War is dreadful; defeat is worse, and slavery is worse. If we waver, if our hearts grow faint at the prospect of what may lie in store for us, I believe we are lost. It may well be that the United Nations has nothing to offer and the world nothing to expect but “blood and toil, tears and sweat”. It may be so, but, a few short years ago, the nations of the British Commonwealth, standing alone against a then triumphant aggressor, faced just that prospect with stern courage and fought their way through. We may, indeed, all be called upon to do the same today. And if we falter now, if we temporize now, if we appease now, peace, in my opinion, is lost and, with it, human dignity and human freedom as far ahead as man can see. One cries with Patrick Henry: “Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery?” Yet, from the affirmative aspect, no honest man can promise success if we do hold fast, if we do fight it out on this line, if it takes all summer or many summers and many winters, too.
68. I do not profess, I cannot profess, to see the outcome of this struggle. It is, and it can be, known only to God. But I will assert with all possible conviction that the risk and the suffering to be expected in resisting evil and aggression by force of arms, grave and heart-rending as they are, are less — demonstrably, infinitely less — than would result from letting things drift. If we do not make this fight, if we do not win this fight, we will all suffer — every one of us — and the suffering will not be confined to this generation, because, as the lights of liberty go out throughout the world, so die all the hopes we cherish for the generations to come. If — and God forbid — we should fail, liberty will disappear from the earth, not for the first time, and the rights and dignities of man will be submerged. But, if we should fail, we are no worse off than if we had not made this noble attempt — and we shall have proved ourselves to be men, and not pawns.
69. But why should we fail? Our cause is just, our resources are immeasurable, our hearts are strong. Normally, we may expect to emerge from this test of man’s ability to protect freedom and human rights as a co-operating group of nations banded together for just that purpose. Let us not throw away the ground which we shall have gained. Let us — for our own safety, for the preservation of liberty and justice in this world — maintain that co-operation, strengthen it, keep it ever ready to meet any further attack. If we do not do this, the progress towards lasting peace that, with God’s help, we shall have made will be lost.
70. This is a time for all Members of the United Nations to recollect that those international rights which every nation in this world claims postulate correlative; international duties; that — put in its simplest form —; we cannot claim, as all peace-loving nations should be entitled to claim, armed assistance from others in resisting attack unless, for our own part, we are each prepared whole-heartedly to assist others in similar cases.
71. My own small country has always been in the forefront of those who acknowledge their international duties. New Zealanders have died all over the world in defence of human rights and human liberties — and my country did not delay a day in announcing itself and its intentions in respect of the aggression upon South Korea. From the very beginning, New Zealand aligned itself with the United States, the United Kingdom and so many other Members of the United Nations in support of the stand that was properly and promptly taken in this matter by the Security Council, and at once two ships of the Royal New Zealand Navy were dispatched to join the United Nations forces operating under General MacArthur. But, like most of the democracies at the end of the second World War, we had thrown away our sword and our shield. And although we quickly decided to send ground troops to fight shoulder to shoulder with the initial forces provided by the United States, the implementation of that decision, in our case and in every other case, as the aggressor knew, must necessarily be a matter of time. It will be our most earnest endeavour to provide those forces with the least possible delay consistent with justice to the men who are being trained to fight and to those alongside whom they will be fighting.
72. When we in New Zealand accepted the Charter of the United Nations — with all its imperfections — we pledged ourselves to collective resistance to armed attack. We have honoured that pledge, as we shall always honour our pledges. We know there are many, very many, Members of the United Nations who will take the same view, and we are confident that their numbers will grow as the situation becomes clearer and the necessities more obvious.
73. With all the agonizing aspects of the struggle in which we are engaged, the doubts and perplexities that confront us, the well grounded apprehensions that worse perhaps is yet to come, it has been of inestimable advantage to all the free countries and all the free peoples of the world that this flagrant attack on South Korea has awakened us — every man and every woman on every street in every city of every free country in the world — to the peril which confronts us and the plots with which we are beset.
74. Gone — now and I hope for all time — is the complacent belief which has benumbed us all in the years that the locust has just eaten, that so long as men will on the whole try to do well, we will be safe from armed aggression. Gone from our time, and until we can establish an effective system of collective security, is the short-sighted and superficial philosophy that because we won the last war there will never be another war, and that we can accordingly dispense with the forces we gathered together at such peril and at such expense in money and in human anguish. Surely we have learned the lesson that we must never again deprive ourselves of the means of defending our people and our way of life until we have in full and effective operation the organization for this purpose which has been the aim of mankind for centuries past.
75. Here and now is the test of the United Nations, the test of the will and the ability of man to manage man’s affairs in such a way that men and women everywhere and their children to come may live their lives with dignity, in happiness, as God meant them to live their lives, free of this constant, ever-present threat from the forces of evil. This is our chance to banish war even if — and the anomaly is inescapable — by war itself. This is our opportunity to achieve man’s age-long dream of a peaceful world. This is the road, the road we are climbing at present. Long and steep and arduous as it is, it is the only road to the goal. Let us hold together and let us hold fast because if we do not hold fast there will be nothing left to hold.