Presidents -- United States -- Messages; United States -- Politics and government -- Sources
In Asia and Africa, the economic and social problems are different but no
less urgent. There hundreds of millions of people are in ferment, exploding
into the twentieth century, thrusting toward equality and independence and
improvement in the hard conditions of their lives.
Politically, economically, socially, things cannot and will not stay in
their pre-war mold in Africa and Asia. Change must come--is coming--fast.
Just in the years I have been President, 12 free nations, with more than
600 million people, have become independent: Burma, Indonesia, the
Philippines, Korea, Israel, Libya, India, Pakistan and Ceylon, and the
three Associated States of Indo-China, now members of the French Union.
These names alone are testimony to the sweep of the great force which is
changing the face of half the world.
Working out new relationships among the peoples of the free world would not
be easy in the best of times. Even if there were no Communist drive for
expansion, there would be hard and complex problems of transition from old
social forms, old political arrangements, old economic institutions to the
new ones our century demands--problems of guiding change into constructive
channels, of helping new nations grow strong and stable. But now, with the
Soviet rulers striving to exploit this ferment for their own purposes, the
task has become harder and more urgent--terribly urgent.
In this situation, we see the meaning and the importance of the Point IV
program, through which we can share our store of know-how and of capital to
help these people develop their economies and reshape their societies. As
we help Iranians to raise more grain, Indians to reduce the incidence of
malaria, Liberians to educate their children better, we are at once helping
to answer the desires of the people for advancement, and demonstrating the
superiority of freedom over communism. There will be no quick solution for
any of the difficulties of the new nations of Asia and Africa--but there
may be no solution at all if we do not press forward with full energy to
help these countries grow and flourish in freedom and in cooperation with
the rest of the free world.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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