The United States, as the world knows, will never start a war. We do not want a war. We do not now expect a war. This generation of Americans has already had enough - more than enough - of war and hate and oppression. We shall be prepared if others wish it. We shall be alert to try to stop it. But we shall also do our part to build a world of peace where the weak are safe and the strong are just. We are not helpless before that task or hopeless of its success. Confident and unafraid, we labor on - not toward a strategy of annihilation but toward a strategy of peace.
John F. KennedyThere will always be dissident voices heard in the land, expressing opposition without alternatives, finding fault but never favor, perceiving gloom on every side and seeking influence without responsibility.
John F. KennedyThe Kennedy Administration's public pronouncements on the matter suggested that the presence of Soviet nuclear missiles in Castro's Cuba would represent an unacceptable strategic threat to the United States. . . . This urgent transformation of Cuba into an important strategic base - by the presence of these large, long-range, and clearly offensive weapons of sudden mass-destruction - constitutes an explicit threat to the peace and security of all the Americas. . . .
John F. KennedyDont teach my boy poetry, an English mother recently wrote the Provost of Harrow. Dont teach my boy poetry; he is going to stand for Parliament. Well, perhaps she was rightbut if more politicians knew poetry, and more poets knew politics, I am convinced the world would be a little better place to live on this Commencement Day of 1956.
John F. Kennedy