HISTORIC SPEECHES
RONALD REAGAN
The Evil Empire
June 8, 1982
We're approaching the end of a bloody century plagued
by a terrible political invention -- totalitarianism. Optimism
comes less easily today, not because democracy is less
vigorous, but because democracy's enemies have refined
their instruments of repression. Yet optimism is in order
because day by day democracy is proving itself to be a
not at all fragile flower. From Stettin on the Baltic to
Varna on the Black Sea, the regimes planted by totalitarianism
have had more than thirty years to establish their legitimacy.
But none -- not one regime -- has yet been able to risk
free elections. Regimes planted by bayonets do not take
root.
The strength of the Solidarity movement in Poland demonstrates
the truth told in an underground joke in the Soviet Union.
It is that the Soviet Union would remain a one-party nation
even if an opposition party were permitted because everyone
would join the opposition party...
Historians looking back at our time will note the consistent
restraint and peaceful intentions of the West. They will
note that it was the democracies who refused to use the
threat of their nuclear monopoly in the forties and early
fifties for territorial or imperial gain. Had that nuclear
monopoly been in the hands of the Communist world, the
map of Europe--indeed, the world--would look very different
today. And certainly they will note it was not the democracies
that invaded Afghanistan or suppressed Polish Solidarity
or used chemical and toxin warfare in Afghanistan and Southeast
Asia.
If history teaches anything, it teaches self-delusion
in the face of unpleasant facts is folly. We see around
us today the marks of our terrible dilemma--predictions
of doomsday, antinuclear demonstrations, an arms race in
which the West must, for its own protection, be an unwilling
participant. At the same time we see totalitarian forces
in the world who seek subversion and conflict around the
globe to further their barbarous assault on the human spirit.
What, then, is our course? Must civilization perish in
a hail of fiery atoms? Must freedom wither in a quiet,
deadening accommodation with totalitarian evil?
Sir Winston Churchill
refused to accept the inevitability of war or even that
it was imminent. He said, "I do
not believe that Soviet Russia desires war. What they desire
is the fruits of war and the indefinite expansion of their
power and doctrines. But what we have to consider here
today while time remains is the permanent prevention of
war and the establishment of conditions of freedom and
democracy as rapidly as possible in all countries."
Well, this is precisely our mission today: to preserve
freedom as well as peace. It may not be easy to see; but
I believe we live now at a turning point.
In an ironic sense Karl Marx was right. We are witnessing
today a great revolutionary crisis, a crisis where the
demands of the economic order are conflicting directly
with those of the political order. But the crisis is happening
not in the free, non-Marxist West but in the home of Marxism-
Leninism, the Soviet Union. It is the Soviet Union that
runs against the tide of history by denying human freedom
and human dignity to its citizens. It also is in deep economic
difficulty. The rate of growth in the national product
has been steadily declining since the fifties and is less
than half of what it was then.
The dimensions of this failure are astounding: a country
which employs one-fifth of its population in agriculture
is unable to feed its own people. Were it not for the private
sector, the tiny private sector tolerated in Soviet agriculture,
the country might be on the brink of famine. These private
plots occupy a bare 3 percent of the arable land but account
for nearly one-quarter of Soviet farm output and nearly
one-third of meat products and vegetables. Overcentralized,
with little or no incentives, year after year the Soviet
system pours its best resources into the making of instruments
of destruction. The constant shrinkage of economic growth
combined with the growth of military production is putting
a heavy strain on the Soviet people. What we see here is
a political structure that no longer corresponds to its
economic base, a society where productive forced are hampered
by political ones.
The decay of the Soviet experiment should come as no surprise
to us. Wherever the comparisons have been made between
free and closed societies -- West Germany and East Germany,
Austria and Czechoslovakia, Malaysia and Vietnam -- it
is the democratic countries that are prosperous and responsive
to the needs of their people. And one of the simple but
overwhelming facts of our time is this: of all the millions
of refugees we've seen in the modern world, their flight
is always away from, not toward the Communist world. Today
on the NATO line, our military forces face east to prevent
a possible invasion. On the other side of the line, the
Soviet forces also face east to prevent their people from
leaving.
The hard evidence of totalitarian rule has caused in mankind
an uprising of the intellect and will. Whether it is the
growth of the new schools of economics in America or England
or the appearance of the so-called new philosophers in
France, there is one unifying thread running through the
intellectual work of these groups -- rejection of the arbitrary
power of the state, the refusal to subordinate the rights
of the individual to the superstate, the realization that
collectivism stifles all the best human impulses...
Chairman Brezhnev repeatedly has stressed that the competition
of ideas and systems must continue and that this is entirely
consistent with relaxation of tensions and peace.
Well, we ask only that these systems begin by living up
to their own constitutions, abiding by their own laws,
and complying with the international obligations they have
undertaken. We ask only for a process, a direction, a basic
code of decency, not for an instant transformation.
We cannot ignore the fact that even without our encouragement
there has been and will continue to be repeated explosion
against repression and dictatorships. The Soviet Union
itself is not immune to this reality. Any system is inherently
unstable that has no peaceful means to legitimize its leaders.
In such cases, the very repressiveness of the state ultimately
drives people to resist it, if necessary, by force.
While we must be cautious about forcing the pace of change,
we must not hesitate to declare our ultimate objectives
and to take concrete actions to move toward them. We must
be staunch in our conviction that freedom is not the sole
prerogative of a lucky few but the inalienable and universal
right of all human beings. So states the United Nations
Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which, among other
things, guarantees free elections.
The objective I propose is quite simple to state: to foster
the infrastructure of democracy, the system of a free press,
unions, political parties, universities, which allows a
people to choose their own way to develop their own culture,
to reconcile their own differences through peaceful means.
This is not cultural imperialism; it is providing the
means for genuine self-determination and protection for
diversity. Democracy already flourishes in countries with
very different cultures and historical experiences. It
would be cultural condescension, or worse, to say that
any people prefer dictatorship to democracy. Who would
voluntarily choose not to have the right to vote, decide
to purchase government propaganda handouts instead of independent
newspapers, prefer government to worker-controlled unions,
opt for land to be owned by the state instead of those
who till it, want government repression of religious liberty,
a single political party instead of a free choice, a rigid
cultural orthodoxy instead of democratic tolerance and
diversity.
Since 1917 the Soviet Union has given covert political
training and assistance to Marxist-Leninists in many countries.
Of course, it also has promoted the use of violence and
subversion by these same forces. Over the past several
decades, West European and other social democrats, Christian
democrats, and leaders have offered open assistance to
fraternal, political, and social institutions to bring
about peaceful and democratic progress. Appropriately,
for a vigorous new democracy, the Federal Republic of Germany's
political foundations have become a major force in this
effort.
We in America now intend to take additional steps, as
many of our allies have already done, toward realizing
this same goal. The chairmen and other leaders of the national
Republican and Democratic party organizations are initiating
a study with the bipartisan American Political Foundation
to determine how the United States can best contribute
as a nation to the global campaign for democracy now gathering
force. They will have the cooperation of congressional
leaders of both parties, along with representatives of
business, labor, and other major institutions in our society.
I look forward to receiving their recommendations and to
working with these institutions and the Congress in the
common task of strengthening democracy throughout the world.
It is time that we committed ourselves as a nation --
in both the public and private sectors -- to assisting
democratic development...
What I am describing now is a plan and a hope for the
long term -- the march of freedom and democracy which will
leave Marxism-Leninism on the ash heap of history as it
has left other tyrannies which stifle the freedom and muzzle
the self-expression of the people. And that's why we must
continue our efforts to strengthen NATO even as we move
forward with our zero-option initiative in the negotiations
on intermediate-range forces and our proposal for a one-third
reduction in strategic ballistic missile warheads.
Our military strength is a prerequisite to peace, but
let it be clear we maintain this strength in the hope it
will never be used, for the ultimate determinant in the
struggle that's now going on in the world will not be bombs
and rockets but a test of wills and ideas, a trial of spiritual
resolve, the values we hold, the beliefs we cherish, the
ideals to which we are dedicated.
The British people know that, given strong leadership,
time, and a little bit of hope, the forces of good ultimately
rally and triumph over evil. Here among you is the cradle
of self-government, the Mother of Parliaments. Here is
the enduring greatness of the British contribution to mankind,
the great civilized ideas: individual liberty, representative
government, and the rule of law under God.
I've often wondered
about the shyness of some of us in the West about standing
for these ideals that have done so much to ease the plight
of man and the hardships of our imperfect world. This
reluctance to use those vast resources at our command
reminds me of the elderly lady whose home was bombed
in the blitz. As the rescuers moved about, they found
a bottle of brandy she'd stored behind the staircase,
which was all that was left standing. And since she was
barely conscious, one of the workers pulled the cork
to give her a taste of it. She came around immediately
and said, "Here now -- there now, put it back. That's
for emergencies."
Well, the emergency is upon us. Let us be shy no longer.
Let us go to our strength. Let us offer hope. Let us tell
the world that a new age is not only possible but probable.
During the dark days
of the Second World War, when this island was incandescent
with courage, Winston Churchill exclaimed about Britain's
adversaries, "What kind
of people do they think we are?" Well, Britain's adversaries
found out what extraordinary people the British are. But
all the democracies paid a terrible price for allowing
the dictators to underestimate us. We dare not make that
mistake again. So, let us ask ourselves, "What kind
of people do we think we are?" And let us answer, "Free
people, worthy of freedom and determined not only to remain
so but to help others gain their freedom as well."
Sir Winston led his
people to great victory in war and then lost an election
just as the fruits of victory were about to be enjoyed.
But he left office honorably and, as it turned out, temporarily,
knowing that the liberty of his people was more important
than the fate of any single leader. History recalls his
greatness in ways no dictator will ever know. And he
left us a message of hope for the future, as timely now
as when he first uttered it, as opposition leader in
the Commons nearly twenty-seven years ago, when he said, "When we look back on all the perils through
which we have passed and at the mighty foes that we have
laid low and all the dark and deadly designs that we have
frustrated, why should we fear for our future? We have," he
said, "come safely through the worst."
Well, the task I've set forth will long outlive our own
generation. But together, we too have come through the
worst. Let us now begin a major effort to secure the best
-- a crusade for freedom that will engage the faith and
fortitude of the next generation. For the sake of peace
and justice, let us move toward a world in which all people
are at last free to determine their own destiny.
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