by Allen Drury
No Careless Inch. We should not be belligerent—we should simply be firm. We should be willing to negotiate with the communists any time, any place, on any subject—but we should not be the only ones to grant the concessions and make the retreats. We should insist, without the slightest yielding, on every single right that is ours. We should never seek agreement just for the sake of having an agreement. We should agree only if by agreeing we strengthen the free world and advance the cause of freedom. And we should never, under any circumstances, give them the careless inch which with them always becomes the irrecoverable mile.
We don’t have to talk tough. We just have to be tough. Every single time we give a hint of it, the communists switch course and try some other tack; the last thing they want is an all-out frontal showdown. That is why it seems so fantastic that we should so consistently argue ourselves out of the unflinching firmness which may well be our only salvation.
It is true that firmness carries with it the possibility of great risks. But weakness carries with it the certainty of national suicide. Our opponents are not playing Let’s Pretend. They are playing for keeps. It is time we began to play in the same spirit.
Let us take heart therefore. The passage in long and dark, but at its end the light gleams out. It awaits the brave. So let us be.
Let us achieve, finally, in all the areas of conflict where history demands of us that we show our true colors, that just and honorable peace for which our hearts, in common with those of all mankind, cry out.
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About the Author
Allen Drury is a master of political fiction, #1 New York Times bestseller and Pulitzer Prize winner, best known for the landmark novel Advise and Consent. A 1939 graduate of Stanford University, Allen Drury wrote for and became editor of two local California newspapers. While visiting Washington, DC, in 1943 he was hired by the United Press (UPI) and covered the Senate during the latter half of World War II. After the war he wrote for other prominent publications before joining the New York Times’ Washington Bureau, where he worked through most of the 1950s. After the success of Advise and Consent, he left journalism to write full time. He published twenty novels and five works of non-fiction, many of them best sellers. WordFire Press will be reissuing the majority of his works.
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