The above headline is the primary message of the article which U.S. nuclear arms-control specialist Matthew Bunn published June 10 in the National Interest. On the 60th anniversary of its delivery, “Americans ought to remember President John F. Kennedy’s `A Strategy of Peace’ speech and the positive diplomatic efforts it unleashed,” Bunn insisted.
His contrast to today’s “strategic defeat of Russia” policy is clear: “Sixty years ago, in the aftermath of the Cuban Missile Crisis, President John F. Kennedy gave probably the greatest speech on nuclear arms ever given by an American President. Speaking only months after the crisis, Kennedy could have lashed out at the Soviet Union’s reckless behavior in putting missiles in Cuba. Or he could have taken a triumphal tone…. Instead … Kennedy made the case that the horrors of a potential nuclear holocaust made it urgent to find a path to peace and that doing so required both sides of the Cold War to change....”
