I am not here to justify the past, gloss over the problems of the present, or propose easy solutions for the future.

I am here to state what I believe to be right and what I believe to be wrong; and to propose action for correcting what I think wrong!  I.

There are two tasks confronting us that so far outweigh all other that I shall devote this year’s message entirely to them.  The first is to ensure our safety through strength.

As to our strength, I have repeatedly voiced this conviction:  We now have a broadly based and efficient defensive strength, including a great deterrent power, which is, for the present, our main guarantee against war; but, unless we act wisely and promptly, we could lose that capacity to deter attack or defend ourselves.

My profoundest conviction is that the American people will say, as one man:  No matter what the exertions or sacrifices, we shall maintain that necessary strength!

But we could make no more tragic mistake than merely to concentrate on military strength.

For if we did only this, the future would hold nothing for the world but an Age of Terror.

And so our second task is to do the constructive work of building a genuine peace.  We must never become so preoccupied with our desire for military strength that we neglect those areas of economic development, trade, diplomacy, education, ideas and principles where the foundations of real peace must be laid.  II.

The threat to our safety, and to the hope of a peaceful world, can be simply stated.  It is communist imperialism.

This threat is not something imagined by critics of the Soviets.  Soviet spokesmen, from the beginning, have publicly and frequently declared their aim to expand their power, one way or another, throughout the world.

The threat has become increasingly serious as this expansionist aim has been reinforced by an advancing industrial, military and scientific establishment.

But what makes the Soviet threat unique in history is its all—­inclusiveness.  Every human activity is pressed into service as a weapon of expansion.  Trade, economic development, military power, arts, science, education, the whole world of ideas—­all are harnessed to this same chariot of expansion.

The Soviets are, in short, waging total cold war.

The only answer to a regime that wages total cold war is to wage total peace.

This means bringing to bear every asset of our personal and national lives upon the task of building the conditions in which security and peace can grow.  III.

Among our assets, let us first briefly glance at our military power.

Military power serves the cause of security by making prohibitive the cost of any aggressive attack.

It serves the cause of peace by holding up a shield behind which the patient constructive work of peace can go on.

But it can serve neither cause if we make either of two mistakes.  The one would be to overestimate our strength, and thus neglect crucially important actions in the period just ahead.  The other would be to underestimate our strength.  Thereby we might be tempted to become irresolute in our foreign relations, to dishearten our friends, and to lose our national poise and perspective in approaching the complex problems ahead.