In recent months a number of nations have east out those who would subject them to the ambitions of mainland China.

History is on the side of freedom and is on the side of societies shaped from the genius of each people.  History does not favor a single system or belief—­unless force is used to make it so.

That is why it has been necessary for us to defend this basic principle of our policy, to defend it in Berlin, in Korea, in Cuba—­and tonight in Vietnam.

For tonight, as so many nights before, young Americans struggle and young Americans die in a distant land.

Tonight, as so many nights before, the American Nation is asked to sacrifice the blood of its children and the fruits of its labor for the love of its freedom.

How many times—­in my lifetime and in yours—­have the American people gathered, as they do now, to hear their President tell them of conflict and tell them of danger?

Each time they have answered.  They have answered with all the effort that the security and the freedom of this Nation required.

And they do again tonight in Vietnam.  Not too many years ago Vietnam was a peaceful, if troubled, land.  In the North was an independent Communist government.  In the South a people struggled to build a nation, with the friendly help of the United States.

There were some in South Vietnam who wished to force Communist rule on their own people.  But their progress was slight.  Their hope of success was dim.  Then, little more than 6 years ago, North Vietnam decided on conquest.  And from that day to this, soldiers and supplies have moved from North to South in a swelling stream that is swallowing the remnants of revolution in aggression.

As the assault mounted, our choice gradually became clear.  We could leave, abandoning South Vietnam to its attackers and to certain conquest, or we could stay and fight beside the people of South Vietnam.  We stayed.

And we will stay until aggression has stopped.

We will stay because a just nation cannot leave to the cruelties of its enemies a people who have staked their lives and independence on America’s solemn pledge—­a pledge which has grown through the commitments of three American Presidents.

We will stay because in Asia and around the world are countries whose independence rests, in large measure, on confidence in America’s word and in America’s protection.  To yield to force in Vietnam would weaken that confidence, would undermine the independence of many lands, and would whet the appetite of aggression.  We would have to fight in one land, and then we would have to fight in another—­or abandon much of Asia to the domination of Communists.

And we do not intend to abandon Asia to conquest.

Last year the nature of the war in Vietnam changed again.  Swiftly increasing numbers of armed men from the North crossed the borders to join forces that were already in the South.  Attack and terror increased, spurred and encouraged by the belief that the United States lacked the will to continue and that their victory was near.