Charles Lindberg
Our survival, the future of our civilization, possibly the existence of mankind, depend on American leadership—upon the wisdom of our policies and action. On the one hand, we know that peace has never existed for long where some great power has not enforced it by military strength. On the other, we have seen that military strength is like a flame which consumes the very stuff from which it springs. Great military peoples have conquered their known world time and time again through the centuries, only to die out in the inevitable ashes of their fire. Well over two thousand years ago, the Chinese philosopher, Lao Tzu, concluded that:
“Weapons often turn upon the wielder, An army’s harvest is a waste of thorns.”
We may have to resort to arms in the future, as we have in the past. We may have to use them to prevent atomic war from being launched against us. But let us have the wisdom to realize that the use of force is a sign of weakness on a higher plane, and that a policy based primarily on recourse to arms will sooner or later fail.
Excerpted from Of Flight and Life, 1948
Thanks to Dick Eastman of Yakima, Washington for the reference.