So, too, with Hanoi. Then came the buildup in Vietnam and I watched the program broken and eviscerated as if it were some idle political plaything of a society gone mad on war, and I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube. He who lives with untruth lives in spiritual slavery. Part of our ongoing Part of our ongoing commitment might well express itself in an offer to grant asylum to any Vietnamese who fears for his life under a new regime which included the Liberation Front. King, Statement on voter registration in Alabama, 9 March 1965, MLKJP-GAMK. Our only hope today lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go out into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal hostility to poverty, racism, and militarism. Or will there be another message of longing, of hope, of solidarity with their yearnings, of commitment to their cause, whatever the cost? A Speech That Took a Stand But arguably "Beyond Vietnam" was the most famous, and widely denounced, since it came before the Tet Offensive and the massacre at My Lai which turned public opinion in the U.S. broadly against the war. King delivered a speech entitled " Beyond Vietnam ," pointing out that the war effort was "taking the black young men who had been crippled by our society and sending them eight thousand miles away to guarantee liberties in Southeast Asia which they had not found in southwest Georgia and East Harlem" (King, " Beyond Vietnam ," 143). North Vietnam's war profoundly divided American citizens, seriously damaged American credibility around the world, and lent moral support to many radical movements in Africa and Latin America. All Rights Reserved. Equally unclear is why Vietnam decided to begin accepting deportees who arrived in the United States prior to 1995. I speak of the for the poor of America who are paying the double price of smashed hopes at home, and death and corruption in Vietnam. xcbd`g`b``8 "Y& D2 IF>E0y6DrLb`] R3XM-c |)f&!ME Dr. King choose to speak out against the war in Vietnam? What do they think as we test out our latest weapons on them, just as the Germans tested out new medicine and new tortures in the concentration camps of Europe? History is cluttered with the wreckage of nations and individuals that pursued this self-defeating path of hate. 825 Eighth Avenue, New York, NY 10019, WNET is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. Martin Luther King Beyond Vietnam. In the strife of truth and Falsehood, for the good or evil side; It was sending their sons and their brothers and their husbands to fight and to die in extraordinarily high proportions relative to the rest of the population. Tax ID: 26-2810489. While they both may have justifiable reasons to be suspicious of the good faith of the United States, life and history give eloquent testimony to the fact that conflicts are never . We were sending young Black men 8,000 miles away to die for freedoms they don't have at home. These, too, are our brothers. Some great cause, Gods new Messiah offering each the bloom or blight, A true revolution of values will lay hands on the world order and say of war: This way of settling differences is not just. This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nations homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into veins of people normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice and love.. See transcript of full speech, below. I come to this platform tonight to make a passionate plea to my beloved nation. Can I threaten them with death or must I not share with them my life? I speak as a child of God and brother to the suffering poor of Vietnam. Our government felt then that the Vietnamese people were not ready for independence, and we again fell victim to the deadly Western arrogance that has poisoned the international atmosphere for so long. How do they judge us when our officials know that their membership is less than twenty-five percent communist, and yet insist on giving them the blanket name? "Beyond Vietnam", Silence is Betrayal: Martin Luther King's Historic 1967 Speech Introduction by Michel Chossudovsky. Published January 12, 2023. If we will make the right choice, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our world into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. The church maintains an active social justice mission today. In a version of theTransformed Nonconformistsermon given in January 1966 at Ebenezer Baptist Church, King voiced his own opposition to the Vietnam War, describing American aggression as a violation of the 1954 Geneva Accord that promised self-determination. This Hindu-Muslim-Christian-Jewish-Buddhist belief about ultimate ultimate reality is beautifully summed up in the first epistle of Saint John: Let us love one another, for love is God. A genuine revolution of values means in the final analysis that our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than sectional. On 4 April, accompanied by Amherst College Professor Henry Commager, Union Theological Seminary President John Bennett, and Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, at an event sponsored by Clergy and Laymen Concerned about Vietnam, King spoke to over 3,000 at New Yorks Riverside Church. On March 29, 1973, the last U.S. military unit left Vietnam. In addition to Martin Luther King, Jr., the church has hosted many prominent speakers, including Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the German theologian who was executed in 1945 at a German concentration camp; Cesar Chavez, the Mexican-American civil rights activist who co-founded the National Farm Workers Association; and Nelson Mandela, anti-apartheid revolutionary, politician and former president of South Africa. King followed with an historical sketch outlining Vietnams devastation at the hands ofdeadly Western arrogance,noting,we are on the side of the wealthy, and the secure, while we create a hell for the poor(King,Beyond Vietnam,146; 153). Could we blame them for such thoughts? Now there is little left to build on, save bitterness. Follow along with the transcript, below. Please contact Intellectual Properties Management (IPM), the exclusive licensor of the Estate of Martin Luther King, Jr., Inc. atlicensing@i-p-m.comor 404 526-8968. These are the times for real choices and not false ones. #7 Infrastructure Development. This is a case of getting out of a certain frame of mind, of a way of thinking about ourselves and about the world.. It was sending their sons and their brothers and their husbands to fight and to die in extraordinarily high proportions relative to the rest of the population. << /Linearized 1 /L 585080 /H [ 1225 310 ] /O 55 /E 123247 /N 10 /T 584505 >> #1 Strong Economic Growth Rates. King, Transformed Nonconformist, Sermon Delivered at Ebenezer Baptist Church, 16 January 1966, CSKC. It is curious that the Americans, who calculate so carefully on the possibilities of military victory, do not realize that in the process they are incurring deep psychological and political defeat. %PDF-1.5 These are revolutionary times. In a way we were agreeing with Langston Hughes, that black bard of Harlem, who had written earlier: O, yes, I think of them, too, because it is clear to me that there will be no meaningful solution there until some attempt is made to know them and hear their broken cries. During the past ten years, we have seen emerge a pattern of suppression which has now justified the presence of U.S. military advisors in Venezuela. The most serious trouble in recent decades has flared between Vietnam and China, and there have also been stand-offs between the Philippines and China. The peasants watched and cringed as Diem ruthlessly rooted out all opposition, supported their extortionist landlords, and refused even to discuss reunification with the North. Therefore, communism is a judgment against our failure to make democracy real and follow through on the revolutions that we initiated. Every nation must now develop an overriding loyalty to mankind as a whole in order to preserve the best in their individual societies. Christina Knight is Managing Editor of Institutional Marketing at The WNET Group. I say we must enter that struggle, but I wish to go on now to say something even more disturbing. stream We were taking the black young men who had been crippled by our society and sending them eight thousand miles away to guarantee liberties in Southeast Asia which they had not found in southwest Georgia and East Harlem. P. 206-215. America, the richest and most powerful nation in the world, can well lead the way in this revolution of values. Since I am a preacher by calling, I suppose it is not surprising that I have seven major reasons for bringing Vietnam into the field of my moral vision. To change course, King suggested a five point outline for stopping the war, which included a call for a unilateral ceasefire. So it is that those of us who are yet determined that America will be are are led down the path of protest and dissent, working for the health of our land. 3. Three: Take immediate steps to prevent other battlegrounds in Southeast Asia by curtailing our military buildup in Thailand and our interference in Laos. Beyond the calling of race or nation or creed is this vocation of sonship and brotherhood, and because I believe that the Father is deeply concerned especially for his suffering and helpless and outcast children, I come tonight to speak for them. About the Sermon "Beyond Vietnam: A Time To Break Silence" The "Beyond Vietnam" sermon was drafted by historian and activist Vincent Gordon Harding. This February, the Humanities curriculum for Grade 7 is focused on the Vietnam War. Before long they must know that their government has sent them into a struggle among Vietnamese, and the more sophisticated surely realize that we are on the side of the wealthy, and the secure, while we create a hell for the poor. But they ask and rightly so what about Vietnam? How can they trust us when now we charge them with violence after the murderous reign of Diem and charge them with violence while we pour every new weapon of death into their land? In Dr. Martin Luther King's speech "Beyond VietnamA Time to Break Silence" (1967), Dr. King asserts that the war in Vietnam is totally immoral and has far reaching negative implications not only for Vietnam, but for The United States and the rest of the World as well. In 1957, a sensitive American official overseas said that it seemed to him that our nation was on the wrong side of a world revolution. We must not engage in a negative anticommunism, but rather in a positive thrust for democracy, realizing that our greatest defense against communism is to take offensive action in behalf of justice. Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence " Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence ", also referred as the Riverside Church speech, [1] is an anti-Vietnam War and pro- social justice speech delivered by Martin Luther King Jr. on April 4, 1967, exactly one year before he was assassinated. They ask how we can speak of free elections when the Saigon press is censored and controlled by the military junta. 3. stop the creation of battlefield in Laos and Thailand. King, a gifted speaker who normally wouldnt read from text, did read out Beyond Vietnam because he planned to submit it to publications and did not want to be misquoted. In April 1967, Martin Luther King Jr. delivered an eloquent and stirring denunciation of the Vietnam war and US militarism. Now there is something seductively tempting about stopping there and sending us all off on what in some circles has become a popular crusade against the war in Vietnam. Omar Khayyam is right: The moving finger writes, and having writ moves on.. And history is cluttered with the wreckage of nations and individuals that pursued this self-defeating path of hate. Senator Barry Goldwater (AZ), the Republican Party presidential nominee in 1964, said the speech could border a bit on treason., Civil Rights activist and U.S. Representative John Lewis (GA), who was among the 3,800 in the audience when King gave the speech, told the New Yorker Magazine in 2017 that the speech was a speech for all humanityfor the world community. If we do not stop our war against the people of Vietnam immediately, the world will be left with no other alternative than to see this as some horrible, clumsy, and deadly game we have decided to play. For those who ask the question, Arent you a civil rights leader? and thereby mean to exclude me from the movement for peace, I have this further answer. I need not pause to say how very delighted I am to be here tonight, and how very delighted I am to see you expressing your concern about the issues that will be discussed tonight by turning out in such large numbers. The choice is ours, and though we might prefer it otherwise, we must choose in this crucial moment of human history. What do they think of our condoning the violence which led to their own taking up of arms? Good or bad, the US was afraid that communism would spread to South Vietnam and then the rest of Asia. We must speak with all the humility that is appropriate to our limited vision, but we must speak.
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