MARTIN SCHRAM: A performance worth reviving
Copyright Scripps Howard News Service
nandotimes.com
(October 17, 2001 8:33 a.m. EDT) - Firm accusations, unyielding warnings and ominous words of war rolled out of Washington and shook the world. The planet seemed to be plunging headlong into a war unlike anything before. Yet many of the world's newspapers and commentators were frankly skeptical of America's evidence and motives.
Until that day at the United Nations.
As television cameras broadcast live from a tense Security Council session, the United States ambassador to the U.N. began to address his adversary in firm, measured tones.
"Well, let me say something to you, Mr. Ambassador, we do have the evidence. We have it, and it is clear and incontrovertible. "
This was the moment of truth of the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. It is a moment that the current makers and mouthpieces of U.S. policy, now struggling against a world where millions are unwilling to believe the worst about terrorism, would do well to rewind and replay. For it provides a still-valuable lesson in how an overwhelming power - the power of proof - can move a world and shape a world of opinion.
They will see U.S. ambassador Adlai Stevenson in the finest moment of his not always glorious career. Stevenson had been twice defeated by overwhelming margins as a Democratic presidential nominee, and yet on this day, just 39 years ago this month, Stevenson, twice-rejected as the nation's leader, had all of America behind him. For, Stevenson faced down the Soviet Union and convinced a world of skeptics of the truth of America's words and justifiable cause of its deeds.
"Let me ask you one simple question," said Stevenson, directly confronting his Soviet counterpart. "Do you, Ambassador Zorin, deny that the U.S.S.R. has placed and is placing medium- and intermediate-range missiles and sites in Cuba? Yes or no? Don't wait for a translation, yes or no?"
Zorin: "I am not in an American courtroom, sir, and therefore I do not wish to answer a question that is put to me in the fashion in which a prosecutor puts questions. In due course, sir, you will have your answer."
Stevenson: "You are in the courtroom of world opinion right now, and you can answer yes or no. You have denied that they exist, and I want to know whether I have understood you correctly."
Zorin: "Continue with your statement. You will have your answer in due course."
Stevenson: "I am prepared to wait for an answer until hell freezes over, if that's your decision. And I am also prepared to present the evidence to this room."
Then Adlai Stevenson laid out America's evidence - for all the world to see. And in the process, he laid bare the actions and motives of the Soviet government - for all the world to see.
He showed top-secret aerial surveillance photos of the Soviet missile sites in Cuba. As Robert F. Kennedy, then attorney general in the administration of his brother, wrote in his book "Thirteen Days," even some of America's traditional allies had been unconvinced of America's claims that Soviet missiles were in Cuba - until that day at the United Nations. "Many newspapers around the world, particularly in Great Britain, were openly skeptical of the U.S. position, Robert Kennedy wrote. But President Kennedy had been convinced of the wisdom of releasing those highly secret intelligence photos, at the urging of White House pres secretary Pierre Salinger and U.S. Information Agency official Don Wilson. "Stevenson used (the photos) ... most skillfully in his dramatic television confrontation with the Russians," Robert Kennedy noted.
Under great duress, the Bush administration has done many things well since terrorists toppled the World Trade Center towers and smashed into the Pentagon. But it has missed a great moment to lay out its proof, for all the world to see. Administration officials say showing the proof would compromise intelligence sources. But sometimes, some sources need to be shared - for the greater good of shaping a world of opinion.
As former House International Relations Committee Chairman Lee Hamilton said in an interview: "I think more evidence can be released than has been. There is no question that in the national security community there's a tendency to lay out as little as possible. This question of evidence will be more important in world opinion as we move along."
Unfortunately, few in America or the world today - indeed, probably few in Congress today - can even name the present, under-used U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. (It's John Negroponte.) But 39 years ago this month, his predecessor played a leading role in history's epic diplomatic drama of war-and-peace, complete with sound bites and visual props - a performance that is worth reviving today. |
