Lass' sie nach Berlin kommen. Let them come to Berlin.

Maggie reminds that today is the 45th anniversary of President Kennedy visiting Berlin, Germany, two years after the Berlin Wall was begun. 

In his speech, June 26, 1963, Kennedy said, to all those who did not understand the evil of Communism, let them come to Berlin. 

There are many people in the world who really don't understand, or say they don't, what is the great issue between the free world and the Communist world. Let them come to Berlin. There are some who say that communism is the wave of the future. Let them come to Berlin. And there are some who say in Europe and elsewhere we can work with the Communists. Let them come to Berlin. And there are even a few who say that it is true that communism is an evil system, but it permits us to make economic progress. Lass' sie nach Berlin kommen. Let them come to Berlin.

Freedom has many difficulties and democracy is not perfect, but we have never had to put a wall up to keep our people in, to prevent them from leaving us. I want to say, on behalf of my countrymen, who live many miles away on the other side of the Atlantic, who are far distant from you, that they take the greatest pride that they have been able to share with you, even from a distance, the story of the last 18 years. I know of no town, no city, that has been besieged for 18 years that still lives with the vitality and the force, and the hope and the determination of the city of West Berlin.

By the same token, people keep asking why we just can't get along with countries like Iran or accept the existence of extremist Wahabi Islam.   For them, I wish I had the Arab translation for "Let them come to Ramadi" or "Let them come to Basrah."

Most of the people who say such things would never dane to live under such conditions, but are perfectly happy to assign other people to that hell.  Often under some bizarre notion that people must like and support that way of life to live that way now.  Or, that we should allow, without a quibble, for things to be sorted out by themselves, even if it means whole nations are enslaved and mass murder committed.

Freedom is indivisible, and when one man is enslaved, all are not free. When all are free, then we can look forward to that day when this city will be joined as one and this country and this great Continent of Europe in a peaceful and hopeful globe. When that day finally comes, as it will, the people of West Berlin can take sober satisfaction in the fact that they were in the front lines for almost two decades.

All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin, and, therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words "Ich bin ein Berliner."

 

Someday, that is what we will say to Iraqis and Afghanis.  They are defended islands of freedom in a mad, mad world.  They are on the front lines, surrounded all around by those who would prefer Iraqi and Afghani democracy die before it was born. 

Yes.  I would the translation for, "I am a Baghdadi."