Remarks at a Luncheon for Supporters of Radio Free Europe.

Mr. Greenewalt, gentlemen:

I want to thank you for coming to the White House today. In the last year I have had the pleasure of welcoming many of you on other occasions here. Some of you have come as valued advisers on matters of general policy. Others have come as representatives of the great American business community. A few of you have even come to help in a political election. But you are all welcome today, without regard to what you may have said or thought or done in the months before November 3. Our business today is the business of freedom, and that is a subject on which Americans are always united.

I have been a supporter of Radio Free Europe since its earliest years. I have watched it grow and become a major link between the world of freedom and the brave peoples of Eastern Europe. Radio Free Europe has helped to keep alive their longing for freedom. In their own languages, in voices of their own countrymen, it tells the truth. It tells what is happening in Europe and America and Asia and Africa. It even tells them what is really happening inside the Communist world.

As President, I am proud that our people, through their contributions to RFE, help to support direct communication with the people of Eastern Europe.

Radio Free Europe is now more significant than ever. History is again on the march in Eastern Europe, and on the march toward increased freedom. These people--and some of their rulers--long for deeper, steadier, and more natural relations with the West. We understand this longing and we intend to respond to it in every way open to us.

We will welcome evidence of genuine willingness on the part of East European governments to cooperate with the United States Government in joint endeavors. We will reject no such overtures out of hand. We will judge them in terms of the true interests of our own people and the people of these countries. We wish to build new bridges to Eastern Europe--bridges of ideas, education, culture, trade, technical cooperation, and mutual understanding for world peace and prosperity. In this process there is no greater instrument than truth. And truth is the daily business of Radio Free Europe.

When the peoples of Eastern Europe are again able to enjoy radio broadcasting from their own capitals which tells them as much as Radio Free Europe does, then Radio Free Europe will have finished its job. Until then, RFE has work ahead of it, day in day out, year in year out.

I urge you all to continue to support Radio Free Europe vigorously. I ask you to tell your friends and associates, your neighbors and colleagues how much I care about Radio Free Europe, how proud I am of the strong backing given to it by the American people; above all, how vital I believe it is that this strong voice of truth and freedom have the means to keep up its good work on behalf of the people of Eastern Europe.

So I thank you again for coming, and now I would like to turn this meeting over to a man who has been doing a magnificent job of leadership in this great work, Mr. Crawford Greenewalt.