Remarks Upon Arrival at Offutt Air Force Base in Omaha

[The President was accompanied by Manlio Brosio, Secretary General of NATO]

Secretary General Brosio, Governor Morrison, General Power, my friends of Nebraska and of Offutt Air Force Base:

The Secretary General and I are delighted to be here in Nebraska, and we particularly thank you for this wonderful weather and for this warm welcome.

We came here today in the work of the great alliance for peace which is NATO. The Secretary General has been an old friend of our country and he is a very distinguished servant of Iris own country--Italy.

Today he comes to us as the civilian spokesman for our alliance as a whole, and it is altogether fitting that we should come together here in Nebraska.

Mr. Secretary General, you are a son of Italy and your headquarters are now in Paris. More than 150 years ago another son of Italy, with headquarters in Paris, sold this part of the world to the United States of America.

Nebraska has come a long way since Napoleon and Jefferson made that trade. You are now in the center of the part of America which grows food for peace and food for free men. The history of the great State of Nebraska is a history of hard work, a history of steady growth by liberty-loving men that came here from every part of Europe, and men of Nebraska have gone back to Europe more than once within our lifetime for this same cause of liberty.

As we meet here today, Nebraska is the headquarters of the military strength of freedom, and that is what you and I have come to see together. I have, of course, been here before, and I am confident of what we shall find. So let me say, General, simply, as we begin our visit, that this enormous strength has only one purpose, and that purpose is to keep the peace for free men everywhere in the world.

Thank you.