We speak in strange terms: of harnessing the cosmic energy; of making winds and tides work for us; of creating unheard synthetic materials to supplement or even replace our old standard basics; to purify sea water for our drink; of mini ng ocean floors for new fields of wealth and food; of disease preventatives to e xpand life into the hundreds of years; of controlling the weather for a more equ itable distribution of heat and cold, of rain and shine; of space ships to the m oon; of the primary target in war, no longer limited to the armed forces of an e nemy, but instead to include his civil populations; of ultimate conflict between a united human race and the sinister forces of some other plary galaxy; of such dreams and fantasies as to make life the most exciting of all time.
And through all this welter of change and development, your mission remains fixed, determined，inviolable: it is to win our wars.
Everything else in your professional career is but corollary to this vital d edication. All other public purposes, all other public projects, all other publi c needs, great or small, will find others for their aplishment. But you are the ones who are trained to fight. Yours is the profession of arms, the will to win, the sure knowledge that in war there is no substitute for victory; that if you lose, the nation will be destroyed; that the very obsession of your public service must be: Duty, Honor, Country.
Others will debate the controversial issues, national and international, whi ch divide men's minds; but serene, calm, aloof, you stand as the Nation's war?g uardian, as its lifeguard from the raging tides of international conflict, as it s gladiator in the arena of battle. For a century and a half you have defended, guarded, and protected its hallowed traditions of liberty and freedom, of right and justice.
Let civilian voices argue the merits or demerits of our processes of governm ent; whether our strength is being sapped by deficit financing, indulged in too long, by federal paternalism grown too mighty, by