p Comrade delegates,

p My dear countrymen and comrades united and guided by the noblest idea in the history of mankind!

p Comrade foreign friends, people close to us in heart and mind!

p It is not an orator addressing you, but a writer who is used to speaking with ordinary people.

p Forgive me my simple language, but try to understand that even a person who has poor command of oral speech begins to talk when life appeals to him in the name of life. . . .

p Our great country, the greatest country in the world—our Motherland which like a mother-eagle has taken 111 nationalities under her mighty wing—has rallied us here so that we should speak up, on behalf of peoples, in wrathful and resolute condemnation of those who want to unleash a new war. There is probably not a person among us gathered here who has not been bereaved by the war, who has no wounds in his heart inflicted by the last war. . . .

p The capitalists and their servants are preparing a new war. They want to sacrifice our children, and ourselves, for the sake 107 of their profits, for the sake of their own animal wellbeing. . . .

p They shall not!

p People who are earning their right to a radiant future with their honest toil, resolutely say: “We want peace!”

p They have said this at the peace congresses.

p Let this be a warning to all those who still hope to build their prosperity on the blood of toiling mankind. They had better give up this hope.

p An honest British or American soldier, a soldier wearing the uniform of any country, will not go to war against his own kind who wish him only one thing—a happy human life.

p Let those who want to unleash a new war remember that the judgment of the people is the harshest judgment of all.

p We look into the future with clear eyes, we have the greatest faith in our future.

p In our country, where there is no distinction between mental and physical work, people mix as equals. In conclusion, I should like to tell you about a conversation I had with one “common man”. . . .

p He was an ordinary tractor driver, one of the multitude. He had fought with honour in the war, ending it in Berlin, he was wounded four times and every time he returned to the ranks as soon as he had recovered. We discussed life in general, spoke of the future, and this is what he said:

p “I’ve broad shoulders, and so has the Soviet Union. We’ll bear up!"...

1949