Remarks Upon Arrival at Bagram Airport, Kabul

Your Majesty, Your Royal Highnesses, Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen:

It is with the greatest pleasure that I address you here this morning in Afghanistan. I want first to convey the warm and friendly greetings of the American people to Afghanistan and its people. Ever since His Royal Highness Prince Daud visited us in the United States a year ago last June, I have cherished the hope that I could return his call. It is a sign of the age in which we live that I am able to travel the many miles involved in this journey in the short space of time available to me.

It is a reminder of the fact that all of us live very close together in the 20th century. True friendship and mutual respect for nations has become not only desirable, it is an absolute necessity. My one regret is that my visit here must be so brief. All my life I have heard and read about this great country, with these magnificent mountains, already snow-capped as I see, its austere beauty, its brave and sturdy people, and its indomitable spirit of independence.

It is a great privilege for me now to be in your country to see a little of it for myself, and to meet more of your people, even though for so short a time.

I thank you, for this welcome.