Washington, December 1, 1963.
Dear Mr. Chairman President,
I would like to thank you for sending Mr. Mikoyan as your
representative to my husband’s funeral. He looked so upset when he came through the line, and I was
very moved.
I tried to give him a message for you that day—but as it was
such a terrible day for me, I do not know if my words came out as I meant them
to.
So now, in one of the last nights I will spend in the White
House, in one of the last letters I will write on this paper at the White
House, I would like to write you my message.
I send it only because I know how much my husband cared about
peace, and how the relation between you and him was central to this care in his
mind. He used to quote your words in some of his speeches-”In the next war the
survivors will envy the dead.”
You and he were adversaries, but you were allied in a
determination that the world should not be blown up. You respected each other
and could deal with each other. I know that President Johnson will make every
effort to establish the same relationship with you.
The danger which troubled my husband was that war might be
started not so much by the big men as by the little ones.
While big men know the needs for self-control and
restraint—little men are sometimes moved more by fear and pride. If only in the
future the big men can continue to make the little ones sit down and talk,
before they start to fight.
I send this letter because I know so deeply of the importance
of the relationship which existed between you and my husband, and also because
of your kindness, and that of Mrs. Khrushcheva in Vienna. I know that President
Johnson will continue the policy in which my husband so deeply believed—a
policy of control and restraint—and he will need your help.
I read that she had tears in her eyes when she left the
American Embassy in Moscow, after signing the book of mourning. Please thank
her for that.
Sincerely,
Jacqueline Kennedy
Jacqueline Kennedy
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