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For Immediate Release
October 15, 2004

Global Message

From Secretary of State Powell in remarks to the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, 10/13/04

On September 11, 2001, our world changed dramatically in ways that define the principal security challenge of our time.

As President Bush has emphasized from the start, this unprecedented struggle against terrorism has its military as well as its non-military dimensions. We are using all the tools at our disposal to fight this conflict that must be won.

While the United States must protect its borders, it must be done in a way that keeps them open to young people who want to learn here, to those who need our hospitals, and to those who want to enjoy our entertainment facilities. The doors must remain open, but secure, because America is an immigrant nation.

Every day, U.S. officials are working to win the War on Terror while strengthening its international partnerships in law enforcement and intelligence sharing. Each day, the United States is closer to stopping the proliferation and transfer of weapons of mass destruction by working through the President's Proliferation Security Initiative and using skilled diplomacy.

Every day, the United States works with friends and allies, in the Middle East and beyond, to advance reforms that will eliminate the frustration, the injustice, the poverty, the despair that gives rise to ideas of mass destruction.

Every day terrorists have fewer places to run, fewer places in which to hide; and every day terrorists have fewer silent helpers, and more outspoken adversaries, more brave nations and individuals willing to stand up to them, willing to confront the savagery and the hatred and the nihilism that define terrorism.