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Ideas


HOW TO SAVE AMERICA

My parents instilled in me the sense that the world contains many evil
people—but also good people.

By Ivo Daalder

Alfred S. Campbell / Library of Congress
September 6, 2024
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Subscribe to Listen-1.0x+
0:0012:00


Produced by ElevenLabs and News Over Audio (NOA) using AI narration.

I am an American by choice. I left the Netherlands for the United States to
finish my graduate studies in 1984, met the love of my life, and became an
American citizen. America has been good to me. I advised presidential
candidates, served on the National Security Council under Bill Clinton, and was
the U.S. ambassador to NATO under Barack Obama.

But I didn’t choose to become an American just because of the opportunities it
provided. The reason was more personal.

Enes Kanter Freedom: Why I became an American




My parents grew up during the Second World War. My mother escaped the Holocaust
in 1942 after a harrowing six-month journey from Holland, through Belgium and
France, to get to neutral Switzerland. Much of her family was not so lucky. My
father, who lived in occupied northern Holland, suffered through the Hunger
Winter of 1944–45, during which more Dutch civilians died of starvation than
Dutch soldiers died in the entire war.






ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Ivo H. Daalder was U.S. ambassador to NATO from 2009-2013. He is the co-author
of The Empty Throne: America’s Abdication of Global Leadership. He was born and
raised in the Netherlands and immigrated to the United States in 1988.

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