As part of our Bicentennial observance, TIME asked leaders of nations around the world to address the American people through the pages of TIME on how they view the U.S. and what they hope—and expect—from the nation in the years ahead. This message from President Anwar Sadat of Egypt is the tenth in the series.
Generations of modern Egyptians [as well as others from] all over the Arab world have looked to America with interest and hope. There, in your new world, brave men with vision and faith have toiled to carve out of the wilderness a new civilization that fulfills the needs of man in freedom and the pursuit of happiness, away from the atmosphere of bigotry and domination that plagued Europe in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries and obstructed its human experience. Your experiment of building what is now the oldest federal system where human beings and states are equal before the law with no discrimination on the basis of class, national origin, religion and color represents a light that can illuminate the human march toward a better world.
We in Egypt are the oldest "nation state" in history. As such, we enjoy the benefits of the deep roots of values and beliefs that kept us through the difficult ups and downs of history. We emerged into the modern world with a deep sense of identity and with an accumulation of human beliefs and experiences that are helping us to face the process of rapid modernization. We have to achieve in days what you achieved in years, because many centuries have passed while we were suffering from retardation, stagnation and foreign domination.
Through the exercise of power and the pursuit of self-interest, a gap has developed between the United States and nations of the Third World. What is needed is to bring about a dialogue between us and you to bridge this gap in a peaceful and creative way and fulfill on a world scale some of your achievements in America. But the process of give-and-take between the Third World and the more advanced world is not a static process. The dynamic interchange should enrich us both so that we can produce the kind of world system that can achieve peace, stability and the unhindered pursuit of happiness for all, while preserving individual identity in a community of free people the world over.