Jasper Clyatt, Valedictorian of the Class of 2026Good morning, Chairman Kranjac, President Glass, Admiral Becker, faculty, alumni, students, and honored guests of The Institute of World Politics.
When I was first asked to deliver this address, it was a surprise, to be sure, but a welcome one. I am deeply honored to stand before you today. I would like to thank my family and friends for their patience and support over the past few years.
To the faculty and staff at IWP: thank you for building something exceptional—a program that treats national security as a moral vocation, and not just a technical specialty. And to my fellow graduates: congratulations!
One of the great rewards of a Core curriculum is the camaraderie it builds. Our programs vary at the margins, but the Core makes it easy to find common ground with any classmate. We’ve read the same authors, grappled with the same concepts, and endured the same academic trials.
But despite all the similarities, what makes IWP genuinely exciting is that we all arrived here from different places, bringing different questions and ideas. My favorite moment of any course would be when we shared term papers at the end of the semester, when my classmates revealed their unique expertise and the ideas they were exploring with the rest of us.
One of my classmates examined tensions in reunified Germany through the lens of regional soccer leagues and international sports diplomacy; another traced the intelligence roles of women in counterinsurgency; another mapped the psychological principles behind effective propaganda.
Across all of that diversity, the Core puts us on equal footing with a shared intellectual and moral language. We may come from different places and head in different directions, but we always have something in common.
I am fortunate enough to have studied under core curricula during both my graduate and undergraduate education. In college, the library where I would work displayed a large portrait of Dwight Eisenhower in academic robes—before he was President of our country, he was president of my university. Even though the slogan predates me by several decades, I can confidently say that I like Ike—and after reflecting on what I would say to you today, I believe that Ike would have liked us at IWP as well.
In one of my first papers at this school, I wrote about Eisenhower’s role in protecting cultural monuments during the Second World War. In May of 1944, a few weeks before the landing at Normandy, he issued a staff letter that read, in part:
“Shortly we will be fighting our way across the Continent of Europe in battles designed to preserve our civilization. Inevitably, in the path of our advance will be found historical monuments and cultural centers which symbolize to the world all that we are fighting to preserve. It is the responsibility of every commander to protect and respect these symbols whenever possible.”
Eisenhower understood that preserving the moral and cultural foundations of our civilization is not a constraint on effective statecraft — rather, it is effective statecraft.
When we compromise our principles for convenience or tactical gain, we concede something not easily recovered on the battlefield or at the negotiating table. What we must do instead, and what IWP has equipped us to do, is adapt to reality without sacrificing decency; to hold the line between what power can accomplish and what our principles demand.
The audience for our conduct—allies, adversaries, and the next generation of public servants—is always watching to see whether that line holds.
The world we are entering is complex, and the decisions we make will be consequential. The virtue of prudence that we have developed here — realistically driven but morally grounded — is what we will carry forth in our coming endeavors. I look forward to seeing what we all accomplish, and I will watch your careers with great interest.
So, congratulations, Class of 2026; this is where the fun begins.