A Chadds Ford Township Republican fundraiser Monday night carried with it an ominous message. At the May 24 gathering, the guest speaker cautioned the party faithful against treating Democrats as the enemy, especially in the face of a potentially dangerous foreign adversary.

Kenneth Braithwaite — a Chadds Ford resident, former ambassador to Norway in 2017, who served briefly as Navy secretary from May 29, 2020, until the end of the Trump administration — invoked the late President John Kennedy by reminding the Republicans that the country shouldn't be looking for a Republican answer or a Democratic answer to problems. Rather the country should look for the right answer.

"There have been many divisive periods in the history of our great country ... but they have never been as dangerous or as challenging as they are today."

Most ominously, Braithwaite said the country faces the greatest peril since the War of 1812 when the British invaded and burned the White House. That new enemy does have the military strength and political will to "eliminate our way of life," something neither Nazi Germany nor Imperial Japan could have done in WWII.

"We were too strong, too mighty, and at the peak of who we were as a nation," Braithwaite said. He continued by referencing the Cold War and the Soviet Union, saying, "The Soviet Union could have never, ever defeated us in any kind of conflict. They had great first-strike capability, but that was it."

Today, though, we have a different potential adversary in China.

"That adversary has not only the national will but the political system as a communist government, [and] they have the financial and military wherewithal to actually destroy the United States of America," he said. "And not just in a first strike, but in consistent, engaged warfare."

As a former Navy secretary, he said he knew things he couldn't go into, but "what I learned of the People's Republic of China is all of that, and then some."

Braithwaite did not offer any diplomatic solution to a potential conflict with China but said some people anticipate war with China within the next 10 years.

"I pray to God above that that does not happen," he said. "The only way that we as Americans will hold on to what we have is by being vigilant and remembering at the end of the day that we are all Americans, right or left, black or white, male or female."

He went on to criticize the current state of mainstream journalism, saying it's more about spin than objective reporting, that "it is the cause of divisiveness today," and that Trump's handling of the media added to that divisiveness. He also said Republicans need to stop hating Democrats and that Democrats should stop hating Republicans.

"We need, as Abraham Lincoln said, to bind up our nation's wounds…Our job is to remember that, although we believe differently than the Democrats, they are on our team. We may not like their point of view, we may feel differently, but they are not evil. They are not the enemy."

The former Navy pilot and secretary is considering a run for U.S. Senate to replace incumbent Pat Toomey but said later he hadn't made a final decision on that yet. However, during his speech, he said John Lehman — the Navy secretary under President Reagan — sent him a note after reading a news article critical of Braithwaite that Democrats must be afraid that he would seek the senatorial nomination.

He also said that U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine, a Democrat from Virginia and Hillary Clinton's running mate in 2016, told him he'd like Braithwaite to run for senate because the two could work together, even when they disagree.

Again, Braithwaite invoked Lincoln, who said, "No man should have everything that they want; that the only way to progress is through compromise."

"I hope that we can remember that it's not winner take all," Braithwaite told the Republicans, "That when it's our turn to be in the majority, we respect the minority."