Townsend Hoops Quotes

If old American alliance commitments don't count for as much, countries will, in some cases, then say, 'Well, we've got to militarize in certain ways and act more independently.'

For the Kremlin, it is more feasible to preserve its great-power status in cooperation with the United States than in confrontation.

An economic version of mutual deterrence is preserving the uneasy status quo between China and Japan.

If Russia and the United States approach each other in starkly adversarial terms, the conflict will badly warp the foreign policy of both countries ...

And most worryingly, it wouldn't surprise me if Putin ends up starting a major military conflict with the West at some point in the future to save his own skin as head of state in Russia.

Many Europeans are concerned that stronger sanctions are a slippery slope toward war unless the U.S. is at the table.

World War I broke out largely because of an arms race, and World War II because of the lack of an arms race.

In almost every country there are elements of opinion which would welcome such a conclusion because they wish to return to the politics of the balance of power, unrestricted and unregulated armaments, international anarchy, and preparation for war.

Nobody should have any illusion about the possibility of gaining military superiority over Russia. We will never allow this to happen.

We must abandon the unworkable notion that it is morally reprehensible for some countries to pursue weapons of mass destruction, yet morally acceptable for others to rely on them for security - and indeed to continue to refine their capacities and postulate plans for their use.

The only thing that kept the Cold War cold was the mutual deterrence afforded by nuclear weapons.

Competition in armament, both land and naval, is not only a terrible burden upon the people, but I believe it to be one of the greatest menaces to the peace of the world.

It is the ultimate end of absurdity for the arms race to go on.

It is a mistake to isolate arms control from other areas of policy.... There is a danger that arms control will be a safety valve for an otherwise overly aggressive foreign policy.

A great power that uses force far less than vital interests, and that does so frequently or with a short fuse, risks mobilizing other states to join ranks to balance against it.

Most people are disturbed by the shift from deterrence to preemption but the fact is that in international relations, deterrence has a poor track record

It has become increasingly clear that Pakistan’s chief aim in aligning with the West was to gain support against India

Because the United States now leads the world in arms deliveries by such a wide margin, Washington has little credibility when it chides other governments for transferring weapons to U. S. enemies.

If the Cold War is really over, and the West really won, then continuing implicit deterrence does less to protest against a negligible threat from Russia than to feed suspicions that aggravate political friction. In contrast to during the Cold War, it is now hard to make the case that Russia is more a threat to NATO than the reverse.

Security can no longer be attained by arming ourselves against a potential enemy. Rather, security is attainable only with his cooperation.

Nuclear weapons are only good for deterring. It is insane that two men, sitting on opposite ends of the world, should be able to decide to bring an end to civilization.

Disarment ... is a continuing imperative.

Nations do not distrust each other because they are armed. They are armed because they distrust each other.

For the Russians, frankly, it's time that we punched the Russians in the nose. They've gotten away with too much in this world and we need to stand up against them, not just there, but also in Eastern Europe where they threaten some of our most precious allies.

It is impossible to work out a reduction in nuclear threat as long as one side is going all out to demonize the other.