Linus Pauling Quotes

The prospect of a nuclear war is not a bad thing because defeating capitalism would be worth losing up to two-thirds of the world’s population.

A nuclear war does not defend a country and it does not defend a system. I've put it the same way many times; not even the most accomplished ideologue will be able to tell the difference between the ashes of capitalism and the ashes of communism.

One nuclear war is going to be the last nuclear - the last war, frankly, if it really gets out of hand. And I just don't think we ought to be prepared to accept that sort of thing.

It's a near miracle that nuclear war has so far been avoided.

I remember very vividly, as a child growing up in England, living through the Cuban Missile Crisis. For a few days, the entire biosphere seemed to be on the verge of destruction. And the same weapons are still here, and they're still armed. If we avoid that trap, others are waiting for us.

The world has been close to war before - but now man, who has survived all previous threats to his existence, has taken into his mortal hands the power to exterminate the entire species some seven times over.

Every thinking person fears nuclear war, and every technological state plans for it. Everyone knows it is madness, and every nation has an excuse

We are plunging headlong into a cold war, and we have 2,000 nuclear weapons on hair-trigger alert.

I feel worried, deeply worried, only about one thing - the possibility that we fall... that we cannot avoid an atomic war.

We have to risk a nuclear war in order to escape capitulation to Communism. For all I know, we may stumble into this terrible war.

This is the reality of nuclear weapons: they may trigger a world war; a war which, unlike previous ones, destroys all of civilization.

We need to make it very clear to the Iranians, the same way we made it clear to the Soviet Union and China, that their first use of nuclear weapons would result in the devastation of their nation.

Nuclear holocaust might eliminate the Internet.

Even with the best intentions, you can have a nuclear war, a nuclear holocaust, through miscalculation, through accidents.

In 1960 I published a book that attempted to direct attention to the possibility of a thermonuclear war, to ways of reducing the likelihood of such a war, and to methods for coping with the consequences should war occur despite our efforts to avoid it.

If you go on with this nuclear arms race, all you are going to do is make the rubble bounce.

The atomic bomb made the prospect of future war unendurable. It has led us up those last few steps to the mountain pass; and beyond there is a different country.

Nuclear war is such an emotional subject that many people see the weapons themselves as the common enemy of humanity.

In nuclear war all men are cremated equal.

The chief task was to stop the arms race before it brought utter disaster. However, after the collapse of communism and the disintegration of the Soviet Union, any rationale for having nuclear weapons disappeared.

The Cold War isn't thawing; it is burning with a deadly heat. Communism isn't sleeping; it is, as always, plotting, scheming, working, fighting.

We still live with this unbelievable threat over our heads of nuclear war. I mean, are we stupid? Do we think that the nuclear threat has gone, that the nuclear destruction of the planet is not imminent? It's a delusion to think it's gone away.

Nut With A Nuke

A nuclear weapon is not just a football that you can use at will.

The decision to use any kind of nuclear weapon, even the tactical ones, presents such a risk of it getting out of control so quickly …