Colin Powell Quotes

One significant indication of the effectiveness of deterrence is that the Soviet Union and the United States share the belief that a nuclear war would begin only out of desperation or inadvertence. A weakening of deterrence could increase the possibility of a calculated “voluntary” war or worse.

I'd be the last one to use the nuclear weapons, because that's sort of like the end of the ballgame.

This means that the only function of nuclear weapons, while they exist, is to deter a nuclear attack.

Every thinking person fears nuclear war, and every technological nation plans for it.

We do not believe that a nuclear war should be fought and we do not believe that a nuclear war can be won.

The lesson of history is when a war starts every nation will ultimately use whatever weapon it has available. ... Therefore, we must expect that if another war — a serious war — breaks out, we will use nuclear energy in some form.

Maintaining a U. S. Nuclear Arsenal presents only one benefit today: deterring the use of nuclear weapons by others. Thus, there is simply no reason for nuclear weapons to play a central role in U. S. Defense Policy any longer.

Dwight Eisenhower… supported the nuclearization of the military and the militarization of nuclear weapons as a cost saving way of deterring the Soviets. Under Eisenhower, custody or nuclear weapons shifted from the civilian Atomic Energy Commission to the military.

The notion of Armageddon has created a self-defeating prophecy: the more frightened decision makers are, the more careful they become and the less likely they are to initiate any action that might bring about the dreaded escalation to nuclear use. Armageddon is averted to the degree it is feared. As a result, nuclear deterrence has not only worked remarkably well in peacetime and served to limit the scope and intensity of conventional warfare, but it is likely to work surprisingly well in a large U.S.-Soviet conventional, and even a limited nuclear, war.

Deterrence is part objective and part subjective. The objective part is that adequate military preparedness could be critical in some important circumstances. The subjective is, in part, the perception by the potential enemy of the other side’s power, determination, and courage, as well as its estimate of the wartime effectiveness of the other side’s relative nuclear capability. If the aggressor believes that his opponent has the weapons and will use them, deterrence is likely to be effective. Therefore, a nation’s defense lies, in part, in the credibility of its threat to use nuclear force as a last resort, which means that the need remains for coherent and plausible policies for the use of nuclear weapons.

The professed function of the nuclear weapons on each side is to prevent the other side from using their nuclear weapons. If that's all it is, then we've gotta as: how many nuclear weapons do you need to do that?

If in the words which the Secretary of State has just used, the use of a nuclear weapon is to be avoided 'at all costs'. what is the point of having one?

We are told that the possession of nuclear weapons - in some cases even the testing of these weapons - is essential for national security. But this argument can be made by other countries as well.

Nuclear weapons continue to occupy a unique place in global security affairs. No other weapons, in my opinion, anyway, match their potential for prompt and long-term damage and their strategic impact.

If we are to assume that North Korea becomes a nuclear-power state, of course the danger of having an all-out nuclear war, that possibility is very slim.

In the late 1950s a major topic under discussion was whether Canada should acquire nuclear weapons.

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

I say in all sincerity that the nuclear arms race has no military purpose. Wars cannot be fought with nuclear weapons; their existence only adds to our perils because of the illusions which they have generated.

If there was a market in mass-produced portable nuclear weapons, we'd market them, too.

In the Cuban missile crisis [1962] we had 5,000 nuclear strategic weapons and the Russians had only 300.... Even though we had a 17 to 1 advantage, we were deterred. Even if only ten percent of their missiles got through, tens of millions of Americans would have died. We could not use our nuclear superiority.

Designing new low-yield nuclear weapons for limited strikes dangerously lowers the threshold for their use.

It is most regrettable that nuclear energy is being harnessed for making nuclear weapons.

What is the only provocation that could bring about the use of nuclear weapons? Nuclear weapons. What is the priority target for nuclear weapons? Nuclear weapons. What is the only established defense against nuclear weapons? Nuclear weapons. How do we prevent the use of nuclear weapons? By threatening to use nuclear weapons. And we can't get rid of nuclear weapons, because of nuclear weapons. The intransigence, it seems, is a function of the weapons themselves.

The single greatest problem the world has is nuclear armament, nuclear weapons, not global warming.

They'll be no learning period with nuclear weapons. Make one mistake and you're going to destroy nations.