Weapon

“I have no part of my body, in front at least, that is left without scars; there is no weapon, used at close quarters, or hurled from afar, of which I do not carry the mark. Nay, I have been wounded by the sword, hand to hand; I have been shot with arrows, I have been struck from a catapult, smitten many a time with stones and clubs.”

“I know they’re weapons of war. However, there’s a beauty in unadorned functionality totally separate from that. Fighter planes and battleships have a simple, unadorned beauty I’m drawn to. But I don’t want to see them in action, killing people.”

“The danger is becoming greater. As the arsenals of the superpowers grow in size and sophistication and as other governments—perhaps even, in the future, dozens of governments—acquire these weapons, it may be only a matter of time before madness, desperation, greed or miscalculation lets loose the terrible force.”

“Weapons of mass destruction-nuclear, biological, and chemical-along with the systems that deliver them, pose a major threat to our security and that of our allies and other friendly nations. Thus, a key part of our strategy is to seek to stem the proliferation of such weapons and to develop an effective capability to deal with these threats.”

“A preemptive action today, however well-justified, may come back with unwelcome consequences in the future. And because … I've done this. I've ordered these kinds of actions — I don't care how precise your bombs and your weapons are, when you set them off, innocent people will die.”

“It is ironic that the accumulation of arms is one of the few expanding industries in a period of economic depression and gloom.”

“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed. .\xa0.\xa0. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending .\xa0.\xa0. the hopes of its children.”

“When iron was found, the trees began to tremble, but the iron reassured them: 'Let no handle made from you enter into anything made from me, and I shall be powerless to injure you.'”

“They shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”

“Kennedy would have ordered nuclear retaliation on Cuba —and perhaps the Soviet Union— if nuclear weapons had been fired at United States forces.”

“Nuclear weapons serve no military purpose whatsoever. They are totally useless — except only to deter one’s opponent from using them.”

“Language was our secret weapon, and as soon we got language we became a really dangerous species.”

“Stop quoting laws, we carry weapons!”

“Statesmen of dedication and sincerity, many of them in this hall, have done their utmost to arrest this development. Yet the arms race goes on. It is as if the arms race had escaped rational human control.”

“During these four years the arms race has exacerbated the threat to peace, heightening the anxieties of peoples and imposing heavier burdens on each nation at the expense of its economic and social development.”

“Removing the threat of a world war—a nuclear war—is the most acute and urgent task of the present day. Mankind is confronted with a choice: we must halt the arms race and proceed to disarmament or face annihilation.”