Barry Goldwater Quotes

I think that most people believe that Russia, because of its - it has regained some of its military strength. And they do rattle the saber a bit. It wants to be a player.

The engagement policy of détente made the United States number two in a world where it is dangerous, if not fatal, to be second best

I thought that in general we in the United States were too optimistic in believing that the Soviets might alter what had been for a long time, as a matter of fact for centuries, fundamental Russian policies in respect to the rest of the world.

Of the four wars in my lifetime, none came about because the U.S. was too strong.

It is not in the interest of the German people or in the interest of world peace that Germany should become a pawn or a partner in a military struggle for power between the East and the West.

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

American presence is, you know, the major cause of balance of power and the stability in this region.

We now have the opportunity of giving to the USSR its Vietnam war.

Weak countries always exaggerate their power.

I don’t want some bearded dictator ninety miles off thumbing his nose at us.

[John] Foster Dulles is the only case I know of a bull who carries his china shop with him.

As long as we can outproduce the world, can control the sea and can strike inland with the atomic bomb, we can assume certain risks otherwise unacceptable in an effort to restore world trade, to restore the balance of power —military power—and to eliminate some of the conditions which breed war.

There will no longer be need for spheres of influence, for alliances, balances of power ...

A stable world may be one in which the United States can act to secure peace without fear of a nuclear attack.

Containment was merely appeasement on the installment plan.

The overall or political objective is to impose upon Russia the will of the United States and British Empire.

That's the problem with Russia: The world has changed. Europe is not at war, and no one wants to negotiate with us. The world has changed, but Russia prefers to pretend it has not.

Knowing what an opponent values is a necessary condition for deterrence success.

I built a nuclear option to get peace, not to have bombs. Our enemies learned that they could not destroy us.

The United States is as weak as the Soviet Union. If enough pressure is applied to them, they will pull out of the Middle East.

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

Our opposition to Communist expansion is not an absolute factor; containment must be taken in relation to American security and American objectives.

If we can deter the Soviet Union, if we can deter North Korea, why on earth can't we deter Iran?

Richard Nixon, famously, conducted his foreign policy according to the 'madman theory': he tried to convince enemy leaders that he was irrational and volatile in an attempt to intimidate them. But this was a potentially useful approach to foreign policy only because it was an act.

America is not really a strong enough state for us to regard it as an enemy of Russia.