“First: Let us examine our attitude toward peace itself. Too many of us think it is impossible. Too many think it unreal. But that is a dangerous, defeatist belief. It leads to the conclusion that war is inevitable--that mankind is doomed--that we are gripped by forces we cannot control. We need not accept that view. Our problems are manmade--therefore, they can be solved by man. And man can be as big as he wants. No problem of human destiny is beyond human beings. Man's reason and spirit have often solved the seemingly unsolvable--and we believe they can do it again.”

“South Africa is still the only country that has ever renounced and dismantled its full nuclear weapons capability. I have no doubt it was the right decision.”

“What are we to make of a civilization that is only capable of talking about the destruction of everything in prudential and analytic terms?”

“We must ask the question, which might sound naïve to those who have elaborated sophisticated arguments to justify their refusal to eliminate these terrible and terrifying weapons of mass destruction — why do they need them anyway?”

“That is how we achieve security — by giving people the freedom to engage in the decision-making that affects our lives.”

“A nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought. The only value in our two nations possessing nuclear weapons is to make sure they will never be used. But then would it not be better to do away with them entirely?”

“Beyond this, those who disparage the threat of nuclear weapons ignore all evidence of the darker side of man, and of the history of the West--our history. Many times the nations of the West have plunged into inexplicable cataclysm, mutual slaughter so terrible and so widespread that it amounted nearly to the suicide of a civilization. . . . The destruction of two World Wars was limited only by technology. Now nuclear weapons have removed that limit. Who can say that they will not be used, that a rational balance of terror will restrain emotions we do not understand?”

“I believe that the eradication of nuclear weapons is not only crucial, it is also feasible in our lifetime.”

“Disarmament is not an option for governments to take up or ignore. It is a moral duty owed by them to their own citizens, and to humanity as a whole. We must not await another Hiroshima or Nagasaki before finally mustering the political will to banish these weapons from global arsenals.”

I am convinced that in order to avoid nuclear war it is not sufficient to be afraid of it. It is necessary to be afraid, but it is equally necessary to understand. And the first step in understanding is to recognize that the problem of nuclear war is basically not technical but human and historical. If we are to avoid destruction we must first of all understand the human and historical context out of which destruction arises.

The great danger facing us today is not so much the atomic bomb that was created by physical science. No so much that atomic bomb that you can put in an aeroplane and drop on the heads of hundreds and thousands of people as dangerous as that is. But the real danger confronting civilization today is that atomic bomb that lies in the hearts of souls of men, capable of exploding into the vilest of hate and into the most damaging selfishness—that’s the atomic bomb we’ve got to fear today. The problem is with the men. Within the heart of souls of men. That is the real basis of our problem.