The strength of the alliance on which our security depends is dependent in turn on our willingness to meet our commitments to them. - John F. Kennedy

Prince Bismarck once said that one-third of the students of German universities broke down from overwork; another third broke down from dissipation, and the other third ruled Germany.

With all of the history of war, and the human race's history unfortunately has been a good deal more war than peace, with nuclear weapons distributed all through the world, and available, and the strong reluctance of any people to accept defeat, I see the possibility in the 1970's of the President of the United States having to face a world in which 15 or 20 or 25 nations may have these weapons."

It shall be the policy of this Nation to regard any nuclear missile launched from Cuba against any nation in the Western Hemisphere as an attack by the Soviet Union on the United States, requiring a full retaliatory response upon the Soviet Union.