And
this we are trying to do in negotiations with the Soviet Union. We
are not just discussing limits on a further increase of nuclear
weapons. We seek, instead, to reduce their number. We seek the
total elimination one day of nuclear weapons from the face of the
Earth.
Now, for decades, we and the Soviets have lived under the threat
of mutual assured destruction; if either resorted to the use of
nuclear weapons, the other could retaliate and destroy the one who
had started it. Is there either logic or morality in believing
that if one side threatens to kill tens of millions of our people,
our only recourse is to threaten killing tens of millions of
theirs?
I have approved a research program to find, if we can, a security
shield that would destroy nuclear missiles before they reach their
target. It wouldn't kill people, it would destroy weapons. It
wouldn't militarize space, it would help demilitarize the arsenals
of Earth. It would render nuclear weapons obsolete. We will meet
with the Soviets, hoping that we can agree on a way to rid the
world of the threat of nuclear destruction.
We strive for peace and security, heartened by the changes all
around us. Since the turn of the century, the number of
democracies in the world has grown fourfold. Human freedom is on
the march, and nowhere more so than our own hemisphere.
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