US History 1973 - 2014 Commonplace Book: Lecture 11, ((Re)new(ed)) Cold War, 1978 - 1986 (Con't)

[Reagan] surely saw what would have been obvious to anyone in his position: You can't tell the American people that you will make them half safe. You can't say that defenses are "more moral" than offenses if they are designed to protect ICBMs. And you can't promise "to protect American lives rather than avenge them" unless you can propose to make nuclear weapons obsolete.

—Francis Fitzgerald, Way Out There in the Blue

Introduction to (and explanation of) this quote series can be found here.  Read this tag to see all of them.