I formed the hypothesis that each of us could have achieved our objectives without the terrible loss of life. And I wanted to test that by going to Vietnam.

To this day we seem to act in the world as though we know what's right for everybody.

At my age, 85, I'm at age where I can look back and derive some conclusions about my actions. My rule has been try to learn, try to understand what happened. Develop the lessons and pass them on.

I formed the hypothesis that each of us could have achieved our objectives without the terrible loss of life. And I wanted to test that by going to Vietnam.

...but highly placed sources within the Kennedy Administration disagreed: "[T]he assumption that the strategic nuclear balance mattered in any way was wrong... As far as I am concerned, it made no difference... If my memory serves me correctly, we had some five thousand strategic nuclear warheads as against t heir three hundred. Can anyone seriously tell me that their having three hundred and forty would have made any difference? The military balance wasn't changed. I didn't believe it then, and I don't believe it now..."

The commitment of government to deal with the population issue is of course essential....There are many ways to make the death rate increase.

Neither conscience nor sanity itself suggests that the United States is, should or could be the global gendarme.