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

I want to say, and this is very important: at the end we lucked out. It was luck that prevented nuclear war. We came that close to nuclear war at the end. Rational individuals: Kennedy was rational; Khrushchev was rational; Castro was rational. Rational individuals came that close to total destruction of their societies. And that danger exists today.

What makes it immoral if you lose and not immoral if you win?

Action should be founded on contemplation, and those of us who act don't put enough time, don't give enough emphasis, to contemplation.

I like to run down to the beach and have a little swim in the nude in the morning.

There is no more important task in a democracy than resolving the differences among people and finding a course of action that will be supported by a sufficient number to permit the nation to achieve a better life for all.

Kennedy was trying to keep us out of war. I was trying to help him keep us out of war. And General Curtis LeMay, whom I served under as a matter of fact in World War II, was saying "Let's go in, let's totally destroy Cuba."