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We are all passengers aboard one ship, the Earth, and we must not allow it to be wrecked. There will be no second Noah's Ark. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I am an optimist and I believe that together we shall be able now to make the right historical choice so as not to miss the great chance at the turn of centuries and millenia and make the current extremely difficult transition to a peaceful world order. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I have long ago made a final and irrevocable decision. Nothing and no one, no pressure, cither from the right or from the left, will make me abandon the positions of perestroika and new thinking. I do not intend to change my views or convictions. My choice is a final one. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The phenomenon of UFOs does exist, and it must be treated seriously. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
We need a new system of values, a system of the organic unity between humankind and nature and the ethic of global responsibility. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
It sometimes seems to me that some of our Western partners do not want Russia to fully recover. They would like Russia to be in a subdued state, and they want Russian resources to be used for the benefit of the U.S. economy. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Humankind has no option but to protect and live in harmony with its natural environment. However, it would be regrettable if in putting an end to revolutionary extremism, we should then come to environmental extremism. We should not forget that all extremes are the same. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Certain people in the United States are driving nails into this structure of our relationship, then cutting off the heads. So the Soviets must use their teeth to pull them out. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
It would be naive to think that the problems plaguing mankind today can be solved with means and methods which were applied or seemed to work in the past. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
It will be difficult, even painful, but democracy will prevail in Russia. There will be no dictatorship, although relapses into authoritarianism are possible. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The accident at the Chernobyl nuclear plant ... has painfully affected the Soviet people, and shocked the international community. For the first time, we confront the real force of nuclear energy, out of control. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
For the first time ever, we have confronted in reality the sinister power of uncontrolled nuclear energy. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Dangers await only those who do not react to life. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
God has given us enough wisdom to make improvements in our relations. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Life punishes those who come too late. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Democracy must learn to defend itself. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
It is my firm belief that the infinite and uncontrollable fury of nuclear weapons should never be held in the hands of any mere mortal ever again, for any reason. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
In October 1917, we parted with the old world, rejecting it once and for all. We are moving toward a new world, a world of Communism. We shall never turn off that road. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The most puzzling development in politics during the last decade is the apparent determination of Western European leaders to re-create the Soviet Union in Western Europe. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Nature is reminding us that it used to exist without human beings. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I grew up in a family of peasants, and it was there that I saw the way that, for example, our wheat fields suffered as a result of dust storms, water erosion and wind erosion; I saw the effect of that on life - on human life. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Surely, God on high has not refused to give us enough wisdom to find ways to bring us an improvement in relations between the two great nations on earth. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
According to Lenin, socialism and democracy are indivisible ... The essence of perestroika lies in the fact that it unites socialism with democracy and revives the Leninist concept of socialist construction both in theory and in practice. We want more socialism and, therefore, more democracy. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The world's deteriorating ecology poses as great a danger to mankind today as did the nuclear standoff between the superpowers at the height of the Cold War. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The threat of a world war is no more. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
It is better to discuss things, to argue and engage in polemics than make perfidious plans of mutual destruction. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
We are not abandoning our convictions, our philosophy or traditions, nor do we urge anyone to abandon theirs. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I think the United States is sick. It suffers from the sickness, the disease of being the victor and it needs to cure itself from this disease. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I envisage the prinicles of the Earth Charter to be a new form of the ten commandments. They lay the foundation for a sustainable global earth community. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Sometimes people ask me why I began perestroika. Were the causes basically domestic or foreign? The domestic reasons were undoubtedly the main ones, but the danger of nuclear war was so serious that it was a no less significant factor. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
A new world order is taking shape so fast that governments as well as private citizens find it difficult just to absorb the gallop of events. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I believe, as Lenin said, that this revolutionary chaos may yet crystallize into new forms of life. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Peace is not unity in similarity but unity in diversity, in the comparison and conciliation of differences. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
People, human beings with all their creative diversity, are the makers of history. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
It's America calling the shots in everything -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I couldn't wait to get to the most powerful position, because I thought then I would be able to fix problems that only the leader can fix. But when I got there, I realized we needed revolutionary change. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
There is only one superpower now and it doesn't know what to do with its status. As a result, we got Yugoslavia and Iraq, and the situation has only got worse. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
We desperately need to recognize that we are the guests not the masters of nature and adopt a new paradigm for development, based on the costs and benefits to all people, and bound by the limits of nature herself rather than the limits of technology and consumerism. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The market is not an invention of capitalism. It has existed for centuries. It is an invention of civilization. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
We must treat water as if it were the most precious thing in the world, the most valuable natural resource. Be economical with water! Don't waste it! We still have time to do something about this problem before it is too late. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
We had 10 years after the Cold War to build a new world order and yet we squandered them. The United States cannot tolerate anyone acting independently. Every US president has to have a war. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Putin wants to stay in power, but not so that he can finally solve our most pressing problems: education, health care, poverty. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
You cannot go to sleep with one form of economic system and wake up the next morning with another. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I don't think Russia is setting this as a goal; I don't think this should be Russia's goal. I think even the United States doesn't need to be a superpower. China doesn't need to be a superpower. It's a different world. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Even today, a majority of people surveyed say that they regret the fact that the USSR collapsed. But only 9 percent say that they would want it back. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Sometimes it's difficult to accept, to recognise one's own mistakes, but one must do it. I was guilty of overconfidence and arrogance, and I was punished for that. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
History punishes those that come late to it. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I paid too heavy a price for perestroika. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
My goal was to avoid bloodshed. But unfortunately there was some bloodshed, after all. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Lake Baikal in Russia has 25 percent of the freshwater resources of the world. Sixty-five percent of the Russian ecosystems are in danger. So let's preserve what we have, and let's take good care of nature. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
It is really important to solve the problem of rational utilization and distribution of wate supplies. I dare say, the shortage of fresh water is the major ecological problem of this moment. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The human race has entered a stage where we are all dependent on each other. No other country or nation should be regarded in total separation from another, let alone pitted against another. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I certainly wouldn't say that we loved the arms race. Trillions of dollars were used to stoke it. For our economy, which was smaller in size than the American economy, it was a burden. But one cannot agree with the statement that the arms race played the key role in the collapse of the Soviet Union. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The threat of environmental crisis is the 'international disaster key' to unlock the New World Order. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
It seems that the most important thing about Reagan was his anti-Communism and his reputation as a hawk who saw the Soviet Union as an 'evil empire.' -- Mikhail Gorbachev
In our discussions here at the forum there was no trace of the futile debate about what is better, capitalism or socialism ... We should seek a synthesis of ideas and values that have proven their viability ... -- Mikhail Gorbachev
One day we took each other by the hand and went for a walk in the evening. And we walked like that for our whole life. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Women prevent the threads of life from being broken. The finest minds have always understood the peacemaking role of women. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Globalization was supposed to break down barriers between continents and bring all peoples together. But what kind of globalization do we have with over one billion people on the planet not having safe water to drink? -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Every country should conduct its own reforms, should develop its own model, taking into account the experience of other countries, whether close neighbours or far away countries. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Alexander Solzhenitsyn in his speech accepting the Nobel Prize: Violence has no way to conceal itself except by lies, and lies have no way to maintain themselves except through violence. Anyone who has proclaimed violence his method inexorably must choose lying as his principle. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Man is beginning to explore the galaxy. But how much remains undone on earth? -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Sometimes when you stand face to face with someone, you cannot see his face. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I began to feel the desire for something more; I wanted to do something to make things better. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The opponents of perestroika had suffered a defeat, and then they organized the coup. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I will never give up politics. I've tried to give it up three times, but I never made it. Politics mobilizes me. I won't last long if I give it up. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
We have no right ever to forget that psychological warfare
is a struggle for winning people's minds. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
If current technological processes continue without change, the environment will change, and we, the human species, will either have to mutate or even die, to disappear, as many species have disappeared. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Sometimes, the decisions have to be taken in minutes, even seconds, and there would be no time to make the right decision. We understood that this could have ended in catastrophe. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
We used to have just one criterion and that was profit, and then another criterion was added - social welfare. Now we have to add the third important criterion, and that is nature and the environment. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
My life's work has been accomplished. I did all that I could. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
In Russia, there are those who make their money in criminal ways, but I earn everything myself. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
History is a capricious creature. It depends on who writes it. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Today, peace means the ascent from simple coexistence to cooperation and common creativity among countries and nations. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
For a new type of progress throughout the world to become a reality, everyone must change. Tolerance is the alpha and omega of a new world order. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Communist ideology in its pure form is akin to
Christianity. Its main ideas are the brotherhood of all
peoples irrespective of their nationality, justice and
equality, peace, and an end to all hostility between
peoples. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Starting reforms in the Soviet Union was only possible from above, only from above. Any attempt to go from below was suppressed, suppressed in a most resolute way. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I think we need more young people; we need to elect young people to government. We need to give them a chance, in the media, in politics, in democracy. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I am a Communist, a convinced Communist! For some that may be a fantasy. But to me it is my main goal. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Ideological and political intolerance, even with the best and most sincere intentions, produces results that are the direct opposite of those intended. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The ecological crisis, in short, is the population crisis. Cut the population by 90% and there aren't enough people left to do a great deal of ecological damage. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Every part of our program of perestroika - and the program as a whole, for that matter - is fully based on the principle of more socialism and more democracy. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
If what you have done yesterday still looks big to you, you haven't done much today. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Every US President has to have a war. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
A new generation of more educated people started to be active. Then society required freedom, society demanded freedom. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Americans have a severe disease - worse than AIDS. It's called the winner's complex. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The new European Soviet. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Our rockets can find Halley's comet, and fly to Venus with amazing accuracy, but side by side with these scientific and technical triumphs is an obvious lack of efficiency in using scientific achievements for economic needs ... many Soviet household appliances are of poor quality. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
What we need is Star Peace and not Star Wars. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The world will not accept dictatorship or domination. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
We need a new environmental consciousness on a global basis. To do this, we need to educate people. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Democracy is the wholesome and pure air without which a socialist public organization cannot live a full-blooded life. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
What we're talking about is creating new forms of life on the basis of new values. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
You are fortunate to live here. If I were your President, I would levy a tax on you for living in San Francisco! -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I believe in the cosmos. All of us are linked to the cosmos. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
When future generations judge those who came before them on environmental issues, they may conclude "they didn't know": let us not go down in history as the generations who knew, but didn't care -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The soviet people want full-blooded and unconditional democracy. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Contemporary social democracy is what I believe is the right concept. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I think the environmental problem will be the number one item on the agenda of the 21st century ... This is a problem that cannot be postponed. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
America has a right to be a leader. This leadership should be realized through partnership, not domination. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I think God has some mechanism that he uses to punish those that make mistakes. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
If people don't like Marxism, they should blame the British Museum. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
When I cleared out Moscow apartment after stepping down as president, they found all kinds of wiring in the walls. It turned out that they had been spying on me all along. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I say again that I am an atheist. I do not believe in God. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The market came with the dawn of civilization and it is not an invention of capitalism ... If it leads to improving the well-being of the people there is no contradiction with socialism. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The Union was destroyed against the will of the people, and it was done deliberately - with the participation of the Russian leadership, on the one hand, and that of the putschists, on the other. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
To me, nature is sacred; trees are my temples and forests are my cathedrals. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Montreal, this wonderful town ... Pearl of Canada, Pearl of the world. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Imagine a country that flies into space, launches Sputniks, creates such a defense system, and it can't resolve the problem of women's pantyhose. There's no toothpaste, no soap powder, not the basic necessities of life. It was incredible and humiliating to work in such a government. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Ex-Presidents of the United States get state subsidies. Not so in Russia. You get no government support. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
More socialism means more democracy, openness and collectivism in everyday life. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
There should be competition and exchanges between different countries, but there are certainly certain universal values, and that is freedom and democracy. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
I support freedom and I support a free market economy, but it should be a socially oriented market economy. I support globalization, but it should be globalization with a human face. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
We were nearly one of the last to realize that in the age of
information science the most expensive asset is knowledge. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
A New World Order is required to deal with the Climate Change crisis. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
It will not be enough to rely on experts. Ordinary citizens must become experts too. It will take public opinion on a wide scale to ensure that world leaders act. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The forests of Russia and Brazil are the lungs of the Earth. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The time has come to choose a new direction of global development, to opt for a new civilization. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Jesus was the first socialist, the first to seek a better life for mankind. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
What about Jesus Christ? I say that he was a precursor of idealists; a precursor of socialists. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The EU is the old Soviet Union dressed in Western clothes -- Mikhail Gorbachev
In effect, according to Lenin, socialism and democracy are indivisible. By gaining democratic freedoms the working masses come to power. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Those who are late will be punished by life itself. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Without glasnost there is not, and there cannot be, democratism, the political creativity of the masses and their participation in management. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
A society should never become like a pond with stagnant water, without movement. That's the most important thing. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
If not me, who? And if not now, when? -- Mikhail Gorbachev
America must be the teacher of democracy, not the advertiser of the consumer society. It is unrealistic for the rest of the world to reach the American living standard. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The most important thing is who counts the votes. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
History teaches us, however, that when the times are ripe for change and the government refuses or is unable to change, either society starts to decay or a revolution begins. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
If you are not moving forward, you are moving backward. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Politics is my second love, next to my love for Raisa [Gorbacheva]. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The guilt of Stalin and his immediate entourage before the Party and the people for the mass repressions and lawlessness they committed is enormous and unforgivable. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Without perestroika, the cold war simply would not have ended. But the world could not continue developing as it had, with the stark menace of nuclear war ever present. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
If you want Russia to be a real fully developed partner, then America should invest in Russia and activate Russia as a strong nation. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
If the Russian word " perestroika " has easily entered the international lexicon, this is due to more than just interest in what is going on in the Soviet Union. Now the whole world needs restructuring, i.e. progressive development, a fundamental change. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
No one, no single center, can today command the world. No single group of countries can do it. Under the current U.S. president, I don't think we can fundamentally change the situation as it is developing now. It is dangerous. The world is experiencing a period of growing global disarray. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Political leaders still think things can be done through force, but that cannot solve terrorism. Backwardness is the breeding ground of terror, and that is what we have to fight. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
You cannot put Russia down on its knees and hold it there because Russia will ultimately pull out. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The socialist tradition ... goes back to Jesus Christ,
not (Karl) Marx. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Ideally, peace means the absence of violence. It is an ethical value. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
It is better to see once than to hear a hundred times. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The time has come to develop integrated global policies. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
The model of the consumer society is something that will one day end. My personal view is that too much consumption is wrong. -- Mikhail Gorbachev
Further global progress is now possible only through a quest for universal consensus in the movement towards a new world order. -- Mikhail Gorbachev