On
September 20, 1961, in the city of Belgrade, the United States and the Soviet Union
signed the McCloy-Zorin Accords. This remarkable agreement, which calls for
“War No Longer”, set guidelines for not only nuclear disarmament, but complete
and general disarmament of all nations of the world. Should the political will
be found to achieve it, the ideas contained in these Accords can still be used
to reach this goal.
John F.
Kennedy, the 35th President of the United States, gave a speech to the United
Nations five days after the McCloy-Zorin Accords were signed. During his
speech, he made these statements:
Today,
every inhabitant of this planet must contemplate the day when this planet may
no longer be habitable. Every man, woman and child lives under a nuclear sword
of Damocles, hanging by the slenderest of threads, capable of being cut at any
moment by accident or miscalculation or by madness. The weapons of war must be
abolished before they abolish us.
Men no
longer debate whether armaments are a symptom or a cause of tension. The mere
existence of modern weapons--ten million times more powerful than any that the
world has ever seen, and only minutes away from any target on earth--is a
source of horror, and discord and distrust. Men no longer maintain that
disarmament must await the settlement of all disputes--for disarmament must be
a part of any permanent settlement. And men may no longer pretend that the
quest for disarmament is a sign of weakness--for in a spiraling arms race, a
nation's security may well be shrinking even as its arms increase.
For fifteen
years this organization [the United Nations] has sought the reduction and
destruction of arms. Now that goal is no longer a dream--it is a practical
matter of life or death. The risks inherent in disarmament pale in comparison
to the risks inherent in an unlimited arms race.
It is in
this spirit that the recent Belgrade Conference--recognizing that this is no
longer a Soviet problem or an American problem, but a human problem--endorsed a
program of "general, complete and strictly an internationally controlled
disarmament." [the McCloy-Zorin Accords] It is in this same spirit that we
in the United States have labored this year, with a new urgency, and with a
new, now statutory agency fully endorsed by the Congress, to find an approach
to disarmament which would be so far-reaching, yet realistic, so mutually
balanced and beneficial, that it could be accepted by every nation. And it is
in this spirit that we have presented with the agreement of the Soviet
Union--under the label both nations now accept of "general and complete
disarmament"--a new statement of newly-agreed principles for negotiation.
But we are
well aware that all issues of principle are not settled, and that principles
alone are not enough. It is therefore our intention to challenge the Soviet
Union, not to an arms race, but to a peace race- -to advance together step by
step, stage by stage, until general and complete disarmament has been achieved.
We invite them now to go beyond agreement in principle to reach agreement on
actual plans.
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