John Foster Dulles quotes

John Foster Dulles was an American diplomat and statesman who served as U.S. Secretary of State during the 1950s. A leading architect of American Cold War foreign policy, he strongly advocated a tough stance against communism. He played a central role in forming alliances and shaping international relations during a critical period in world history. Here are 26 of his quotes:

A man's accomplishments in life are the cumulative effect of his attention to detail.

John Foster Dulles

The measure of success is not whether you have a tough problem to deal with, but whether it is the same problem you had last year.

John Foster Dulles

The world will never have lasting peace so long as men reserve for war the finest human qualities. Peace, no less than war, requires idealism and self-sacrifice and a righteous and dynamic faith.

John Foster Dulles

Of all tasks of government the most basic is to protect its citizens against violence.

John Foster Dulles

Once - many, many years ago - I thought I made a wrong decision. Of course, it turned out that I had been right all along. But I was wrong to have thought that I was wrong.

John Foster Dulles

The ability to get to the verge without getting into the war is the necessary art.

John Foster Dulles

I wouldn't attach too much importance to these student riots. I remember when I was a student at the Sorbonne in Paris, I used to go out and riot occasionally.

John Foster Dulles

I'm making progress if today's problems are different from yesterday's.

John Foster Dulles

We walked to the brink and we looked it in the face.

John Foster Dulles

We have reconfirmed the unity and firmness of our position, the position expressed in the Joint Communique of the four powers at Paris on December 14th. We do not accept any substitution of East Germans for the Soviet Union in its responsibilities toward Berlin and its obligations to us. We are resolved that our position in, and access to, West Berlin shall be preserved.

John Foster Dulles

Our capacity to retaliate must be, and is, massive in order to deter all forms of aggression.

John Foster Dulles

There are plenty of problems in the world, many of them interconnected. But there is no problem which compares with this central, universal problem of saving the human race from extinction.

John Foster Dulles

Mankind will never win lasting peace so long as men use their full resources only in tasks of war. While we are yet at peace, let us mobilize the potentialities, particularly the moral and spiritual potentialities, which we usually reserve for war.

John Foster Dulles

The United Nations was not set up to be a reformatory. It was assumed that you would be good before you got in and not that being in would make you good.

John Foster Dulles

The United States of America does not have friends; it has interests.

John Foster Dulles

A peaceful world is a world in which differences are tolerated, and are not eliminated by violence.

John Foster Dulles

Local defense will always be important. But there is no local defense which alone will contain the mighty land power of the Communist world. Local defense must be reinforced by the further deterrent of massive retaliatory power.

John Foster Dulles

The Soviets sought not a place in the sun, but the sun itself. Their objective was the world. They would not tolerate compromise on goals, only on tactics.

John Foster Dulles

Our institutions of freedom will not survive unless they are constantly replenished by the faith that gave them birth.

John Foster Dulles

Freedom & Duty always go hand in hand and if the free do not accept the duty of social responsibility, they will not long remain free.

John Foster Dulles

The ability to get to the verge without getting into the war is the necessary art. If you try to run away from it, if you are scared to go to the brink, you are lost.

John Foster Dulles

The United Nations represents not a final stage in the development of world order, but only a primitive stage. Therefore its primary task is to create the conditions which will make possible a more highly developed organization.

John Foster Dulles