Mikhail Gorbachev Quotes

The world will not accept dictatorship or domination.
We are not abandoning our convictions, our philosophy or traditions, nor do we urge anyone to abandon theirs.
What we need is Star Peace and not Star Wars.
A society should never become like a pond with stagnant water, without movement. That's the most important thing.
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.
Ex-Presidents of the United States get state subsidies. Not so in Russia. You get no government support.
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.
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.
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.
I paid too heavy a price for perestroika.
I say again that I am an atheist. I do not believe in God.
I think God has some mechanism that he uses to punish those that make mistakes.
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.
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.
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.
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.
On the day I became Soviet leader, in March 1985, I had a special meeting with the leaders of the Warsaw Pact countries and told them: 'You are independent, and we are independent. You are responsible for your policies, we are responsible for ours. We will not intervene in your affairs, I promise you.'
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.
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.
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.
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Mikhail Gorbachev
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