UN General Assembly
1960

110. One may very well question if the People's Republic of China is sincere. It seems to my delegation that it is a pointless question, since the word "sincerity" has long been dropped from the vocabulary of diplomacy. The only criterion that should be applied to Peking's proposal is the more reliable one of whether it serves China's long-term interests. It is obvious that the People's Republic of China cannot afford, with her very ambitious industrial revolution and all the colossal cost it entails, to become a nuclear Power also. Development in the one field implies some retardation in the other, in view of the vast handicaps it has to go through. The best way for the West to find out if Premier Chou En-lai was indulging in mere propaganda or not would be to take his proposals at their face value and initiate discussions on them.