UN General Assembly
1953

113. We have repeated again and again the reasons why we cannot accept these very general proposals of the Soviet Union as they now stand. A cut by one-third of the existing armed forces and armaments of the five permanent members of the Security Council would produce an arbitrary and quite inequitable redistribution of strength, even if we could be sure, without some kind of supervision, that such a reduction would be made in fact by all, or even if we knew from what existing strength the reduction would take place. A decision to abolish atomic and other weapons of mass destruction seems to us to be impractical except within the framework of a system which will ensure that the dangerous material involved will be used only for peaceful purposes. Also this matter must necessarily be linked with the limitation of conventional armaments.