UN General Assembly
1963

78. The year which has passed since we assembled here last September has been an eventful one. It may prove to be —and the speeches we have heard so far at this session give us hope that it will be— a turning-point in the history of relations between States in the modern era. Early during that year the world suddenly found itself teetering on the brink of a nuclear holocaust. Fortunately, restraint and common sense prevailed, and the ultimate disaster was narrowly averted. For a world which had become inured to the existence of nuclear and thermo-nuclear weapons, and to its use in propaganda, it was a sobering experience to awake suddenly and find that what we were witnessing was no propaganda battle but the imminent threat of irretrievable catastrophe.