UN General Assembly
1984

40. Since the beginning of the Second World War, the United States, with its absolute military and economic superiority, has never concealed its ambition to impose on the world a United States order—a "pax americana”—and to make this century the United States century. To this end, the United States has used two familiar instruments: the carrot and the stick aimed at ensuring lasting military and economic superiority so as to threaten and subjugate other countries and compel the Soviet Union to engage in an arms race which would result in its economic collapse. That is why, even in the 1950s when the United States enjoyed absolute military and economic superiority over all the other Powers combined, it still accelerated the arms race and adopted a policy of massive retaliation and brinksmanship. Even though the United States has to this day remained the number one Power in terms of strategic forces, ever since the early 1960s it has continued to clamour against the so-called missile gap.