To function optimally, our stabilizing role must be based on an adequate defence. This can only have a deterrent function if it includes a nuclear component. Forty years ago the nuclear weapon was the ultimate war-fighting weapon. NATO has transformed it into the ultimate peace-keeping instrument. Our security concept extends its protection to all the members of our Alliance whether they are nuclear powers or not.
Nuclear deterrence is the bedrock of our security.
In preserving peace it also serves Soviet interests. It is incumbent on the Soviet Union to recognize this fact and to accept the concept of stable nuclear deterrence, and to restructure its own nuclear forces, down to minimal levels. I strongly dispute recent claims by Soviet leaders that NATO's nuclear weapons in Europe are a gesture of hostility and an obstacle to the Vienna negotiations. Such considerations, after all, have not prevented the Soviet Union from completing its own modernization of a far greater number of such weapons in recent years. Yet a robust defence is not required only for abstract deterrence.