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The whole idea of a nuclear system is to have a deterrent where we decide if we're going to use it.

We have got thousands of nuclear weapons in order to achieve deterrence.

Deterrence is the art of producing, in the mind of the enemy, the fear to attack.

Our nuclear weapons are meant purely as a deterrent against nuclear adventure by an adversary.

Nuclear doctrine consists of thinking the unthinkable. It involves making threats and promising retaliation that is cruel and destructive beyond imagining. But it has its purpose: to prevent war in the first place.

Deterrence is still fundamentally about influencing an actor's decisions. It is about a solid policy foundation. It is about credible capabilities. It is about what the U.S. and our allies as a whole can bring to bear in both a military and a nonmilitary sense.

When you talk about peace through strength, what you're talking about is the concept of deterrence.

Nuclear deterrence doesn't work outside of the Russian - U.S. context; Saddam Hussein showed that.

There are some people that will be deterred by the fact that we have nuclear weapons... But those people are the folks we can deal with anyway.

I have to bring to your notice a terrifying reality: with the development of nuclear weapons Man has acquired, for the first time in history, the technical means to destroy the whole of civilization in a single act.