Dwight D. Eisenhower

President Dwight D. Eisenhower delivered this "Atoms for Peace" speech to the General Assembly of the United Nations in 1953. At that time, atomic bombs were twenty-five times more powerful than the ones dropped on Japan, and the United States was no longer the sole nuclear power. The Soviet Union had also developed nuclear arms, and Eisenhower predicted that in the future all nations may possess nuclear weapons. As he spoke to the United Nations, the possibility of a nuclear war loomed over the world as the United States and Russia squared off in the tense Cold War era. A nuclear exchange between the United States and Russia could mean the destruction of civilization and even the eradication of the human race.

Eisenhower proposed talks with the Soviet Union to limit and control nuclear weapons. He further proposed to trans-form...