Mikhail Gorbachev quotes

If what you have done yesterday still looks big to you, you haven't done much today. (Mikhail Gorbachev)
I believe, as Lenin said, that this revolutionary chaos may yet crystallize into new forms of life. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
Jesus was the first socialist, the first to seek a better life for mankind. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
The soviet people want full-blooded and unconditional democracy. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
The market is not an invention of capitalism. It has existed for centuries. It is an invention of civilization. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
Democracy is the wholesome and pure air without which a socialist public organization cannot live a full-blooded life. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
My life's work has been accomplished. I did all that I could. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
Dangers await only those who do not react to life. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
Our rockets can find Halley's comet, and fly to Venus with amazing accuracy, but side by side with these scientific and technical triumphs is an obvious lack of efficiency in using scientific achievements for economic needs, and many Soviet household appliances are of poor quality. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
Americans have a severe disease - worse than AIDS. It's called the winner's complex. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
The world will not accept dictatorship or domination. (Mikhail Gorbachev)
If not me, who? And if not now, when? View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
If the Russian word "perestroika" has easily entered the international lexicon, this is due to more than just interest in what is going on in the Soviet Union. Now the whole world needs restructuring, i. e. progressive development, a fundamental change. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
We desperately need to recognise that we are the guests, not the masters, of nature and adopt a new paradigm for development, based on the costs and benefits to all people, and bound by the limits of nature herself rather than the limits of technology and consumerism. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
I began to feel the desire for something more; I wanted to do something to make things better. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
For a new type of progress throughout the world to become a reality, everyone must change. Tolerance is the alpha and omega of a new world order. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
With Yeltsin, the Soviet Union broke apart, the country was totally mismanaged, the constitution was not respected by the regions of Russia. The army, education and health systems collapsed. People in the West quietly applauded, dancing with and around Yeltsin. I conclude therefore that we should not pay too much attention to what the West is saying. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
We had 10 years after the Cold War to build a new world order and yet we squandered them. The United States cannot tolerate anyone acting independently. Every US president has to have a war. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
Certain people in the United States are driving nails into this structure of our relationship, then cutting off the heads. So the Soviets must use their teeth to pull them out. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
The reform of our enormous state indeed demanded decentralization and redistribution of powers between the centre and the regions. But the local elites tried to paint this need in the exaggerated colours of 'national survival.' View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
The aims and ideals of the Soviet revolution inspired the patriotic enthusiasm of millions of people in the 1930s, during World War II, and in the postwar reconstruction period. This explains the Soviet Union's great leap forward, the achievement of a high level of industrial capacity in a very short time, the transformation of the Soviet Union into a major power in terms of science and culture. The historic victory in the Great Patriotic War against Nazism, which was a surprise not only for Hitler but also for the Western democracies is also explained by what we have said above. All this is true. But the historical truth is also that the regime and the system abused the faith of the people in these high ideals, turning them to its own advantage. Rule by the people, equality, justice, and the promise of a happy future - all these ideas were utilized for the sake of maintaining and strengthening totalitarianism. (Mikhail Gorbachev)
I believe in the cosmos. All of us are linked to the cosmos. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
Have we not been able to cross the threshold of mistrust, though mistrust has not completely disappeared? Has not the political thinking in the world changed substantially? Does not most of the world community already regard weapons of mass destruction as unacceptable for achieving political objectives? View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
The more I reflect on the current world developments, the more I become convinced that the world needs perestroika no less than the Soviet Union needs it. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev
I view the award of the Nobel Prize to me as an expression of understanding of my intentions, my aspirations, the objectives of the profound transformation we have begun in our country, and the ideas of new thinking. I see it as your acknowledgment of my commitment to peaceful means of implementing the objectives of perestroika. View quote
Mikhail Gorbachev