Mikhail Gorbachev

Americans have a severe disease — worse than AIDS. It's called the winner's complex.

ABC News (12 July 2006), 2006

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.

Interview with USA Today (5 April 2006), 2006

If what you have done yesterday still looks big to you, you haven't done much today.

101 Best Ways to Get Ahead: Solid Gold Advice from 101 of the World's Most Successful People (2004) by Michael E. Angier and Sarah Pond, p. 30, 2004

The market is not an invention of capitalism. It has existed for centuries. It is an invention of civilization.

Statement (8 June 1990), as quoted in The Economics of the Environment and Natural Resources (2004) by R. Quentin Grafton, p. 277, 2004

I began to feel the desire for something more; I wanted to do something to make things better.

On his ambitions as a youth, in an Academy of Achievement interview (28 October 2000), 2000

Jesus was the first socialist, the first to seek a better life for mankind.

As quoted in The London Daily Telegraph (16 June 1992), 1992

My life’s work has been accomplished. I did all that I could.

The Observer [London] (15 December 1991), 1991

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.

During a tour of the United States, as quoted in The New York Times (5 June 1990), 1990

I believe, as Lenin said, that this revolutionary chaos may yet crystallize into new forms of life.

As quoted in The Times [London] (18 May 1990), 1990

Berlin wall can disappear when those conditions that created it fall away.

As quoted in "A Gorbachev Hint for Berlin Wall" (16 June 1989), The New York Times, 1989

The Soviet people want full-blooded and unconditional democracy.

Speech (July 1988), 1988

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.

Variant: Soviet rockets can find Halley's comet and fly to Venus with amazing accuracy, but . . . many household appliances are of poor quality., 1987

The accident at Chernobyl showed again what an abyss will open if nuclear war befalls mankind. For inherent in the nuclear arsenals stockpiled are thousands upon thousands of disasters far more horrible than the Chernobyl one.

Speech on the Chernobyl accident (15 May 1986), 1986

Democracy is the wholesome and pure air without which a socialist public organization cannot live a full-blooded life.

Speech to the 27th Party Congress, Moscow (25 February 1986), 1986

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.

As quoted in TIME magazine (9 September 1985), 1985