Heads Of State

"In reality, all experts were voicing that the policy led in Armenia made the war inevitable. Different expert circles insisted we were not ready and we night face a controversial and severe war."

"They want to go to Crimea, but no one is waiting for them there. If they want to leave, then let them find their place in Kazan."

"After warning the stenographers not to record his speech, he attacked Crimean Tatars as an "irresponsible people" for wanting return to their homeland and be so as an equal as all other peoples of the USSR."

"Dingarn's conduct was worthy of a savage as he is. It was base and treacherous, to say the least of it – the offspring of cowardice and fear. Suspicious of his warlike neighbours, jealous of their power, dreading the neighbourhood of their arms, he felt as every savage would have done in like circumstances that these men were his enemies, and being unable to attack them openly, he massacred them clandestinely."

"Pray to your God to keep me from the power of Dingaan."

"Everything is fine, there is no problem (after a stabbing attempt on him during prayers at a mosque in the capital Bamako). It's part of being a leader. There are always people who are unhappy. There are people who will try to destabilize (the government)."

"If that is your belief you are of no use to me or to my people; we knew all that before you came to preach to us. I and my people believe there is only one God – I am that God. We believe there is one place to which all good people go; that is Zululand. We believe that there is one place where all bad people go. There (pointing to a rocky hill to the north, the hill of execution). There is hell where all my wicked people go. The chief who lives there is Umatiwane, the head of the Amangwane. I put him to death, and made him the devil chief of all wicked people who die. You see that there are but two chiefs in this country – Matiwane and myself; I am the Great Chief – the God of the living; Umatiwane is the Great Chief of the wicked. I have now told you my belief; I do not want you to trouble me again with the fiction of you English people. You can remain in my country as long as you conduct yourself properly."

"I see that every white man is an enemy to the black, and every black man an enemy to the white, they do not love each other and never will."

"The comprehensive cooperation relationship and the help of the Soviet Union, other countries in the socialist community, as well as the two brothers Laos and Cambodia, create favorable conditions for us to strive to overcome difficulties in the future. But here, the decisive factor is still the strong efforts of our people."

"In the field of socialist revolution, party building work must be associated with the renovation and economic construction, cultural renovation and development. The strengthening of ideological and political work, organization and inspection work must be really associated with the productive labor movement, with striving for the implementation of economic and social plans."

"Indeed, if we compare the United States with us, the American empire is hundreds, even thousands of times stronger than us in terms of economy, quantity and quality of weapons and military equipment, when the war just started. But America is absolutely weaker than us in politics, culture, and at the same time inferior to us in science and military art."

"We hail our glorious fatherland from now on definitively rid of the slavery of foreign domination and the scourge of partition. We hail the beautiful land of Vietnam from Lạng Sơn to the Cape of Cà Mau, from now on completely in­dependent and free, and independent and free forever."

"We hail the new era in our nation's 4,000 year history - an era of brilliant prospects for the development of a peaceful, independent, reunified, democratic, prosperous and strong Vietnam, an era in which the labour in people have become the complete masters of their destiny and will pool their physical and mental efforts to build a plentiful and happy life for themselves and for thousands of generations to come."

"Unlike the leaders of Iraq or Argentina, Vietnamese leaders Ho Chi Minh and Le Duan made decisions cautiously and shrewdly, using force only after lengthy internal debate. Their approach paid off: the United States withdrew in 1973, and Vietnam was reunified in 1975. It was a stunning defeat for the democratic side, and Le Duan’s reward for the victory was a long career as ruler of a united Vietnam."

"We won against the US because our party had a correct and creative revolutionary line, and method. The revolutionary line is to raise the two banners of national independence and socialism. That is the source of all the strength of our revolution. That is also the truth, the power of the times. The revolutionary method is to apply an offensive strategy and know how to win step by step. With that line and method, our party and people have magnified the combined forces of our whole country and combined the forces of the Vietnamese revolution with the revolutionary forces of the new era, creating a powerful force. Synthesize the power of America and its minions on the battlefield to defeat them."

"Currently, the American imperialists are still planning to intensify and expand the war in order to recover from their current situation, which is one of defeat and stalemate. However, they also are eager for us to sit down with them at the negotiating table so that they can force us to make concessions. As for our side, we believe we cannot sit down at the table until we have caused the puppet army to disintegrate and until we have crushed the American imperialist will to commit aggression. This is very secret, and we have not yet advised any of the fraternal communist] parties of our position on this matter."

"Our party has concluded that the world revolution is now in an offensive position, and our party advocates an intensification of the revolution’s attacks against imperialism, which is led by the American imperialists, in order to maintain world peace and to push back, one step at a time, and overthrow individual components of world imperialism so that we can achieve victory for the world proletarian revolution."

"Our party’s experiences and our revolutionary realities have demonstrated that whenever we firmly maintain a spirit of independence and self-reliance we are able to be creative in our development of policies and directions, and we achieve success."

"Today, with boundless joy, throughout the country our 45 million people are jubilantly celebrating the great victory we have won in the central offensive and uprising this Spring of 1975, in completely defeating the war of aggression and the neo-colonialist rule of US imperialism, liberating the whole of the southern half of our country so dear to our hearts, and gloriously ending the longest, most difficult and greatest patriotic war ever waged in the history of our peoples' struggle against foreign aggression."

"Kimbangu wanted to be the saviour and the redeemer of the Negro race, as Mozes, Jezus, Mohammed and Buddha were for the other races, it would seem that the same idea has occured to Kassavubu."

"If I am under a moral obligation to support and defend the government within the limits set by the law, the members of the government themselves have a duty to work together as a team. Their policy must be the policy of the government and not that of one party, one race, or one tribe. It must be a policy which reflects the interests of the nation and which allows humanitarian values to flourish in freedom."

"The “heart of Africa” is resuming its rhythm and is beginning to beat at an increasingly normal rate. Yes, and it is not complacency:"

"Our experience has taught us that mutual confidence and respect between partners constitutes the basis of success of all efforts at unity."

". We can affirm, without fear of contradiction by history, that the assistance of the African countries which hastened to our aid in a brotherly way has been a decisive if not a determining element in our victory against foreign interest."

"Nothing can be built on hatred, bitterness, or on vengeance."

"We have suffered from tribalism, which is not only a Congolese phenomenon, but one which unfortunately occurs in various guises all over the continent and threatens the stability of our States."

"Belgium then had the wisdom not to oppose the current of history, and-a deed without precedent in the story of peaceful decolonisation-she let our country pass directly from foreign domination to full independence."

"I wanted to study the enemy on his home grounds."

"I proclaim in the name of the nation the birth of the Republic of the Congo!"

"Congolese of all provinces and races, we are bringing you independance... This independance has been won by a united front of all Congolese delegates."

"As soon as we were freed… we rid ourselves of those foreign bases on our soil which might have constituted a pole of attraction for the cold war in the very heart of Africa"

"We should prepare more knives and forks, buy more plates and sit around the table to eat Chinese food in the Western style, that is, each from his own plate. By doing so, we can avoid contagious diseases."

"If you make the mistake of capitalism, you should not be criticized. But we should have self-criticism."

"His biggest contribution [to China] is that he had helped restore order and right the wrongs."

"We are against the world war being fomented by the superpowers and also against all the local wars of aggression which they instigate or back."

"When I recalled [what] Hu Yaobang [had achieved] some 30 years ago, I deeply felt as if that was from another life. China has become a different country… And by his example, you can tell how much this [communist] party has backtracked."

"Journalists should give 80 percent of space to reporting good things and achievements and 20 percent to criticizing the seamy side of things and expose our shortcomings [...] This conforms with the reality of society."

"Hu Yaobang neither put his own, nor the Communist Party's grip of power before [the welfare] of the people. It was in his belief that people would live a better life should there be no intervention from country leaders and that the economy and society would revive itself should the party impose no social and economic controls. I'd say that no Chinese leaders before or after Hu have shared his vision or style of governance."

"I was always interested in Hu Yaobang. I was working in the U.S. government during the time when he was general secretary, and I always found him to be a very interesting man. He was not a typical leader. He was just a little short guy, had a very high voice, very kind of bouncy and interested in discussions of issues and so forth. He was not a kind of a Mao type, or even a Deng Xiaoping type -- a great leader figure. So I thought that was interesting. And the more I looked at the period of time when he was in office, the more it began to occur to me that that he was more of a reformer than Deng Xiaoping. Deng Xiaoping gets a lot of credit for the PRC reform efforts, and in some cases and there's a fair number of Chinese writers who actually believe that Deng does not deserve the credit that he's gotten."

"We should not blame foreigners for problems afflicting China. There are things in the West that should be considered acceptable to us, and things that are unacceptable. It is up to us to decide."

"It is not easy to capture a terrorist sanctuary like this (in Mali) ... but we (Chadian armed forces) are aware that this is just one battle in the war."

"“They threw at me not just the kitchen sink but also the toilet bowl.""

"Cleanliness starts in the toilet."

"Since we have no confidence in the government that has just been formed in Leopoldville and is led by Mister Lumumba, we have decided to declare Katanga Independent."

"I doubt that there are no Communists in the US State Department, I wonder, I don't understand that the Americans go along with the Russians and then say they voted reluctantly, so to speak."

"The future structure of Congo must be federal for us."

"I must return to Katanga because it is my responsibility to help the Katangese peoples."

"I never liked luxury, but I grew up in an environment of businessmen, in an environment where I had to sell goods, so I had to emit the quality of those goods."

"I've been living outside of the Congo for a year now. And I have often made it known that I wanted to return to Congo when the time was right. I remain convinced that there is general reconciliation possible between all Congolese and that this is the only absolute condition to get this country out of the misery and anarchy."

"I consider myself lucky that Emil Jurado taught me English for only one semester. I'm afraid to think of what my English would now be if he had taught me any longer. This is what I get for having been attentive during his class."