quotd

"'We are certain,' declared Mikhail Gorbachev, at that time one of the candidates for the post of general secretary and at fifty-two years of age in 1984 the youngest member of the Politburo, 'that social progress cannot be stopped, that it is impossible to impede the historical progress of mankind's transition to socialism. And socialism means peace.' But 'peace', according to the party's new concepts turns out to be war! While rejecting thermonuclear war as a means for attaining its global aims, the USSR has by no means abandoned any of these aims. As Admiral Sorokin, director of the Main Political Directorate of the Soviet army and navy, declared, one of the most important missions of the Soviet armed forces is 'to defend peace throughout the world.' This is in fact a legitimization of military intervention wherever the interests of a 'just peace,' as interperated by the Soviets, require it."

--Mikhail Heller and Aleksandr Nekrich in "Utopia in Power" pg.723 © 1982