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Dean Acheson Quotes

1893–1971 United States

Dean Gooderham Acheson (April 11, 1893 – October 12, 1971) was the United States Secretary of State under President Harry S. Truman.

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Random Dean Acheson quote

31 quotes

"The test for aid to poor nations is therefore whether it makes them capable of being productive. If it fails to do so, it is likely to make them even poorer in the – not so very – long run."

Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (1969)

147, on the situation in Greece: "imminent collapse due to mounting guerrilla activity, supplied and directed from outside, economic chaos, and the Greek governmental inability to meet the crisis."

Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (1969)

"The best environment for diplomacy is found where mutual confidence between governments exists..."

Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (1969)

"… the situation was still too delicate for complete candor and the ultimate truth too unformed for statement."

Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (1969)

"The position of the United States had undergone a drastic change; the purpose and capabilities of the State Department had not."

Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (1969)

"If I have said nothing new tonight, it may well be because, in a family of nations as in families of individuals we should expect nothing more sensational than growth."

Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (1969)

The experiences of the years...have brought the country, particularly its young people, to a mood of depression, disillusion, and withdrawal from the effort to affect the world.

Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (1969)

a "mixture of frustration and progress is the daily grind of foreign affairs."

Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (1969)

Acheson's State Department "comrades...played a vital role in setting the main lines of American foreign policy for many years to come and...they may feel in their hearts that it was nobly done."

Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (1969)

"It is a mistake to interpret too literally and sweepingly the poet's admonition that things are not what they seem. Sometimes they are, and it is often essential to survival to know when they are and when they are not."

Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (1969)

"There is perhaps nothing more important in the world today than the steadiness and consistency of the foreign policy of this Republic. Too much depends on the United States for us to indulge in the luxury of either undue pessimism or premature optimism."

Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (1969)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Dean Acheson (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.