“Destiny so ruled that when I found myself at the helm of this state it already was clear that something was wrong in this country. We had a lot of everything - land, oil and gas, other natural resources - and there was intellect and talent in abundance. However, we were living much worse than people in the industrialized countries were living and we were increasingly lagging behind them. The reason was obvious even then. This country was suffocating in the shackles of the bureaucratic command system. Doomed to cater to ideology, and suffer and carry the onerous burden of the arms race, it found itself at the breaking point.”

—  Mikhail Gorbachev

1990s, Resignation Address (1991)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Destiny so ruled that when I found myself at the helm of this state it already was clear that something was wrong in th…" by Mikhail Gorbachev?
Mikhail Gorbachev photo
Mikhail Gorbachev65
General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union 1931

Related quotes

Wesley Clark photo

“We live in a liberal democracy…. That’s what we created in this country. I think we should be very clear on this. You know, this country was founded on the principles of the Enlightenment… It was the idea that people could talk, reason, have dialogue, discuss the issues. It wasn't founded on the idea that someone would get struck by a divine inspiration and know everything right from wrong. I mean, people who founded this country had religion, they had strong beliefs, but they believed in reason, in dialogue, in civil discourse. We can’t lose that in this country. We've got to get it back.”

Wesley Clark (1944) American general and former Democratic Party presidential candidate

Interview with Bill Maher, on Real Time with Bill Maher (5 September 2003) http://www.safesearching.com/billmaher/print/t_hbo_realtime_090503.htm

Calvin Coolidge photo

“This country would not be a land of opportunity, America could not be America, if the people were shackled with government monopolies.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

John Wayne photo

“I don't feel we did wrong in taking this great country away from them. There were great numbers of people who needed new land, and the Indians were
selfishly trying to keep it for themselves.”

John Wayne (1907–1979) American film actor

Sid Meier photo

“The irony is we thought we were behind the curve, that the industry had already peaked, and we were just trying to catch up.”

Sid Meier (1954) Canadian-American game programmer and designer

http://www.gamespot.com/features/sidlegacy/interview.html

Enrique Peña Nieto photo

“Mexico is a country that has a lot of energy potential. We not only have oil; we also have shale gas. But we cannot expect that a Mexican state company is the only one that can exploit the resources. Resources will continue belonging to Mexicans. They are the patrimony of the nation. But the Mexican state must find more efficient ways to exploit those resources.”

Enrique Peña Nieto (1966) 57th President of Mexico

Foreign Affairs interview (January 2014)

Tawakkol Karman photo

“I came from Yemen, the country of civilization, the Yemen that was led by two women, and it was one of the greatest countries in the world. We were led by a dictatorship regime, a corrupted regime. This regime was founded in killing others…My country has a lot of poverty, from a lot of diseases, from ignorance. And these are some of the reasons that led us to lead this revolution.”

Tawakkol Karman (1979) Yemeni journalist, politician, human rights activist, and Nobel Peace Prize recipient

2010s, Democracy Now! interview (2011)

Anastas Mikoyan photo

“There are no U. S. flyers in our country. The bodies were handed over to the Americans. We have no other bodies of flyers or living flyers in the Soviet Union. If we had, why should we try to hide them?”

Anastas Mikoyan (1895–1978) Russian revolutionary and Soviet statesman

Traveling With Mikoyan Quote By Quote (1959)

Lal Bahadur Shastri photo

“We want freedom for our country, but not at the expense or exploitation of others, not us to degrade other countries…I want the freedom of my country so that other countries may learn something from my free country so that the resources of my country might be utilized for the benefit of mankind.”

Lal Bahadur Shastri (1904–1966) The second Prime Minister of the Republic of India and a leader of the Indian National Congress party

“Birthdays could be such a bummer when you were older than the country you lived in.”

Lynsay Sands Canadian writer

Source: A Quick Bite

Jim Webb photo

“Friends are found on the battlefield, and unfortunately friends are also lost. And where do we find the measure of that sacrifice? How can we account for the value of that loss? Sometimes we can find an answer in our sense of country, at other times in our Corps. But clearly we can see it in the lives that were able to continue due to the acts of others who were not so fortunate.”

Jim Webb (1946) American politician, military officer and author

[2008-03-07, http://www.jameswebb.com/speeches/iworeunion.htm, February 2000, Speech at Iwo Jima reunion]

Related topics