- Don Tobin: Twenty years ago, I used to spend a lot of time talking about... hypothetical nuclear war scenarios with a man who was one of the pioneers in that form of prophecy... he's dead now... really believed in his craft. He said to me once, "Don, I'm convinced that sooner or later there will be a nuclear exchange - but I'm also convinced that when the leaders confront the terror of that exchange, they'll realize they can't get away any longer with playing war games, and they'll turn around... if there's anything to the power of prayer."
- The President of the U.S: [making a speech about the crisis] My fellow Americans: our country is faced today with a serious challenge. We have been asked, as a people, to make a decision so important that how the world evolves, the course it takes for the next century, will almost surely depend on what we decide. As your President, and with the valued counsel of the leaders of the Congress, the National Security Council, and the members of my cabinet, I have made that decision. My decision is to make it absolutely clear to those who would impose unreasonable and crippling restrictions on vital commerce... that such restrictions are unacceptable. To make a decision which would send a signal that is one whit less clear, less determined, would be to abdicate America's responsibilities to the free world.
- Don Tobin: I'm remembering that even in the midst of gastric spasm at the time of the Cuban missile crisis, there was something inside me that kept insisting that once the players came to the edge of the abysm and looked into it, that they would pull back. And even today, as black as it seems, I still hear that insistent voice that says that reasonable people, once they looked the devil in the face aren't going to shake hands with them.