Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.

Dwight D. Eisenhower delivered this line in a major Cold War address often referred to as “The Chance for Peace,” given on April 16, 1953, shortly after he became president. Speaking in the wake of Stalin’s death and amid intense U.S.–Soviet rearmament, Eisenhower argued that the escalating arms race imposed real social and economic costs. He framed military spending not only as a strategic necessity but also as a moral trade-off, insisting that resources devoted to weapons inevitably divert labor and materials from civilian needs. The passage reflects Eisenhower’s attempt to define a peace-oriented policy without appearing weak on defense.

Eisenhower casts armaments as an act of “theft” to emphasize opportunity cost: the true price of weapons is measured in foregone human welfare. By listing “gun,” “warship,” and “rocket,” he spans the spectrum from conventional arms to modern strategic technology, suggesting that no level of militarization is morally neutral. The rhetoric links national security to social justice, arguing that security purchased through endless accumulation of arms can impoverish the very society it claims to protect. The quote’s enduring force lies in its ethical accounting—treating budgets and production as choices with direct consequences for hunger, poverty, and dignity.

“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities. It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals. It is some fifty miles of concrete pavement. We pay for a single fighter plane with a half million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people.”

“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed; those who are cold and are not clothed.”