Video: 'President Kennedy radio and television address on the Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, July 26, 1963'

(Friday, July 26, 1963, 7:00 p.m. EDT; during the Cold War) — U.S. President John F. Kennedy, speaking to the nation tonight in a “spirit of hope,” described the treaty for a Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty as a “victory for mankind” in its pursuit of peace.

The treaty, initialed in Moscow on July 25, 1963, by representatives of the United States, the Soviet Union and Britain, would ban nuclear tests in the atmosphere, outer space and under water.

Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko, U.S. Undersecretary of State W. Averell Harriman, and the British Minister of Science, Lord Hailsham, gave their tentative approval at the Spiridonovka Palace in Moscow, in advance of the formal signing.

Kennedy conceded the limitations of the treaty and the fact that it could be abrogated or violated. But he said several times it did not endanger the military security of the U.S.

Rather, he said, the risks of a continued arms race, a proliferation of nuclear weapons among other nations, and a further poisoning of the atmosphere with radioactivity far outweighed any-risks the test ban might bring.

Describing the agreement as a “shaft of light cut into the darkness” of Cold War discords and tensions, Kennedy nonetheless warned that it was “not the millenium.”

“It will not resolve all conflicts, or cause the Communists to forego their ambitions, or eliminate the dangers of war,” he said. “It will not reduce our need for arms or allies or programs of assistance to others.”