Quotes from
Stroustrup ("C++ Designer")
"More good code has been written in languages denounced as "bad" than in languages proclaimed "wonderful" - much more."
"It would be nice if every kind of numeric software could be written in C++ without loss of efficiency, but unless something can be found that achieves this without compromising the C++ type system it may be preferable to rely on FORTRAN…"
"FORTRAN is harder to compete with. It has a dedicated following who… care little fro programming languages or the finer points of computer science. They simply want to get their work done."
"I see C++ as a language for scientific computation and would like to support such work better than what is currently provided. The real question is not "if?" but "how?""
"C++ was designed to be a systems programming language and a language for applications that had a large system-like component."
"I am not among those who think that a single language should be all things to all people."