Chuck Hagel
The United Nations has a critical role to play in promoting stability, security, democracy, human rights, and economic development. The UN is as relevant today as at any time in its history, but it needs reform.Collection: History
Alliances and international organizations should be understood as opportunities for leadership and a means to expand our influence, not as constraints on our power.Collection: Leadership
Peace comes through dealing with people. Peace doesn't come at the end of a bayonet or the end of a gun.
Well, Mr Obama inherited probably the biggest inventory of problems, certainly foreign policy problems, than any American president ever has. I think the entire inventory of problems that he inherited is probably as big overall as any president, certainly since Franklin Roosevelt and maybe, in some cases, worse.
Engagement is not appeasement. Engagement is not surrender.
You can't just drop the 82nd Airborne into Baghdad and it will all be over.
Our foreign policy needs to support our energy, economic, defense and domestic policies. It all falls within the arch of national interest. There will be windows of opportunity, but they will open and close quickly.
Foreign policy will require a strategic agility that, whenever possible, gets ahead of problems, strengthens U.S. security and alliances, and promotes American interests and credibility.
I'm not saying my idea is the one and only idea. We should have other ideas, but the president has not laid down a specific plan as to how he's going to get us to solvency. I do that.
Our alliances should be understood as a means to expand our influence, not as a constraint on our power. The expansion of democracy and freedom in the world should be a shared interest and value with all nations.
Well, let's go back to the original intent of Social Security. It is an insurance contract.
Foreign policy is all about a universe of bad decisions, imperfect decisions; every situation is different. The dynamics, the atmospherics, the people, the pressures, the geopolitical realities shift.
We live in a world where there are dangerous people, there are bad people.
Nations, great nations have limitations. All nations have limitations. Even great powers have limitations.
I have never believed you go to war in Iraq, you go to war in Afghanistan, and believe that you can deal with those battlefields, those countries, in microcosms, or narrow channels.
The Israeli people must be free to live in peace and security.
I am fully supportive of 'open service' and committed to LGBT military families.
No one individual vote, no one individual quote or no one individual statement defines me, my beliefs, or my record.
My overall worldview has never changed: that America has and must maintain the strongest military in the world, that we must lead the international community to confront threats and challenges together, and that we must use all tools of American power to protect our citizens and our interests.
The United States can't impose democracies. We can't impose our will. The Russians found that out in Afghanistan.
When you're dealing in situations that are uncontrollable and combustible, you try to stabilize the situation as quickly as you can and then work toward and work out toward democratic reform.
Institutions are imperfect. Governments surely are. People are.
Too often in Washington we tend to see foreign policy as an abstraction, with little understanding of what we are committing our country to: the complications and consequences of endeavors.
It is easy to get into war, not so easy to get out.
When I came to the Senate in 1997, the world was being redefined by forces no single country controlled or understood. The implosion of the Soviet Union and a historic diffusion of economic and geopolitical power created new influences and established new global power centers - and new threats.
Bogging down large armies in historically complex, dangerous areas ends in disaster.
Imposing democracy through force is a roll of the dice.
I'm a supporter of Israel, always have been.
I would not trade America's position in the world - our ledger, our debts and assets - for any country in the world. There isn't a country in the world even close to America.
People are not trying to get into China, they're trying to get out of China. The United States is the only great country where people are trying to get into to this country for obvious reasons.
No border that touches Israel is always secure.
I have said many times that Iran is a state sponsor of terrorism.
Well, no American wants to in any way hurt our capabilities to national defense, but that doesn't mean an unlimited amount of money, and a blank check for anything they want at any time, for any purpose. Not at all.
Politics or ideology must not get in the way of sound planning.Collection: Sound
I took an oath of office to the Constitution, I didn't take an oath of office to my party or my president.Collection: Party
Closing Guantanamo Bay is not a military solution. The closing of that prison, which I support, I supported it when I was in the Senate, requires more than just a military dimension.Collection: Military
There are always consequences to actions that you take. There are consequences to inaction. And thinking through, asking the questions, "Well, then what happens? What comes next?" is critically important.Collection: Thinking
No one person leads alone - can't do it, it's impossible. It doesn't make any sense. You need a team.Collection: Team
We live in a world of absolute immediacy. It is an interconnected, combustible world, where technology and many other actions have given nonstate actors a reach, into countries and societies, for both good and evil, that we have never seen before. So it isn't a matter of just state versus state challenges or conflict. The bigger problem is nonstate actors.Collection: Country
You can have all the capabilities; if you don't have the quality people, you don't have much.Collection: People
And this - this board was - was impanelled in 1951. And it's gone through ups and downs in how the secretaries have used it. But I have put a premium on that advisory board.Collection: Military
Things aren't getting better; they're getting worse. The White House is completely disconnected from reality. It's like they're just making it up as they go along. The reality is that we're losing in Iraq.Collection: Reality
The president of the United States is the commander in chief, and the people who work with him at the National Security Council are his arm in working with the Defense Department. And, quite frankly, they have responsibility for all of the government. We are one component of the government.Collection: Responsibility
I'm not sure leaders listen enough, especially to their people. And I've always thought in everything I've tried to do in my life, in the jobs I've had, is that if we can turn our transmitters off and our receivers on more often, we're better leaders and we know more of what is going on and therefore we can lead more effectively.Collection: Jobs
This is a complicated time to govern in the world today because of so much going on and it's coming at us at such an unprecedented rate.Collection: World
I think this is the biggest lesson a president or any of us who has responsibility to govern have to learn: There are always consequences to actions that you take. There are consequences to inaction.Collection: Responsibility
Assad must go. He's lost the legitimacy to govern.Collection: Legitimacy
History has shown that a country most effectively speaks with one voice. When nationally elected officials work together, build consensus, and provide leadership, the American people will follow.Collection: Country
This current government in Iraq has never fulfilled the commitments it made to form a unity government with the Kurds, the Sunnis and the Shia. We have worked hard with them within the confines of our ability to do that but we can't dictate to them.Collection: Military
There has to be a reason and objective (to air strikes). What does it do to move the effort down the road for a political conversation?Collection: Military