Leon Panetta Quotes
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I think the primary message to the world is that the United States is going to remain the strongest military power in the world.
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Well, you know, any defense force worth its salt has to be able to deal with uncertainty, has to be able to deal with events that we may not have planned for.
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The fundamental premise is that neither the United States or the international community is going to allow Iran to develop a nuclear weapon.
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Unfortunately these days, there is a hell of a lot that keeps me awake.
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I know that young people sometimes, caught up in the moment, make some very foolish decisions.
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Iran is isolating itself from the rest of the world.
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The Taliban is resilient.
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After every major conflict - World War I, World War II, Korea, Vietnam, the fall of the Soviet Union - what happened was that we ultimately hollowed out the force, largely by doing deep across-the-board cuts.
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I'm going to give people the benefit of the doubt.
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When the president went around the table to the country's national security leadership, Hillary was clear: We have to go get bin Laden. And our Special Operations Forces did just that.
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Today, I think the attitude is that governing is not necessarily good politics, and the result is that it's much more partisan and much more divided.
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Rather than undermining the Palestinian Authority, it is in Israel's interests to strengthen it by... continuing to transfer Palestinian tax revenues and pursuing other avenues of cooperation.
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Well, the United States is a Pacific power. And we have always had a presence in the Pacific.
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Well look, CIA is an agency that has to collect intelligence, do operations. We have to take risks and it's important that we take risks and that we know that we have the support of the government and we have the support of the American people in what we're doing.
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Frankly, my fundamental beliefs have not changed.
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Throughout the 40 years I've been in Washington, I've always worked hard, particularly with regards to the budget issues.
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One demonstration of extremists, any more than a Ku Klux Klan demonstration in the United States, is not necessarily reflective of what the rest of the country feels.
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If the Iraqis fail to implement the reforms, if they fail to get a handle on the violence, there's nothing the United States can do, militarily or otherwise, that can solve those problems. They have to assume the primary responsibility to govern themselves.
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You know, as director of the CIA, I got an awful lot of intelligence about all the horrible things that could go on across the world.
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The United States, and the president's made this clear, does not want Iran to develop a nuclear weapon. That's a red line for us. And it's a red line obviously for the Israelis so we share a common goal here.
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An aggressor nation or extremist group could gain control of critical switches and derail passenger trains, or trains loaded with lethal chemicals.
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The United States has to have the capability to deal with more than one enemy at one time and be able to confront them and win.
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The United States will do whatever we have to do to protect our forces.
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I don't engage in hypotheticals.