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After the '30s, we said, no more Munichs. And it got us in a lot of problems. Then we said, No more Vietnams. Now if we say, No more Iraqs, the next one won't be an Iraq. It will be something different. You can't learn lessons.

Brent Scowcroft

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Brent Scowcroft
Age: 95 †
Born: 1925
Born: March 19
Died: 2020
Died: August 6
Former National Security Advisor
Geopolitician
Military Officer
Politician
Ogden
Utah
Lessons
Problems
Learn
Next
Problem
Different
Something
Vietnam
Iraq

More quotes by Brent Scowcroft

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For most of mankind, the average person knew what was happening in his own village and the next one, and nothing beyond that, and he didn't care, so that leaders were able to guide their countries almost irrespective of what people really thought because they weren't involved in it. Now, everybody knows what's happening instantaneously.
Brent Scowcroft
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We have never recognized that Iran lives in a dangerous neighborhood. And it's not surprising that they want some protection. We have not been forthcoming about explaining a security relationship for the region, in which Iran can feel secure and thus maybe willing to do something.
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An idea can be as flawless as can be, but its execution will always be full of mistakes.
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The Europeans must finally understand the incredible shock triggered by the attacks of September 11.
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You know, different people are going to react different ways. And I don't think we should be intolerable because people do things a little differently.
Brent Scowcroft
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To sum up, the position we took was that since we didn't know the internal situation in Iraq nor Saddam Hussein, that our best bet was to take counsel from the people who did know him and who did deal with him.
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I think that America is a part of the world, that we want to cooperate with the world. We are not the dominant power in the world, that everyone falls in behind us. But we want to reach out and cooperate.
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We must find out where the roots of terrorism lie.
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The radical elements in Islam are very dangerous. They want to achieve a return to the Islamic purity of the Middle Ages.
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America wants to work with friends, with allies, with people of good will, to make this a better world.
Brent Scowcroft
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Much of what we know about mathematics and trade comes from the Arabs. Then came stagnation, and now they're the West's whipping boy. This is a problem that cannot be solved overnight, and certainly not militarily.
Brent Scowcroft
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The radical elements in Islam are very dangerous.
Brent Scowcroft
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The Russians are not going to do what we want them to do because we want them to do it.
Brent Scowcroft
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If Iraq were to descend into chaos, the Europeans would feel the effects just as much as we would.
Brent Scowcroft
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Everybody is within reach of a television set. And so they're all politicized, and they're all stimulated, and then they have these desires, pleasures, hates, resentments, and so on, and they're reacting instantaneously.
Brent Scowcroft
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We can't make China a friend, but we can behave to make them an enemy.
Brent Scowcroft
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Europeans are familiar with terrorism and violence. We have not experienced a true conflict on our soil in a hundred years, and especially not one that involved 3,000 dead.
Brent Scowcroft
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Perhaps the most troubling area in the world goes from the Balkans through the Middle East and in Central Asia.
Brent Scowcroft
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We believe we are creating the beginning of a new world order coming out of the collapse of the US-Soviet antagonisms.
Brent Scowcroft
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Information technology has politicized the world's population.
Brent Scowcroft