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Nationalism is like cheap alcohol. First it makes you drunk, then it makes you blind, then it kills you.

Daniel Fried

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Daniel Fried
Age: 72
Born: 1952
Born: January 1
Diplomat
Washington
District of Columbia
Cheap
Alcohol
Drunk
Blind
Makes
Firsts
First
Nationalism
Like
Kills

More quotes by Daniel Fried

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[Russians would like to] undermine the West and its institutions, create doubts about NATO, create doubts about the European Union, support nationalists on the right just as the Soviet communists supported communists on the left. Weaken the West in general and create an atmosphere in which we`re uncertain about ourselves.
Daniel Fried
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My 40 years in the foreign service and the careers of many of my friends became associated with the fall of the Soviet Empire and the putting in order of what came after - the building of a Europe whole, free, and at peace. It`s hard to recall today how improbable victory in the Cold War appeared.
Daniel Fried
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America's security and prosperity didn't work unless other nations were also secure, and prosperous. There had to be something in it for them, so we weren't looking simply to grab territory, or widen our sphere of influence, or anything like that. We wanted to make the world a better place, and get very rich in the process.
Daniel Fried
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Sanctions are a strong and agreed element of the West's response to Russia's aggression. It is puzzling to me that there is so much skepticism about the sanctions. I don't understand it.
Daniel Fried
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At least in my country, we have come to accept the flags burning, but what we cannot accept is violence, burning of embassies and intimidations, and there is no excuse for that.
Daniel Fried
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Nothing can be taken for granted and this great achievement is now under assault by Russia. But what we did in my time is no less honorable. It is for the present generation to defend.
Daniel Fried
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Diminish us across the board. They [Russians] do not wish us well.
Daniel Fried
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Our mistakes, blunders, flaws, and shortcomings notwithstanding, the world America made after 1945 and 1989 has enjoyed the longest period of general peace in the west since Roman times, and decades of prosperity.
Daniel Fried
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Remember, the American grand strategy works when other countries feel secure. But it doesn't work if we acquiesce in the aggression of other countries.
Daniel Fried
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We should not assume that Russia is doomed to live according to its worst traditions. In fact, in Russian history, failed efforts at external aggression, when they fail, usually bring on areas of internal reform.
Daniel Fried
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America's grand strategy did not come from nowhere. It followed from our deeper conception of ourselves, and our American identity. Who are we, Americans? What is our nation? We are not an ethnostate with identity rooted in shared blood. The option of a white man's republic ended at Appomattox.
Daniel Fried
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[Donald Trump administration] didn`t ask me to stay and 40 years seemed like enough.
Daniel Fried
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I think, Russia is pushing against the West in general, not just the United States but the institutions of the West, the key governments in the West using a variety of tools, as well as military assault on Ukraine.
Daniel Fried
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The Russians are using the tools at their disposal to weaken Western solidarity, to create doubt, to support nationalist parties, just as the old Soviets supported leftist parties. We need a united Western response to this multi-pronged threat.
Daniel Fried
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It was my honor to have done what I could do to help. I learned to never underestimate the possibility of change, that values have power and that time and patience can pay off, especially if you`re serious about your objectives.
Daniel Fried
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The Civil War was fought, in a sense, over whether that sentence - all men are created equal - is to be taken literally. And the southerners in the 1850s argued that it was not.
Daniel Fried
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Don't mistake the Russia you want to exist for the Russia that there actually is. Be realistic.
Daniel Fried
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We are a new nation conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. That's what makes us Americans. When we sign onto that belief, we sign onto the core American identity, and that's very deep in us.
Daniel Fried
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The sense the great democracies of the world - Europe, the United States, Japan, others - are going to set the agenda for the world. [Russians] want to bring that down.
Daniel Fried
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The United States comes in 1945 and we basically blow the whistle.
Daniel Fried