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You might be a cunning linguist, but I am a master debater.

Donald Rumsfeld

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Donald Rumsfeld
Age: 88 †
Born: 1932
Born: July 9
Died: 2021
Died: June 29
Author
Businessperson
Diplomat
Former U.S. Secretary Of Defense
Military Officer
Politician
Chicago
Illinois
Donald Henry Rumsfeld
Master
Masters
Funny
Might
Linguist
Linguists
Cunning

More quotes by Donald Rumsfeld

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Members of the U.S. House and the U.S. Senate are not there by accident. Each managed to get there for some reason. Learn what it was and you will know something important about them, about our country and about the American people.
Donald Rumsfeld
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I stand for 8-10 hours a day. Why is standing limited to four hours?
Donald Rumsfeld
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Secretary Powell and I agree on every single issue that has ever been before this administration except for those instances where Colin's still learning.
Donald Rumsfeld
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No. That's someone else's business. Quagmire is - I don't do quagmires.
Donald Rumsfeld
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If I know the answer I'll tell you the answer, and if I don't I'll just respond cleverly.
Donald Rumsfeld
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We have an orientation that tends to make us think that everything is our responsibility and that we should be doing this. It is the Iraqis' country, 28 million of them. They are perfectly capable of running that country.
Donald Rumsfeld
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Reduce the layers of management. They put distance between the top of an organization and the customers.
Donald Rumsfeld
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The reality is that [Barack] Obama has some 15 countries in the current Libya coalition. President Bush put together close to 50 countries for the Afghan coalition, some 40 countries for the Iraqi coalition, more than 90 countries for the Proliferation Security Initiative and over 90 countries in the Global War on Terror.
Donald Rumsfeld
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What is needed [to combat terrorism], in my view, is resolve, not retreat courage, not concession. Rather than thinking in terms of an exit strategy, focus on a strategy for success.
Donald Rumsfeld
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I believe what I said yesterday. I don't know what I said, but I know what I think and I assume it's what I said.
Donald Rumsfeld
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Don't divide the world into them and us.
Donald Rumsfeld
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There are things that we know, and there are things that we don't know. Then there are the things that we don't even know that we don't know. Those are the things that are the hardest.
Donald Rumsfeld
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When starting at the bottom, be willing to learn from those at the top.
Donald Rumsfeld
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Being Vice President is difficult. Don't make it tougher.
Donald Rumsfeld
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... something under $50 billion for the cost. How much of that would be the U.S. burden, and how much would be other countries, is an open question.
Donald Rumsfeld
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We do know that the Iraqi regime has chemical and biological weapons. His regime has amassed large, clandestine stockpiles of chemical weapons - including VX, sarin, cyclosarin and mustard gas. His regime has amassed large, clandestine stockpiles of biological weapons—including anthrax and botulism toxin, and possibly smallpox.
Donald Rumsfeld
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A terrorist can attack any time, any place using any technique and you can't defend everywhere against every technique at every moment.
Donald Rumsfeld
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Don't be a bottleneck. If a matter is not a decision for the President or you, delegate it. Force responsibility down and out. Find problem areas, add structure and delegate. The pressure is to do the reverse. Resist it.
Donald Rumsfeld
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Most of the 50 or so invitations you receive each week come from people inviting the President's Chief of Staff, not you. If you doubt that, ask your predecessor how many he received last week.
Donald Rumsfeld
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Pieces of intelligence, scraps of intelligence...you run down leads and you run down leads, and you hope that sometimes it works.
Donald Rumsfeld