Quote

The United States has been a global power since late in the 19th century.

Robert M. Gates

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Robert M. Gates
Age: 81
Born: 1943
Born: September 25
Air Force Officer
Politician
Wichita
Kansas
Robert Michael Gates
Global
Late
Century
Since
United
Power
States

More quotes by Robert M. Gates

Image
In my opinion, any future defense secretary who advises the president to again send a big American land army into Asia or into the Middle East or Africa should 'have his head examined,' as General MacArthur so delicately put it.
Robert M. Gates
Image
Even when I was at CIA, I'd go to visit foreign leaders and I'd say, 'You know, I'm not a diplomat. I'm just an old CIA guy'... I said, 'If I wanted to be diplomatic, I'd have been a diplomat.'
Robert M. Gates
Image
I think Donald Trump has gotten China's attention to a degree that his predecessors have not that this is a very serious matter for the United States.
Robert M. Gates
Image
Well, I've ruffled a few feathers at all the institutions I've led. But I think that's part of leadership.
Robert M. Gates
Image
Some people have said, in so many words, that I'm kind of wooly-headed in believing that the Iranians would see not having nuclear weapons as more in their security interest than not.
Robert M. Gates
Image
It has become clear that America's civilian institutions of diplomacy and development have been chronically undermanned and underfunded for far too long - relative to what we spend on the military, and more important, relative to the responsibilities and challenges our nation has around the world.
Robert M. Gates
Image
Well, what I've said is that the war in Iraq will always be clouded by how it began, which was a wrong premise, that there were in fact no weapons of nuclear - weapons of mass destruction.
Robert M. Gates
Image
One of the big changes in the Congress since I first came to Washington is that all of these folks go home every weekend. They used to play golf together their families got to know each other, go to dinner at each other's homes at weekends - and these would be people who were political adversaries.
Robert M. Gates
Image
I read in the press, and therefore it must be true, that no secretary of defense had ever been quoted as arguing for a bigger budget for State.
Robert M. Gates
Image
One of the toughest battles in intelligence is combating conventional wisdom.
Robert M. Gates
Image
If Iraq and Afghanistan have taught us anything in recent history, it is the unpredictability of war and that these things are easier to get into than to get out of, and, frankly, the facile way in which too many people talk about, 'Well, let's just go attack them.
Robert M. Gates
Image
Things have gotten so nasty in Washington.
Robert M. Gates
Image
I don't think any president that I worked with has ever said 'pretty please.
Robert M. Gates
Image
You know, if I were an - if I were a Taliban, I'd say, 'What did al-Qaida ever do for me except get me kicked out of Afghanistan?'
Robert M. Gates
Image
I've been very sensitive for a long time to the repeated pattern, during economic hard times or after a war, of the United States' essentially unilaterally disarming.
Robert M. Gates
Image
I will always be an advocate in terms of wars of necessity. I am just much more cautious on wars of choice.
Robert M. Gates
Image
I think that Iran with a nuclear weapon is extremely destabilizing. I think it could precipitate a nuclear arms race in the region.
Robert M. Gates
Image
I didn't think this whole business with Director James Comey was handled well. So there are sort of day-to-day aspects of the operation that I think are really troublesome. And I know that there are a lot of people in the country who have lots of issues with decisions that Donald Trump has making on the domestic side.
Robert M. Gates
Image
If there's ever an example that military power alone cannot be successful in Afghanistan, I think it was the Soviet experience.
Robert M. Gates
Image
And so the greatest of American triumphs... became a peculiarly joyless victory. We had won the Cold War, but there would be no parades.
Robert M. Gates