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Let's address the issue of how America deals with the Iraqis and how we deal with the region, recognize the fact that this is a misadventure, which it is in our interest to terminate and not to repeat. That's a rather important conclusion to draw, and a very important lesson.

Zbigniew Brzezinski

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Zbigniew Brzezinski
Age: 89 †
Born: 1928
Born: March 28
Died: 2017
Died: May 26
Author
Critic
Former National Security Advisor
Geopolitician
Pedagogue
Political Scientist
Strategist
University Teacher
Warszawa
Zbigniew Kazimierz Brzezinski
Zbigniew Kazimierz Brzeziński
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Regions
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Terminate
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Conclusion
Iraqis
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Draw
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Recognize
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More quotes by Zbigniew Brzezinski

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Yes, ISIS is a threat. It's more than a nuisance. It's also in many respects criminal violence. But it isn't, in my view, a central strategic issue facing humanity.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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The American people have to think hard about their definition of the meaning of the good life, that hedonistic, materialistic society of high levels of consumption, increasing social inequality is not a society that can be part of the solution of the world's problems.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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Like so many empires before it, the Soviet Union eventually imploded and fragmented, falling victim not so much to a direct military defeat as to disintegration accelerated by economic and social strains.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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Too rich to be relevant to the world's poor, [Europe] attracts immigration but cannot encourage imitation. Too passive regarding international security. Too self-satisfied, it acts as if its central political goal is to become the worlds most comfortable retirement home. Too set in its ways, it fears multicultural diversity
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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Acting alone in a world that's alive in political stirring is to condemn oneself to isolation and probably protracted warfare of the kind that can be dissipating.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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Benchmarks are targets that have to be fulfilled. They cannot be fulfilled in an indefinite period of time, so there are timetables in benchmarks.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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I never exploited my father’s role in helping Jews avoid the concentration camps...
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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We have actually experienced in recent months a dramatic demonstration of an unprecedented intelligence failure, perhaps the most significant intelligence failure in the history of the United States.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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I can't believe that the Russians really think they're more insecure because Estonia is in NATO. And we don't have forces poised in Estonia to attack Russia.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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Indeed, for almost 10 years, Moscow had to carry on a war in Afghanistan, unsupportable by the government, a conflict that brought about the demoralization and finally the breakup of the Soviet empire.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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I don't think there is an implicit obligation for the United States to follow like a stupid mule whatever the Israelis do. If they decide to start a war, simply on the assumption that we will be automatically drawn into it, I think it is the obligation of friendship to say you're not going to be making national decisions for us
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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The attitude of the American public toward the external projection of American power has been much more ambivalent. The public supported America's engagement in World War II largely because of the shock effect of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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The key point to bear in mind is that Russia cannot be in Europe without Ukraine also being in Europe, whereas Ukraine can be in Europe without Russia being in Europe.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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nation state as a fundamental unit of man's organized life has ceased to be the principal creative force: International banks and multinational corporations are acting and planning in terms that are far in advance of the political concepts of the nation-state.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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Most Americans are close to total ignorance about the world. They are ignorant. That is an unhealthy condition in a country in which foreign policy has to be endorsed by the people if it is to be pursued. And it makes it much more difficult for any president to pursue an intelligent policy that does justice to the complexity of the world.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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I was confident about America and the idea that in America people can become American without masking their ethnic identity.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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We didn't push the Russians to intervene, but we knowingly increased the probability that they would.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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America has exercised its power to insist on elections in Palestine, which Hamas did win. Once they won, we then engaged in a policy not only of ostracism, but by financial boycott, in effect of undermining it, and creating more tension and radicalism and poverty in Gaza, which was susceptible to exploitation by Hamas.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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The Israeli-Palestinian problem becomes very acute with Gaza dominated by Hamas. With the possibility of the conflict escalating, not only in terms of Gaza but also the Hezbollah and Lebanon, with the continuing crisis in Iraq, which is very dynamic and unpredictable and which could get out of hand, and maybe even escalate and enlarge.
Zbigniew Brzezinski
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I happen to think that as the Ukraine moves to the West, towards the E.U., eventually towards NATO, it will pave the way also for Russia moving towards the West. Because it will become a logical extension of the same process, and it will eliminate any imperial ambitions.
Zbigniew Brzezinski