Top 74 Quotes & Sayings by Chuck Hagel

Foreign policy is all about a universe of bad decisions, imperfect decisions; every situation is different. The dynamics, the atmospherics, the people, the pressures, the geopolitical realities shift.

I would not trade America's position in the world - our ledger, our debts and assets - for any country in the world. There isn't a country in the world even close to America.

Peace comes through dealing with people. Peace doesn't come at the end of a bayonet or the end of a gun.

I have never believed you go to war in Iraq, you go to war in Afghanistan, and believe that you can deal with those battlefields, those countries, in microcosms, or narrow channels.

Institutions are imperfect. Governments surely are. People are.

Well, let's go back to the original intent of Social Security. It is an insurance contract.

Engagement is not appeasement. Engagement is not surrender.

Alliances and international organizations should be understood as opportunities for leadership and a means to expand our influence, not as constraints on our power.

My overall worldview has never changed: that America has and must maintain the strongest military in the world, that we must lead the international community to confront threats and challenges together, and that we must use all tools of American power to protect our citizens and our interests.

Bogging down large armies in historically complex, dangerous areas ends in disaster.

No one individual vote, no one individual quote or no one individual statement defines me, my beliefs, or my record.

People are not trying to get into China, they're trying to get out of China. The United States is the only great country where people are trying to get into to this country for obvious reasons.

Our foreign policy needs to support our energy, economic, defense and domestic policies. It all falls within the arch of national interest. There will be windows of opportunity, but they will open and close quickly.

No border that touches Israel is always secure.

The United States can't impose democracies. We can't impose our will. The Russians found that out in Afghanistan.

Imposing democracy through force is a roll of the dice.

Foreign policy will require a strategic agility that, whenever possible, gets ahead of problems, strengthens U.S. security and alliances, and promotes American interests and credibility.

I'm not saying my idea is the one and only idea. We should have other ideas, but the president has not laid down a specific plan as to how he's going to get us to solvency. I do that.

When I came to the Senate in 1997, the world was being redefined by forces no single country controlled or understood. The implosion of the Soviet Union and a historic diffusion of economic and geopolitical power created new influences and established new global power centers - and new threats.

You can't just drop the 82nd Airborne into Baghdad and it will all be over.

Our alliances should be understood as a means to expand our influence, not as a constraint on our power. The expansion of democracy and freedom in the world should be a shared interest and value with all nations.

It is easy to get into war, not so easy to get out.

The United Nations has a critical role to play in promoting stability, security, democracy, human rights, and economic development. The UN is as relevant today as at any time in its history, but it needs reform.

The Israeli people must be free to live in peace and security.

When you're dealing in situations that are uncontrollable and combustible, you try to stabilize the situation as quickly as you can and then work toward and work out toward democratic reform.

We live in a world where there are dangerous people, there are bad people.

Well, no American wants to in any way hurt our capabilities to national defense, but that doesn't mean an unlimited amount of money, and a blank check for anything they want at any time, for any purpose. Not at all.

I am fully supportive of 'open service' and committed to LGBT military families.

Well, Mr Obama inherited probably the biggest inventory of problems, certainly foreign policy problems, than any American president ever has. I think the entire inventory of problems that he inherited is probably as big overall as any president, certainly since Franklin Roosevelt and maybe, in some cases, worse.

I'm a supporter of Israel, always have been.

Nations, great nations have limitations. All nations have limitations. Even great powers have limitations.

Too often in Washington we tend to see foreign policy as an abstraction, with little understanding of what we are committing our country to: the complications and consequences of endeavors.

I have said many times that Iran is a state sponsor of terrorism.

I'm not sure leaders listen enough, especially to their people. And I've always thought in everything I've tried to do in my life, in the jobs I've had, is that if we can turn our transmitters off and our receivers on more often, we're better leaders and we know more of what is going on and therefore we can lead more effectively.

And this - this board was - was impanelled in 1951. And it's gone through ups and downs in how the secretaries have used it. But I have put a premium on that advisory board.

There's always a balance, I think, any administration has to find in not just the military but in any agency of government.

Palestinians caged up like animals.

Assad must go. He's lost the legitimacy to govern.

In a general way, if one cannot attribute to the Jew the whole responsibility of the situation, economic, political, and social, by which Algeria is being strangled, it is no exaggeration to recognize him as morally guilty, for the great part of his rìle here, still more than elsewhere, has consisted in corrupting, degrading, and disintegrating.

There are always consequences to actions that you take. There are consequences to inaction. And thinking through, asking the questions, "Well, then what happens? What comes next?" is critically important.

I took an oath of office to the Constitution, I didn't take an oath of office to my party or my president.

Things aren't getting better; they're getting worse. The White House is completely disconnected from reality. It's like they're just making it up as they go along. The reality is that we're losing in Iraq.

This is eventually how Syria will be resolved - through a political settlement.

You can have all the capabilities; if you don't have the quality people, you don't have much.

This current government in Iraq has never fulfilled the commitments it made to form a unity government with the Kurds, the Sunnis and the Shia. We have worked hard with them within the confines of our ability to do that but we can't dictate to them.

I think this is the biggest lesson a president or any of us who has responsibility to govern have to learn: There are always consequences to actions that you take. There are consequences to inaction.

I don't think it's a matter of going back and having a review of our process. Our process is about as thorough as there can be. Is it imperfect? Yes. Is there risk? Yes, but we start with the fact that we have an American that's being held hostage and that American's life is in danger and that's where we start. And then we proceed from there.

This is a complicated time to govern in the world today because of so much going on and it's coming at us at such an unprecedented rate.

There has to be a reason and objective (to air strikes). What does it do to move the effort down the road for a political conversation?

[Sheehan] deserves some consideration, and I think that should have been done right from the beginning.

We live in a world of absolute immediacy. It is an interconnected, combustible world, where technology and many other actions have given nonstate actors a reach, into countries and societies, for both good and evil, that we have never seen before. So it isn't a matter of just state versus state challenges or conflict. The bigger problem is nonstate actors.

The president of the United States is the commander in chief, and the people who work with him at the National Security Council are his arm in working with the Defense Department. And, quite frankly, they have responsibility for all of the government. We are one component of the government.

The recent wave of Taliban attacks has made clear that the international community must not waiver in its support for a stable, secure and prosperous Afghanistan.

Closing Guantanamo Bay is not a military solution. The closing of that prison, which I support, I supported it when I was in the Senate, requires more than just a military dimension.

I believe, and always have, that America must engage - not retreat - in the world.

The twenty first century will require a re-affirmation and re-definition of our alliances and international organisations.

History has shown that a country most effectively speaks with one voice. When nationally elected officials work together, build consensus, and provide leadership, the American people will follow.

We must prepare for everything.

Politics or ideology must not get in the way of sound planning.

No one person leads alone - can't do it, it's impossible. It doesn't make any sense. You need a team.