Top 91 Quotes & Sayings by Leon Panetta

I'm not big on commissions.

I think the primary message to the world is that the United States is going to remain the strongest military power in the world.

Rather than undermining the Palestinian Authority, it is in Israel's interests to strengthen it by... continuing to transfer Palestinian tax revenues and pursuing other avenues of cooperation.

When the president went around the table to the country's national security leadership, Hillary was clear: We have to go get bin Laden. And our Special Operations Forces did just that.

The American Dream has been defended, in every generation, by the brave men and women willing to fight and die for America. They are our greatest national treasure. They deserve a serious Commander-in-Chief.

Throughout the 40 years I've been in Washington, I've always worked hard, particularly with regards to the budget issues.

Today, I think the attitude is that governing is not necessarily good politics, and the result is that it's much more partisan and much more divided.

I think soon after I became director of the CIA - President Obama pulled me into the Oval Office and said: 'Look, I just want you to know that your top priority is to go after Osama bin Laden.'

The United States is going to defend itself under any circumstances.

China is a major power in the Pacific and I think we are dealing with some common threats in that region: the whole issue of Korea and the stability of Korea, the whole issue of nuclear proliferation, the whole issue of providing free access to our ships that are operating in that area.

She is smart. She is principled. She is tough, and she is ready. Hillary is the single most experienced and prepared person who has ever run for president.

Companies should be able to share specific threat information with the government without the prospect of lawsuits hanging over their head.

Well, you know, any defense force worth its salt has to be able to deal with uncertainty, has to be able to deal with events that we may not have planned for.

I don't think I should penalize people who were doing their duty.

If you're a terrorist, you're a terrorist.

Iran is isolating itself from the rest of the world.

I suddenly realized at the CIA that I had to make life-and-death decisions about people.

Winning in Afghanistan is having a country that is stable enough to ensure that there is no safe haven for Al Qaida or for a militant Taliban that welcomes Al Qaida. That's really the measure of success for the United States.

It doesn't make a lot of sense for us to borrow money from the Chinese to go give to another country for humanitarian aid. We ought to get the Chinese to take care of the people.

After every major conflict - World War I, World War II, Korea, Vietnam, the fall of the Soviet Union - what happened was that we ultimately hollowed out the force, largely by doing deep across-the-board cuts.

You know, as director of the CIA, I got an awful lot of intelligence about all the horrible things that could go on across the world.

Go forward, knowing that you are greater than the challenges of your time.

We either believe in the dignity of the individual, the rule of law, and the prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment, or we don't. There is no middle ground.

When you cut a half-a-trillion dollars from the defense budget, it affects almost every area in the defense budget.

If the Iraqis fail to implement the reforms, if they fail to get a handle on the violence, there's nothing the United States can do, militarily or otherwise, that can solve those problems. They have to assume the primary responsibility to govern themselves.

There's no question that the main location of Al Qaida is in tribal areas of Pakistan.

I don't engage in hypotheticals.

The fundamental premise is that neither the United States or the international community is going to allow Iran to develop a nuclear weapon.

Red lines are kind of political arguments that are used to try to put people in a corner.

Unfortunately these days, there is a hell of a lot that keeps me awake.

I'm going to give people the benefit of the doubt.

During my time as CIA Director and Secretary of Defense, Hillary was a strong supporter of our efforts to protect our homeland, decimate al-Qaeda, and bring Osama bin Laden to justice.

These days, it takes only seconds - seconds - for a picture, a photo, to suddenly become an international headline.

An aggressor nation or extremist group could gain control of critical switches and derail passenger trains, or trains loaded with lethal chemicals.

Frankly, my fundamental beliefs have not changed.

The United States will do whatever we have to do to protect our forces.

The United States was attacked on 9/11/12, and we know who attacked us.

I mean, the Taliban, my view is that they have been weakened. We have not seen them able to conduct any kind of organized attack to regain any territory that they've lost. We've seen levels of violence going down.

Iran's continued drive to develop nuclear capabilities, including troubling enrichment activities and past work on weaponization documented by the IAEA, and its continued support to groups like Hezbollah, Hamas and other terrorist organizations make clear that the regime in Tehran is a very grave threat to all of us.

Rising sea levels, severe draughts, the melting of the polar caps, the more frequent and devastating natural disasters all raise demand for humanitarian assistance and disaster relief.

The Taliban is resilient.

Well, the United States is a Pacific power. And we have always had a presence in the Pacific.

You know, one thing I've learned over 40 years is that when you have jobs in Washington, you do it day by day and that's what I'm doing as secretary of defense.

I mean, the Taliban, my view is that they have been weakened.

Al Qaeda still remains a threat.

My whole life has been dedicated to public service.

You don't deploy forces into harm's way without knowing what's going on.

I don't usually comment on columnists' ideas of what I'm thinking. That's a dangerous game to get into.

Well look, CIA is an agency that has to collect intelligence, do operations. We have to take risks and it's important that we take risks and that we know that we have the support of the government and we have the support of the American people in what we're doing.

In this century, the 21st century, the U.S. recognizes our prosperity and our security depends even more on the Asia-Pacific region.

The area of climate change has a dramatic impact on national security.

The United States has to have the capability to deal with more than one enemy at one time and be able to confront them and win.

When you're smaller and leaner, you're not going to have that large a presence throughout the world.

The United States, and the president's made this clear, does not want Iran to develop a nuclear weapon. That's a red line for us. And it's a red line obviously for the Israelis so we share a common goal here.

I don't think there's any question that America is safer as a result of the bin Laden operation.

I think what both Republicans and Democrats need to do and the leaders on both sides is to recognize that if sequester takes place, it would be disastrous for our national defense and very frankly for a lot of very important domestic programs. They have a responsibility to come together, find the money necessary to de-trigger sequester.

The last thing I want to do is to make the mistakes of the past.

I know that young people sometimes, caught up in the moment, make some very foolish decisions.

The potential for the next Pearl Harbor could very well be a cyber-attack.

We are a nation at war. This is also a time for hard choices. It's about ensuring that we are able to prevail in the conflicts in which we are now engaged. But it's also about being able to be strong and disciplined in applying our nation's limited resources to defending America.