Justin Trudeau Quotes

Indeed, we're strongest when the face of America isn't only a soldier carrying a gun but also a diplomat negotiating peace, a Peace Corps volunteer bringing clean water to a village, or a relief worker stepping off a cargo plane as floodwaters rise.

I think most Americans believe that although it's better not to use military force if you can avoid it, that the world simply doesn't provide us the luxury of giving away military force as an important tool of foreign policy.

What I've learned, and will try to remember from now on, is that defending your country's credibility is never sufficient reason to fight a war.

Britain does not normally these days play a huge part in peacekeeping.

America must continue diplomacy, even as we continue the war, to expand the coalition of the willing to share the burden of war and to share the responsibility and the economic cost of rebuilding Iraq.

We would not have our country's vigour exhausted or her moral force abated, by everlasting meddling and muddling in every quarrel, great and small, which afflicts the world.

And, perhaps most importantly, regional conflicts will again and again confront us with a cruel choice between costly engagement and costly indifference.

We are a country that has many friends, many allies, when we operate in the world, we operate with friends and allies that's been true for decades and if we wind up going to war in Iraq it will be true in Iraq.

I think that war is diplomacy by other means, for sure, and there have been wars that have been fought for righteous reasons. There are wars that have had to be fought, and there will probably continue to be.

It is one thing to be against unilateralism and against nonhumanitarian interventionism - but it is quite another thing to be against humanitarian interventionism.

Most wars, after all, present themselves as humanitarian endeavors to help people.

We haven't been out in many of these countries helping them build infrastructure. How would they look at us today if we had been there helping them with some of that, rather than just being the people who are going to bomb in Iraq and go to Afghanistan?

American soldiers and marines are good diplomats in their own right.

War sometimes is a necessary instrument to bring clarity to a society.

There appears to be almost no way in which the deployment of military force ... could be brought rationally to bear upon the decision of any of the political, economic, emotional or philosophical issues by which men still remain divided.

When our vital interests are challenged, or the will and conscience of the international community is defied, we will act; with peaceful diplomacy whenever possible, with force when necessary.

If American lives must end, and American treasure be spilled, in countries we barely know, that is the price that change has demanded of conviction and of our enduring covenant.

Every war I have ever covered – Kosovo, Bosnia, Sierra Leone and Liberia – withstood all diplomatic efforts to end it until Western military action finally forced a resolution.

It is impossible to think of a world in which America was not there in the honorable service of humanity.

When I became secretary of state, I felt one of my primary jobs was building relationships around the world.

The Great Seal was an early proclamation of 'humanitarian intervention,' to use the currently fashionable phrase.

We are now changing the culture at the United Nations. And with that, we're changing the culture in the world in the discussions that we're having.

What some people argue is that Vietnam stands for the proposition that there's no role for American power anywhere on earth. I don't believe that's the case at all. I think we're the strongest force for democracy and for stability on earth, and we must have a strong capacity to perform that role.

The role that I played in Ukraine ended up resulting in Ukraine becoming part of the European community.

My childhood overseas instilled in me an appreciation for foreign languages and cultures, but also a deep understanding of the vital role of American leadership in confronting aggression abroad.