James Forrestal Quotes

Pakistan is not about to crack down on terror groups or cut its military budget in order to build roads, schools and hospitals.

No nation, no matter how destitute, likes to be told how much military "security" to buy.

Every dollar needlessly spent on our military … diminishes our overall security.

An overstretched military undermines homeland security and our ability to meet threats around the world.

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.

And the Marshall Plan, to us, meant a general who had turned into a secretary of state, and that the secretary of state saw the necessity of the reconstruction of these European countries that had suffered so heavily.

What I say is, national defense is the most important thing we do in Washington, but there's still waste in the military budget.

There's no excuse for skimping on national defense when the country is at war.

The military always asks for more [appropriations] than it gets.

After World War II, the United States became the world’s undisputed leader, first by providing markets for the recovering European and Asian economies but also by offering international security.

Japan is the only country in the world that does not call its defense organizations a military. That is absurd, when the government is spending 5 trillion yen a year for self-defense.

Foreign policy debates are frequently segregated from domestic policy ones, so commentators who propose increasing the defense budget or sending more foreign aid are seldom asked to explain which domestic programs they’d cut or which taxes they’d raise, in order to find the money.

If you don't fund the State Department fully, then I need to buy more ammunition ultimately. So I think it's a cost-benefit ratio. The more that we put into the State Department's diplomacy, hopefully the less we have to put into a military budget as we deal with the outcome of an apparent American withdrawal from the international scene.

Rebuilding the military is something Putin will pay attention to.

I have spoken to Donald Trump about this. He understands the dramatic budget cuts our military has faced.

I have long maintained the military budget is not a jobs bill... and will continue to support the lowest budget possible.

Clearly, we need a strong economy to build a strong military.

If the military is to show the capabilities that we demand and expect of it, then the defense budget has to continue to rise.

To ensure prosperity here at home and peace abroad, we all share the belief we have to maintain the strongest military on the planet.

The U.S. has subsidized the armies of other countries while allowing for the very sad depletion of our military.

I will not cut our military budget by a trillion dollars, which is a combination of the budget cuts Barack Obama has, as well as the sequestration cuts. That, in my view, is making our future less certain and less secure.

Of course, ISIS is a terrible organization that has to be defeated. And, of course, we need a strong military. But just as with every other agency of government, you know what, the military also has got to get rid of waste and fraud and cost overruns.

Should we continue to spend billions to subsidize foreign military dictatorships, or should we concentrate on taking better care of the one we have right here at home?

We will strengthen our security by building missile defense, restoring our military might, and standing by and strengthening our intelligence officers.

But the federal government, our collective government, has responsibilities that none of these other levels of government can fulfill; and chief among these is national defense.