Warren Christopher Quotes

Diplomacy: The patriotic art of lying for one's country.

Diplomacy [is] ... the art of restraining power.

Diplomacy and coalition-building are hard work and not easy for any president.

Richard Holbrooke is known for many things, but I will remember him as an impressive, sometimes even intimidating diplomat who understood the value of culture in diplomacy.

And so there has been a lot of diplomatic movement.

Yasser Arafat was the epitome of gracious Arab hospitality. I must have had 1000 meals with him. The problem was that he could never translate that hospitality to negotiations.

Let him (the king) also appoint an ambassador who is versed in all sciences, who understands hints, expressions of the face and gestures, who is honest, skilful, and of noble family. Such an ambassador is commended to a king who is loyal, honest, skilful, possessing a good memory, who knows the proper place and time for action, who is handsome, fearless, and eloquent. For the ambassador alone makes kings' allies and separates allies; the ambassador transacts that business by which kings are disunited or not.

Statecraft, as these cases convincingly illustrate, is demanding and often exhausting work. There are risks, and success is not guaranteed. It requires major governmental and political resources and the same kind of hourly, year-round planning and execution as the conduct of a military campaign.

Talking and diplomacy is often seen as a concession in America, in a way that it is not in other places.

The limits of diplomacy must be acknowledged.

We won’t be very successful with the Chinese leadership [on human rights issues] if we’re in their face all the time.

You'd make a great Secretary of State because State Department personnel don't answer questions completely either.

All diplomacy is a continuation of war by other means.

We have to develop preventive diplomacy.

Dr. Kissinger is a man you can talk to.

Diplomacy, is persuasion in the shadow of power.

Public diplomacy, practiced in harmony with traditional diplomacy, will enable us to advance our interest, to protect our security, and to continue to provide the moral basis for our leadership in the world.

Negotiations are the most essential tool of statecraft.

Diplomacy takes time.

Diplomacy is tough, slogging, slow work—and hard work.

Be careful what you say. Words matter. Words really matter in foreign policy.

I am neither frustrated nor planning anything other than being the best Secretary of State I could be.

I have always done my bit to improve Indo-Pak ties, but sometimes you say something, and it is interpreted the other way.

Diplomacy never stops, and, with or without an election, it never stops.

Diplomats were invented simply to waste time.