Richard Armitage Quotes

Number one, that it is smart to communicate and negotiate with your enemy instead of just waging war with bombs and weapons of mass destruction.

We always have hoped that American diplomacy deploys itself in dialogue and persuasion rather than by ultimatums. That is the path we want in international relations.

I think we should all talk to our enemies and talk to our friends. Talk! That's the only way we'll find solutions.

And we ought to work our diplomacy first and I think it's a reason it's going to respond increasingly to our diplomacy particularly with the president's direct involvement in the peace process, and I think that's extraordinarily important.

It's better to have a dialogue with your enemies than not.

The art of diplomacy is to take your humiliations in private.

What matters is not whether one talks to adversaries but what one says to them, which strategies of engagement are set in place, and how competently they are executed.

Everybody's still talking about diplomacy and I'm very hopeful that as long as we talk about diplomacy, as long as we're not talking about enforcement measures, sanctions, et cetera, we are on the right track. But we need to accelerate the process.

When we're trying to solve difficult national issues its sometimes necessary to talk to adversaries as well as friends. Historians have a word for this: diplomacy.

Dialogue is good, America used to talk to Iraq all the time. Members of Congress don't have any special skill in weapons inspection. However, if members could be accompanied by weapons inspection experts, that could be a step in the right direction.

We've said to the Iranians all along . . . we still remain open to diplomacy. But it's been very clear that the Iranians don't want to engage with us.

Despite his deeply-held ideology, Reagan was willing to talk to Gorbachev. He willing to do business with him. We should realize that engaging with adversaries is often one of our great strengths. As long as we use the engagement to stand up for the things we care about, there is no harm in talking.

President Trump also mentioned that under the right conditions, he is willing to engage in dialogue with North Korea.

I don't think you can solve what's going on in Iraq unless you can deal effectively with the region and you can't deal effectively with the region if you start with the premise that you can't talk to people who disagree with you.

Create the impression of endless willingness to compromise and you almost invite deadlines. That's the challenge we now have in North Korea and have had in North Korea for 10 years. In this sense, diplomacy and foreign policy and other elements of political activity have to be closely linked and have to be understood by the negotiators

Diplomats do not know how to negotiate, they only know how to keep their job.

You cannot have a diplomatic offensive without talking.

Diplomacy can be a frustrating thing. I think the strategy can work, so long as the force is robust and the rules of engagement are clear.

Diplomacy, if properly practiced, is not just talking for the sake of talking.

I know that speaking with parties, which I do, but not very often, is seen by many as a 'contamination.'

A peace deal requires agreements, and you don't make agreements with your friends, you make agreements with your enemies.

Negotiating in the classic diplomatic sense assumes parties more anxious to agree than to disagree.

I'm simply saying that there are advantages in sending a skilled diplomat who can always say, 'I'll get back to you on that, Mr. Minister'.

To jaw-jaw is always better than to war-war.

If you want to make peace, you don't talk to your friends. You talk to your enemies.