Benjamin Wade Quotes

Our policy is to deepen the relations with all the countries in the world - monarchies, kingdoms, large powers - we want to respect all differences and have our relationships based on mutual respect.

Friends from the press, China needs to learn more about the world, and the world also needs to learn more about China. I hope you will continue to make more efforts and contributions to deepening the mutual understanding between China and the countries of the world.

Diplomacy is like jazz: endless variations on a theme.

Between major countries, there certainly always are some common ground and points of tension.

Much of the relationship between the peoples of two countries has nothing to do with treaties or pieces of paper exchanged by people like me.

Sometimes everyone is foreign minister.

Diplomacy is a little bit like Jazz. It’s improvisation on a theme.

The European family may well be anything but perfect. But it is the best thing that we have for bringing the countries of Europe around the same table and for forging compromises so that people here can live in peace, freedom, and prosperity.

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

The best diplomacy starts with getting to know each other.

My job is to communicate to the American people that the Muslim world is filled with extraordinary people who simply want to live their lives and see their children live better lives. My job to the Muslim world is to communicate that the Americans are not your enemy. We sometimes make mistakes. But if you look at the track record America was not born as a colonial power, and that the same respect and partnership that America had with the Muslim world as recently as 20 or 30 years ago, there's no reason why we can't restore that. And that I think is going to be an important task.

I think it also important that the policies of the great nations be made simple and clear, so that the chance of misunderstanding is minimized.

There must of course always be separate interests of different nations which their governments are bound to maintain, but there are also common interests in which all civilized nations share. These common interests arise from the interdependence of civilized peoples and they are a product of developing civilization.

We don’t tell others how to run their countries.

… diplomatic relations are merely practical conveniences and not measures of moral judgment.

The people of China well over a century have been, in thought and in objective, closer to us Americans than almost any other peoples of the world—the same great ideals.

I believe mutual respect for one another and cooperation should be the basis for relationships with foreign nations.

As our relationship with China grows and matures, tensions will naturally emerge.

It's an honor to be presented with an opportunity to follow in the footsteps of my mentor, Mike Mansfield, who worked to strengthen and improve America's important relationships throughout Asia.

I learned during my term and in the presidency that we should not discuss about assumptions or insinuations. If one day I have to do something against the U.S., the first one to get to know what I was going to do would be the president of the U.S.

I don't think it is so difficult to solve the problems between Cuba and the United States; it all depends on whether there is a dialogue, a discussion, or if the prejudices and hatred of people like the extremists and terrorists from the Cuban community, who try to impose their policies, prevail.

Europe and the United States are better off extending a helping hand to those who know best rather than dictating to them an unfamiliar future.

It's been a great privilege to see how interwoven nations are and how incredibly complex these relationships are. It's so elaborate.

Working with Russia, we worked with Iran. Are they our friends? You have to take each situation uniquely.

I grew up thinking that I would be an ambassador secret agent. From age 14 to right before I graduated college, I was really interested in the foreign service and the United Nations. I learned to speak French, Turkish, and all these things.