Rand Paul Quotes

The United States of America, justifiably and proudly, went to war in Afghanistan in early winter of 2001. The United States invaded Iraq on a false premise in the spring of 2003.

The decision to attack Iraq in March 2003 was discretionary; it was a war of choice.

Had the decision belonged to Senator Kerry, Saddam hussein would still be in power today in Iraq. In fact, Saddam Hussein would almost certainly still be in control of Kuwait.

Most liberals I know were for invading Afghanistan right after 9/11.

The use of military force against Iraq and Afghanistan was and remains just.

Let's be clear: Neither Secretary Powell or I opposed the notion of removing Saddam Hussein by force, but we wanted to avoid the war if we could. But if we couldn't, the notion of removing Saddam Hussein from the scene seemed eminently sensible, given that you had, what, 16 or so U.N. Security Council resolutions basically saying the same thing.

When Americans invade Iraq, Bush says, we will be greeted as liberators by the Iraqi people, proving that taking out Saddam Hussein was the right thing to do.

The Second World War is and was constantly being drudged up by Blair and Bush to rationalize the invasion of Iraq.

I'm one of the ones who believed the Iraq War was a complete mistake from the very beginning.

I was very much in favor of the Iraq invasion.

We have concluded that the U.K. chose to join the invasion of Iraq before the peaceful options for disarmament had been exhausted. Military action at that time was not a last resort.

There is no getting around the reality that the second Iraq war was a war of choice; had it been carried out differently, it still would have been an expensive choice and almost certainly a bad one.

I still agree with the invasion of Iraq. I don't agree with most of the decisions that accompanied it.

The United States armed forces and coalition troops deserve recognition and support for their work to remove Saddam Hussein from power, and ensure the safety and security of the American people, civilians abroad, and the people of Iraq.

Tony Blair took us to war in Iraq on the basis of the supposed threat of Saddam's weapons of mass destruction.

Whatever one wants to say about the conduct of the Iraq War, going to war to remove Saddam Hussein in 2003 was a necessary act. It should and could have been done earlier, had not the Clinton White House, which understood the need, not wasted the opportunity through timidity and bluster.

It was essentially for self defence that we went to war in Afghanistan and would go to war in Iraq.

Today, war of necessity is used by critics of military action to describe unavoidable response to an attack like that on Pearl Harbor that led to our prompt, official declaration of war, while they characterize as unwise wars of choice the wars in Korea, Vietnam and the current war in Iraq.

I believe very deeply in the proposition that what we did in Iraq was the right thing to do. It was hard to do. It took a long time. There were significant costs involved.

Well, what I've said is that the war in Iraq will always be clouded by how it began, which was a wrong premise, that there were in fact no weapons of nuclear - weapons of mass destruction.

For no good reason, George W. Bush and the best and brightest he could muster, including the likes of Paul Bremer and Paul Wolfowitz, decided it made sense to attack Iraq.

I’m not opposed to all wars; just dumb wars.

We're not going to spread democracy at the business end of a M16 held by a 23 year old Marine.

The Invasion of Iraq is unwise, immoral and illegal.

Regime change cannot be the objective of military action.