Ronald Reagan Quotes
If it's to be a bloodbath, let it be now. Appeasement is not the answer.
Shortly after, he backed off the notion of having a bloodbath removing protesting students.
Ronald Reagan, 1911-2004, 40th President of the United States (Republican, CA), On what to do about student protests and disruptions over the Vietnam war at UC Berkeley, quoted in the Los Angeles Times, April 8, 1970
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
This appears to be the first American utterance of a longstanding doctrine of foreign policy.
In this case, he was referring to the situation with the Barbary Pirates who had an incredible extortion racket going in the Mediterranean. If nations would pay them an annual sum each year, they would not attack and seize merchant ships of that country and sell the ships and goods while holding the sailors for ransom. Jefferson favored and authorized war—a naval attack which for many reasons the European nations had not done (they just paid the tribute). Then a peace treaty was finally signed—the first American Treaty.
Ronald Wilson Reagan was an American politician who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989 and became a highly influential voice of modern conservatism. Prior to his presidency, he was a Hollywood actor and union leader before serving as the 33rd governor of California from 1967 to 1975.
