Anthony Zinni Quotes

In my view, airstrikes without an effective ground force are unlikely to make any meaningful contribution to defeating Isis.

Responding to terrorism inevitably implies military consequences. This may shock some people, but these groups must also be dealt with on a military footing. I won't use the word 'combat' to avoid being painted as a crusader.

We're making progress. Our military is assisting in Iraq. And we're hoping that within the year we'll be able to push ISIS out of Iraq and then, you know, really squeeze them in Syria.

If they listen to the military people, we probably wouldn't be having an ISIS right now.

Many in the U.S. military believe ISIS needs to be immediately, and repeatedly, smashed by American drones and warplanes.

Quote A: I don’t think we need boots on the ground I don’t think that is an option worth consideration. Quote B: This idea that we’ll never have any boots on the ground to defeat them [ISIS] in Syria is fantasy.

I think there are real dangers to escalating military conflict with ISIS, and we need to be aware of them. But at the same time, you have to understand, you know, that this whole thing started with Bashar al-Assad and how he is the one who continued to escalate against the people of Syria who were trying to get democratic reform.

In 2016, Washington and its coalition partners conducted more than 7,000 strikes in Iraq and Syria. And in Libya, the United States has conducted more than 350 air strikes since August as part of its military campaign against ISIS there.

If the U.S. wants to destroy ISIS, it can destroy ISIS. We won't end terrorism around the world. But we can destroy ISIS in Syria and Iraq. Prominent generals are telling us that. Prominent national-security strategists are telling us that. So let's do it.

I'm afraid you're gonna have to see more American military involvement in order to keep ISIS from spreading even further.

I have already said that I find the coalition air strikes to be insufficient. A ground intervention will be necessary to overcome Daesh.

In my view, it is only when civilians are protected that we will defeat ISIS, and until that is at the centre of our plan, I will remain an outspoken advocate for that cause.

We have to be willing to engage ISIS militarily, economically, and even on the Internet without delay. For instance, I think we waited too long to engage al-Qaida and the Taliban in Pakistan. And we should not make a similar mistake with ISIS elements throughout the world.

What we have done is when the threat has been directed at the United States, i.e., the terrorist threat from ISIL or Al-Qaeda in Syria, is to go after them.

We are not putting ground troops into Iraq ever again. And we're not putting ground troops into Syria. We're going to defeat ISIS without committing American ground troops.

It's easy to stand up and say I will destroy ISIS; I will make the sands in the Middle East glow in the dark. Well, that's fine, but you have to have something to do that with.

If you look at the current Mosul campaign against ISIL, for example the few thousand troops that we have there to support that effort allows the Iraqi military to move forward in an effective way.

You bomb ISIL. You're not trying to bomb innocent people. And that requires intelligence and confidence in our military to be able to develop the kinds of targets that we need. We're already doing Special Forces, who are going to help us gather that intelligence and help advise and assist and train local forces so that they can go after ISIL in areas like Raqqah and Mosul.

We need to destroy ISIS in the caliphate. That's - that should be our objective. The refugee issue will be solved if we destroy ISIS there, which means we need to have a no-fly zone, safe zones there for refugees and to build a military force.

We need to focus on killing the bad guys, not getting stuck in Middle Eastern civil wars that don't keep America safe.

Our objective is clear: we will degrade, and ultimately destroy, ISIL through a comprehensive and sustained counter-terrorism strategy.

Let me just suggest to everybody, and I hear - last February [2015], I said we needed to have people on the ground in a coalition with Europe and our allies. This is not going to get done just by working with the Sunnis. And it is not going to get done if we just embed a few people.

Instead of being a Woodrow Wilson democracy promoter we ought to hunt down our enemies and kill ISIS rather than creating opportunities for ISIS to take control of new countries.

Some of the same self-certified smart people, who preached about mushroom clouds and weapons of mass destruction, are once again trying to stampede us into war. They seem to think only with their guns. To those who want to shoot first and ask questions later in Iraq, I join in a firm 'No!' We've been there and done that, and America is still paying for their past failure.

There is no one else at all who is fighting ISIS on the ground, except for President al-Assad's army.