Barack Obama Quotes

We don't mind that we still have troops in Germany, or that we still have troops in Japan or Korea. But they are not in danger, and we know that they are in danger in Iraq.

We don't have enough American troops inside of Iraq to destroy ISIL any time soon.

You know, if you didn't pay close attention, you'd think we were the only people in Iraq and the only people fighting the terrorists.

The question becomes what kind of coalition can we build that will make a transition and empower the people of Iraq? The American soldiers' presence there is an act of provocation. There's a big red ball on the back of every American soldier in that country, so our being there contributes to the crisis, it does not resolve the crisis.

Iraq will require US occupation of undetermined length.

Iraq is not occupied, but there are foreign forces on its soil, which is different.

Make no mistake, our troops will be in Afghanistan and Iraq for a long time.

We will not send troops. Germany is not committed to Iraq - we will not commit ourselves with troops.

Nor should the U.S. military be forced to remain in Iraq essentially as an army for one side of a civil war.

We have to go in and win this war quickly, and then be prepared to help stabilize Iraq over an indefinite period, five to ten years, at a minimum, I believe, using a large fraction of American forces. This is a major undertaking that likely would require a total of 150,000 troops and could stay above 100,000 for several years

Within 120 days, we’ll win this war and get all U.S. troops out of the country, except 30,000

If anything, prolonged overseas military presence breeds radicalization.

In practice, the U.K.'s most consistent strategic objective in relation to Iraq was to reduce the level of its deployed forces.

Afghanistan would have been difficult enough without Iraq. Iraq made it impossible. The argument that had we just focused on Afghanistan we'd now be okay is persuasive, but it omits the fact that we weren't supposed to get involved in nation-building in Afghanistan.

The most foreign fighters in Iraq are wearing British and American uniforms. The level of self-delusion is bordering frankly on the racist. The vast majority of the people of Iraq are against the occupation of Iraq by the American and British forces.

President Obama is sending a couple hundred troops to Iraq. We spent six years trying to figure a way to get out of Iraq. And now we're back. But this time there is an exit strategy. Barack Obama has an exit strategy. In 2016, he's gone.

I would have troops where they’re wanted, in our bases in Kuwait. I would have a contingency in case of an international terrorist attack. Our involvement in Iraq has led us to fail to focus on the true threat, al-Qaeda in Afghanistan... It was a mistake.

I will begin to remove our troops from Iraq immediately.

We know definitively that Al-Qaida isn't all over Afghanistan anymore. According to CIA estimates, there are less than a hundred Al-Qaida members in the entire country. Most of them are in Pakistan. So, it's hard for me to understand why we're still fighting there and sending in more and more troops. I would get out of Afghanistan as quickly as possible.

We don't have this huge footprint, we are less likely to be targeted as, you know, occupiers [in Afghanistan and Iraq].

We are very fortunate to have someone else's weapons stationed on our soil, to fight those targeted on us.

U.S. military action in Iraq: It sure didn't work out well last time. Let's not make that mistake again.

I was not in favor of U.S. troops in Lebanon. And I voted against it.

The general election's taking place today in Iraq, so I guess that means we're one step closer to being there for another 10 years.

Today, I can report that, as promised, the rest of our troops in Iraq will come home by the end of the year.