Robert McNamara Quotes

The United States can't be sheriff of the whole world.

U.S. society doesn't want to play the role of international policeman.

The British can not alone act as the policemen of the world.

Americans cannot be the policemen of the world. We cannot protect countries all over the world.

The American Left complains that we have no right to be the world's police force. On the contrary. We've been the world's janitor for almost a century, and after September 11, it became obvious it's better, safer, and more productive to change things instead of cleaning up after the mess.

America has a rap sheet. You can't police the world and tell the world how to act when you're just as bad yourself.

I think that although we say we don't want to be the policeman of the world and et cetera, when 911 is dialed, it's the United States that has to answer the call.

We should change our attitude toward the United Nations. There has to be some power in the world superior to our own. We should not have attacked Iraq without the okay of the United Nations. Now we have to live with that mistake. We're living with it, and too many of our guys are dying with it.

One of the fondest expressions around is that we can't be the world's policeman. But guess who gets called when suddenly someone needs a cop.

Don't let anybody make you think God chose America as His divine messianic force to be a sort of policeman of the whole world.

America has saved the world most of the time, but messed it up a couple of times.

Is it our party's position that Americans are rich enough to police the world but not rich enough to take care of our own?

A world authority and an eventual world state are not just desirable in the name of brotherhood, they are necessary for survival.

If local civil government is necessary for local civil peace, then world civil government is necessary for world peace.

America cannot be the world's policeman. But we must reject the new isolationism that says: don't help anywhere, because we cannot help everywhere.

Both Russia and the United States are struggling to define their proper roles in the world.

The United States' job is not to police the whole world.

Since World War II, the rules-based international order created and maintained by the United States has benefited peoples around the globe and none more so than Americans here at home.

The U.S. cannot be the policeman of the world. When we tried that in Vietnam, they beat us up.

It's expensive to police the world.

Why does America always need to be the world's policeman?

I know that sometimes we, as Americans, we reach outside of our means, and every once in a while we like to 'police the world,' but I think we do a lot of good as well.

We have to acknowledge and discuss with citizens that Germany needs to take on more responsibility. One of the questions is, 'Can we keep a functioning international order?'

America is the world's policemen, whether you and I like that or not. That's a fact. People globally feel that.

That's the problem with the American position; they think that they are the police of the world.