United States Congress Quotes

You know what I had a problem with? The war - the war in Afghanistan.

If the national security is involved, anything goes. There are no rules.

Except in case of attack by armed forces … the people shall have the sole power by a national referendum to declare war or to engage in warfare overseas.

I make no apologies for us wanting to do this [bombing Iraq and Syria] appropriately and in a way that is consistent with American values.

Declarations of war have never been a constitutional requirement for military action abroad.

If we have actionable intelligence about high value terrorist targets and President [Pervez] Musharraf will not act, we will.

It's like [Donald's Trump] plan to defeat ISIS. He says it's a secret plan, but the only secret is that he has no plan.

We need, from time to time, to use military force or all of the resources at our command in order to defend the nation and defend our friends. Sometimes, that requires us to take actions that generate controversy. I think there are probably some who actually believe, if we just go talk nice to these folks, everything is going to be OK. I don't think the world works that way.

The president does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation. As commander in chief, the president does have a duty to protect and defend the United States. In instances of self-defense, the president would be within his constitutional authority to act before advising Congress or seeking its consent.

If the United States had not intervened in Afghanistan, then obviously, we would have then allowed the attacks of 9/11 to go unanswered. I don't think most of Americans wanted that to happen.

The best defense against terrorism is a strong offensive against terrorists. That work continues.

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.

There was in the House only one dissenting vote, from Barbara J. Lee, a Democrat from California, who warned that military action could not guarantee the safety of the country and that 'as we act, let us not become the evil we deplore.

If not in the interests of the state, do not act. If you cannot succeed, do not use troops. If you are not in danger, do not fight.

I will be as careful as I can in making the most significant decisions any president and commander-in-chief can make about sending our men and women into harm's way.

We know about bad guys, what they do, and often, who they are. The politicians have chosen to send us into battle, and that's our trade. We do what's necessary. And in my view, once those politicians have elected to send us out to do what 99.9 percent of the country would be terrified to undertake, they should get the hell out of the way and stay there.

We have an authorization to use military force against terrorists. We passed it after 9/11.

The purpose of war is to support your government's decisions by force.

After Mitt Romney said it would be naive to go into Pakistan to pursue the terrorists, it took President Obama, against the advice of many, to give that order and finally rid this earth of Osama bin Laden. Ask Osama bin Laden is he is better off now than he was four years ago.

I would not have had our troops in Iraq.

The United States has an absolute duty to attack terrorism where it lives and breeds, in order to prevent future attacks on American citizens around the world. The American people stand united in the face of terrorism. The men and women who undertook this mission deserve our praise and prayers.

If we have Osama bin Laden in our sights and the Pakistani government is unable or unwilling to take them out, then, I think that we have to act and we will take them out. We will kill bin Laden. We will crush al Qaeda. That has to be our biggest national security priority.

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

When any kind of military action is popular it's because either there's been a very clear, direct threat to us - 9/11 - or an administration uses various hooks to suggest that American interests were directly threatened - like in Panama or Grenada. And sometimes, those hooks are more persuasive than others, but typically, they're not put before Congress.

I happen to be one of those in the antiwar part of things who actually supported Bill Clinton when he sent the cruise missiles in to take out bin Laden. I had thought we had the right to use Special Forces to go in for bin Laden. He had attacked American embassies. He attacked ships. And so, I didn't see any need to coddle the Taliban.