Robertson Davies Quotes

We should stop giving aid to countries that hate us..

Our country! In her intercourse with foreign nations may she always be in the right; but our country, right or wrong.

American national security and American economic interests, of course - every president, every secretary of state - that is the primary goal. As you are in this job and in the work, you begin to see, though, that in the long run, both American economic interests and American national security are better served when there are other decent countries in the world who are both your allies and even when your adversaries are acting more decently.

I don't know what specific frontiers Germany could adopt for her purposes, but I think that those willing "to lend" a frontier to her can be found.

I recognize the United States is a superpower. It has various interests. It has to balance various things.

The national interest is predetermined by geopolitics or the history of a country. Important political leaders never just followed their interests - they were concerned about the interests of their people.

You see, psychologically, Australia must understand it has to live in the region around it. Australia must find its security in Asia; it cannot find its security from Asia.

Japan and China are isolated and without intercourse with other countries; hence the President directed me to attend to or watch the state of affairs in China also.

We should have been there shoulder to shoulder with our allies. Our concern is the instability of our government as an ally. We are playing again with national and global security matters.

Israeli interests are not necessarily in harmony with the American interests.

Diplomacy is not an end in itself if it does not advance U.S. interests.

I remain committed to a balanced policy, which will protect our national interests both on our eastern border - I mean with Russia - and of course with the European Union.

I have spent time discussing the American political system and current events in Taiwan with the junior diplomats, and they have repeatedly expressed their country's desire to avoid confrontation with China.

In the current environment, we find it very difficult to defend America, and so we keep our silence. Because, to be very frank with you, how can we defend America?

In 1983, all of us had U.S. passports, but because there was so much tension between America and the U.S.S.R., we were announced as a Canadian group.

When it comes to setting national priorities, determining threats, defining challenges, and fashioning and implementing foreign and defense policies, the United States and Europe have parted ways.

America's relations with complex Middle Eastern states such as Egypt are often difficult.

It is dangerous to permit conscienceless party politics to proceed to a point which does not hesitate to drag foreign politics and relations to a point with a great neighboring country into the vortex of partisan strife.

Governments interfere in the affairs of each other, when they conceive their own peace is endangered.

We do not want to tie ourselves ... to the United States, because she is unreliable ... and her statesmen do not know the mind of their own country.

I like to stand up to the Americans. It’s popular, but you have to be very careful because they’re our friends.

Once nations get emotional, their relationships can change at bewildering speed.

You should never make alliances with a decadent nation like France and a semi-barbarous nation like Russia

More and more countries, mostly all countries, do not want large American forces on their soil. That’s a reality. We can live in the denial of that, but we are also living in the reality of that.

An economic version of mutual deterrence is preserving the uneasy status quo between China and Japan.