Jonathan Powell Quotes

The War on Terror is the only war we have ever been involved with in which our enemy did not want the war to end…. Terrorists do not want to defeat us in the usual sense; they want us to become more like them.

All terrorism is theater.

Historically, terrorism falls in a category different from crimes that concern a criminal court judge.

They may be rich, they may be powerful, they may have atom bombs, but Americans and British are no longer safe anywhere in the world…. They may perhaps be able to put Al-Qaeda out of commission, but that does not mean that there will not be other groups. They have been killing so-called terrorist all these years, but there'll simply be more and more terrorists

Terrorists cannot win unless they affect the way we think and act.

Terrorism always has the advantage of surprise.

Terrorism is what the weak use to increase their bargaining power against the strong.

Terrorists continue to be outliers with limited appeal at best.

Terrorism is the intentional use of, or threat to use violence against civilians or against civilian targets, in order to attain political aims.

Terrorism is the best political weapon for nothing drives people harder than a fear of sudden death.

True terrorism, you know, weaponized fear. In defense of ourselves, we're fighting - actively fighting something else. But if you're going to fight terrorism, to me, you fight the root causes of terrorism.

I believe terrorism cannot be won over by military action. Terrorism must be condemned in the strongest language. We must stand solidly against it, and find all the means to end it. We must address the root causes of terrorism to end it for all time to come.

Transnational terrorism, in the form of the Salafi Jihadist movement, is fundamentally a function of globalization.

The uncertainty of the danger belongs to the essence of terrorism.

Terrorism needs to be fought against and certainly delegitimized or attacked, but some of the underlying grievances that might in fact lead individuals astray to terrorism cannot be ignored.

Terrorism takes us back to ages we thought were long gone if we allow it a free hand to corrupt democratic societies and destroy the basic rules of international life.

I never call it an insurgency. I call it terrorism.

Some people are more terrorist than others.

Terrorism is a significant threat to peace and security, prosperity and people.

Terrorism is not an enemy. It is a tactic used by an enemy in pursuit of a political objective. There will be no final victory against terrorism, but there may be victories that are close enough to final against particular political groups that use terror tactics.

The War on Terrorism does not distinguish between ordinary terrorists and those espousing a political ideology.

Counter-terrorism is not solely a military matter.

You can’t negotiate with them. You can’t buy them off. They want a change of the world. The only way to defeat the Islamic Fundamentalist terrorists is to persuade them to abandon their effort…. It must be an intellectual victory.

Terrorism is a means/a tactic, not an ideological or defined physical enemy

You cannot bomb extremism into submission