Pat Roberts Quotes

It's very strange getting out of the military, when you've lived in Iraq, and people you know are going overseas again and again. Some of them are getting injured.

When we ask American men and women in uniform to fight for this country and to defend this country's interest and then to send them overseas, there is no question we have an obligation to protect them and provide for their safety.

That's driven by any number of factors, the most prominent of which have been the combat experience of two major campaigns - one in Afghanistan and the other in Iraq - and the ongoing demands of the global war on terrorism.

With a nation at war against terrorism and our men and women on the front line defending our homeland from abroad, resources need to be prioritized and allocated properly.

Our military is overextended. Nine out of 10 active-duty Army divisions are either in Iraq, going to Iraq or have come back from Iraq. One way or the other, they're wrapped up in it.

When you combine the men and women deployed from our military installations with activated reservists and members of the National Guard, Georgia is contributing more personnel to the theatre than any other State in our Union.

So a truthful assessment of how America is doing in the war on terror as a result of President Bush's war on Iraq is that we have been set back by decades.

Anybody who was in the military or a military family has a certain sensitivity to the separation. Everyone knows military wives have the hardest jobs. I was born into one. When I think back to those days, I didn't appreciate it then.

We ought to recognize that we have an offensive responsibility to take the war to the terrorists where they are. That responsibility has waned in the last year as military and intelligence resources were withdrawn from Afghanistan and Pakistan to be used in Iraq.

There's a tendency to look at anybody who joined the military as if they underwrote everything that happened policy-wise. That's not really the case. I have a friend who both protested the Iraq War and joined the military, and ended up serving two deployments in Afghanistan.

And most countries are now reducing the number of conscripts and increasing the professionals that are available because they're available on short notice.

As the Pentagon makes plans for the largest troop rotation since World War II, I will work with the Armed Services Committee to help make this proposal a reality.

My mission is to support our service members. They're volunteers, and if they're going to go to a hostile place like Afghanistan, I think we owe it to them to back them up and try to help them get through it.

I've been giving free money seminars for the troops at Walter Reed Hospital and one of the Iraqi War Vets realized that the military wouldn't pay for the dental work he needed.

Afghanistan and Iraq were lumped together in what was called a 'global war on terrorism.'

My dad was in the military. It was difficult sometimes, because he would have to be away a lot, and we would have to move around a lot. Trying to adapt to new schools and new places can be really tough.

George Bush didn't campaign on, 'If you elect me, I'm going to be a great president to confront terrorism and launch a war in the Middle East' because nobody was thinking about it in the year 2000. But it became the defining issue of his presidency.

There was a military police brigade with over 3,400 soldiers getting ready to go home because their mission - prisoner-of-war operations - was finished.

Carter's hopes died when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan and he ended up having to reverse policy and launch the military buildup that Reagan continued. Mr. Obama would be forced back into a war on terror if terrorist groups pull off enough damaging or frightening attacks to force this issue to the fore.

Operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and the war on terrorism have reduced the pace of military transformation and have revealed our lack of preparation for defensive and stability operations. This Administration has overextended our military.

The men and women on the front lines of the war on terror continue to risk their lives to save ours - and for that we owe them a debt that we can never truly repay. Thanks to their efforts we have made tremendous progress. Yet, the job is not done.

Victory is the most important aspect in Iraq, because victory in Iraq will help us have victory in the War on Terror.

It's a tough time my friends. We need to make sacrifices to ensure our troops have the tools they need in order to get the job done. This budget will help us win the War on Terror.

Ironically, the Canadian naval vessels, aircraft and personnel in the Persian Gulf I mentioned earlier who are fighting terrorism will provide more support indirectly to this war in Iraq than most of the 46 countries that are fully supporting our efforts there.

I consider that 9/11 was the day when war was started against my own work and against myself. Even though we are not sure of the links, Iraq was one of the countries that did not lower its flags in mourning on 9/11.