Bill Clinton Quotes

In most cases, cables are marked secret not because the U.S. requires it but because those speaking to us - the foreign leaders across the table - do. They are not keeping secrets from us, but from two other groups: their enemies and their subjects.

Diplomats make it their business to conceal the facts, and politicians violently denounce the politicians of other countries.

Diplomacy is the lowest form of politeness because it misquotes the greatest number of people. A nation, like an individual, if it has anything to say, should simply say it.

Now there is a cultural change under way in the Foreign Service.

The old diplomat liked to move with deliberation, in secret, following well-established traditions and working through what he loved to describe as "the usual channels". To him, the open debate carried on, not by professional diplomats, but by politicians and statesmen having little regard for the use of the technical phraseology of diplomacy and intent merely on reaching results which would make diplomacy unnecessary, was offensive to all his instincts.

A pupil of diplomacy has to learn three things: to speak French, to speak nothing, and to speak falsehood.

One has to be careful when listening to diplomats to hear exactly what is being said.

I'm convinced there's a small room in the attic of the Foreign Office where future diplomats are taught to stammer

One is treading on very delicate ground when you have to consider the public opinion in China, Japan, the League of Geneva, and at home. It is pretty hard to avoid using a word which may arouse unintended repercussions in one or the other of those half a dozen localities

A diplomat is one that says something that is equally misunderstood by both sides, and never clear to either.

We must be careful about speech writers making foreign policy.

Be careful what you say. Words matter. Words really matter in foreign policy.

Yes, sir, from Constantinople, or from the Brazils; from Turk or Christian; from black or white; from the dey of Algiers or the bey of Tunis; from the devil himself, if he wore a crown, we should receive a minister.

I am an undiplomatic diplomat.

Sarah Palin has already had an effect on foreign relations... The new president of Pakistan, Ali Zardari, is in hot water, because last week, Sarah was on a class trip to New York, where she met foreign leaders... And one of the leaders she met was Zardari, and he was gushing over her. He said, oh, you're more gorgeous in person than you are on TV. And so the people in his home country of Pakistan, the Islamists, they issued a fatwa on him, for being too 'flirty.' And when Sarah today was told that Zardari had gotten a fatwa because of her, she said, 'I know, I felt it when he hugged me.'

In the world of diplomacy, some things are better left unsaid.

When we put our trust in diplomacy, it is not because it is an inspiring or uplifting discourse or because it helps us see the common humanity in others. The stylized circumlocutions of diplomats can make them seem ridiculous or irrelevant: they never seem to be talking about what is really going on.

An ambassador is not simply an agent; he is also a spectacle.

It is not polite for a Russian to interfere in British politics.

We can't make any statements here. We can't talk about the internal politics of Paraguay.

American officials have bent over backwards to show how sensitive they are to Muslim culture. It didn't seem very effective. They seem to be worried about winning the respect of other people.

It is fortunate that diplomats have long noses since they usually cannot see beyond them.

We are going to have to discuss with and seek the opinions of other countries. We don't wish to offend anyone, least of all a country we hold in such deep regard as the United Kingdom.

My father had been in the German Diplomatic Service, and although he had been in the United States since World War II and out of diplomacy, it was something that was very much talked about in the family. So when I went to college, it was always my intention to try to get into the Foreign Service.

The function of a briefing paper is to prevent the ambassador from saying something dreadfully indiscreet. I sometimes think its true object is to prevent the ambassador from saying anything at all.