Counterterrorism Efforts Quotes

If a regular law enforcement agency wants your phone records, all they have to do is issue a subpoena. But now the intelligence agency is not able to quickly gather records and look at them to see who these terrorists are calling.

Together, leading the world, the U.S.A. will rid our planet of this barbarous organization called ISIS.

There have been the most terrible, shocking events taking place in the United States of America within the last hour or so... I am afraid we can only imagine the terror and the carnage there and the many, many innocent people who will have lost their lives... It is perpetrated by fanatics who are utterly indifferent to the sanctity of human life and we, the democracies of this world, are going to have to come together to fight it together and eradicate this evil completely from our world.

There seems to be some coverage these days that somehow terrorism is not a big problem. Or somehow, national security is all taken care of, and that's just not true.

I look at what the president [Barack Obama] it doing, it adds up to me. We just have to keep - try to get more support for those people on the ground in Syria and Iraq who have to actually physically take the territory back.

I think, while it is true that the Hillary Clinton and I voted differently on the war in Iraq, what is important is that we learn the lesson of the war in Iraq. And that lesson is intrinsic to my foreign policy if elected president, is the United States cannot do it alone. We cannot be the policeman of the world. We are now spending more I believe than the next eight countries on defense. We have got to work in strong coalition with the major powers of the world and with those Muslim countries that are prepared to stand up and take on terrorism.

We've got this arc of instability from North Africa to South Asia, and we have to pay close attention to it. And we have to build coalitions, something that I did to take on the Iranian nuclear program, and what I will do as president to make sure that we defeat these terrorist networks.

What we can do is make sure that Afghanistan is not a safe haven for Al Qaeda. What we can do it make sure that it is not destabilizing neighboring Pakistan, which has nuclear weapons. The key is we’ve got to have a clear objective...

I think we'll see it mostly in the United States. We're getting to the point where al Qaeda is ready to again attack us inside America. I think we're basically defenseless.

You know, nobody likes to see innocent people die. Nobody wants to turn on their TV on a daily basis and see havoc wrought by terrorists.

It's important that the United States not forget the lessons of September the 11th, 2001. I assure you, I'm not going to forget them.

I also think now that Islamic terrorism is going to be front and center, there is going to be a new focus on whether this administration, the administration of Hillary Clinton at State, was permeated at the highest levels by Saudi intelligence and others who are not loyal Americans.

Foreign fighters are travelling into Iraq to make it a front line in the war on terror. And I would rather defeat them there than face them in our own country.

Lieutenant General Michael Flynn ran the defense intelligence agency from 2012 to 2014. He served as a top national intelligence adviser to General Stanley McChrystal in Iraq.

President al-Assad and his army are the only force that actually fights ISIS.

We had no domestic attacks under Bush.

This is a problem that Islam has. I called upon Muslim leaders to call out and denounce these murders, these terrorists. Decrying violence isn't enough.

I want to emphasis again, Governor (Thomas) Kean and Congressman (Lee) Hamilton pointed out that congressional oversight also was a major contributor to our failures prior to 9/11 and that has to be fixed as well.

My experience is that our intelligence officials try to do the right thing, but even with good intentions, sometimes they make mistakes. Sometimes they can be overzealous.

Our strategy right now is to accelerate the campaign against ISIS. It is a threat to all civilized nations.

I'm from the American West. We have forest fires out there. And some of the worst forest fires in our history, the most damage were caused when we pulled the fire crews off the line too early. And so we're going to have to continue to keep the pressure on the enemy - ISIS. There's no room for complacency on this.

Did business with Qatar, a US ally which protects al-Qaeda.

I'm going to spend a lot of time trying to explain as best I can why it's important for us to succeed in Iraq. I'm going to do what I think is right, and if, you know, if people don't like me for it, that's just the way it is.

The coalition did not act in Iraq because we had discovered dramatic new evidence of Iraq's pursuit. We acted because we saw the evidence in a dramatic new light - through the prism of our experience on 9/11.

I have in the past declared that in order to achieve a real, just and durable peace, I would be willing to make painful compromises. But we cannot make any compromise on the security of our citizens and their right to live without the threat of terrorism and violence.