Chuck Hagel Quotes

History has shown that a country most effectively speaks with one voice. When nationally elected officials work together, build consensus, and provide leadership, the American people will follow.

If America is to succeed in responding to these 21st Century challenges, our political system cannot continue to bog down in the mire of partisan gamesmanship.

Politics or ideology must not get in the way of sound planning.

You can't just drop the 82nd Airborne into Baghdad and it will all be over.

Foreign policy will require a strategic agility that, whenever possible, gets ahead of problems, strengthens U.S. security and alliances, and promotes American interests and credibility.

The United Nations has a critical role to play in promoting stability, security, democracy, human rights, and economic development. The UN is as relevant today as at any time in its history, but it needs reform.

There are always consequences to actions that you take. There are consequences to inaction. And thinking through, asking the questions, "Well, then what happens? What comes next?" is critically important.

Engagement is not appeasement. Engagement is not surrender.

It's critically important that we have governments to work with, that we have entities to work with. President Hadi has been a good partner in that, and we would hope that the next set of leaders that govern Yemen will also take the same approach to cooperation with the United States.

In a general way, if one cannot attribute to the Jew the whole responsibility of the situation, economic, political, and social, by which Algeria is being strangled, it is no exaggeration to recognize him as morally guilty, for the great part of his rìle here, still more than elsewhere, has consisted in corrupting, degrading, and disintegrating.

I took an oath of office to the Constitution, I didn't take an oath of office to my party or my president.

Alliances and international organizations should be understood as opportunities for leadership and a means to expand our influence, not as constraints on our power.

The twenty first century will require a re-affirmation and re-definition of our alliances and international organisations.

We live in a world of absolute immediacy. It is an interconnected, combustible world, where technology and many other actions have given nonstate actors a reach, into countries and societies, for both good and evil, that we have never seen before. So it isn't a matter of just state versus state challenges or conflict. The bigger problem is nonstate actors.

And this - this board was - was impanelled in 1951. And it's gone through ups and downs in how the secretaries have used it. But I have put a premium on that advisory board.

Things aren't getting better; they're getting worse. The White House is completely disconnected from reality. It's like they're just making it up as they go along. The reality is that we're losing in Iraq.

Peace comes through dealing with people. Peace doesn't come at the end of a bayonet or the end of a gun.

No one person leads alone - can't do it, it's impossible. It doesn't make any sense. You need a team.

Nations, great nations have limitations. All nations have limitations. Even great powers have limitations.

We live in a world where there are dangerous people, there are bad people.

I have said many times that Iran is a state sponsor of terrorism.

Well, let's go back to the original intent of Social Security. It is an insurance contract.

Desperate men do desperate things when you take hope away. And that's where the Palestinians are today.

It is easy to get into war, not so easy to get out.

I am fully supportive of 'open service' and committed to LGBT military families.

The president of the United States is the commander in chief, and the people who work with him at the National Security Council are his arm in working with the Defense Department. And, quite frankly, they have responsibility for all of the government. We are one component of the government.

Imposing democracy through force is a roll of the dice.

My overall worldview has never changed: that America has and must maintain the strongest military in the world, that we must lead the international community to confront threats and challenges together, and that we must use all tools of American power to protect our citizens and our interests.

(The) chain of command has failed over the years, obviously, for a lot of reasons.

The Israeli people must be free to live in peace and security.

Iraq was a war of choice, like Vietnam.

The recent wave of Taliban attacks has made clear that the international community must not waiver in its support for a stable, secure and prosperous Afghanistan.

I don't think it's a matter of going back and having a review of our process. Our process is about as thorough as there can be. Is it imperfect? Yes. Is there risk? Yes, but we start with the fact that we have an American that's being held hostage and that American's life is in danger and that's where we start. And then we proceed from there.

There has to be a reason and objective (to air strikes). What does it do to move the effort down the road for a political conversation?

I would not trade America's position in the world - our ledger, our debts and assets - for any country in the world. There isn't a country in the world even close to America.

Palestinians caged up like animals.

Foreign policy is all about a universe of bad decisions, imperfect decisions; every situation is different. The dynamics, the atmospherics, the people, the pressures, the geopolitical realities shift.

I have never believed you go to war in Iraq, you go to war in Afghanistan, and believe that you can deal with those battlefields, those countries, in microcosms, or narrow channels.

Closing Guantanamo Bay is not a military solution. The closing of that prison, which I support, I supported it when I was in the Senate, requires more than just a military dimension.

I believe, and always have, that America must engage - not retreat - in the world.

This current government in Iraq has never fulfilled the commitments it made to form a unity government with the Kurds, the Sunnis and the Shia. We have worked hard with them within the confines of our ability to do that but we can't dictate to them.

There's always a balance, I think, any administration has to find in not just the military but in any agency of government.

[Sheehan] deserves some consideration, and I think that should have been done right from the beginning.

I'm a supporter of Israel, always have been.

And I want every one of you, every one of us, 100 senators to look in that camera, and you tell your people back home what you think. Don't hide anymore; none of us. That is the essence of our responsibility. And if we're not willing to do it, we're not worthy to be seated right here. We fail our country. If we don't debate this, if we don't debate this, we are not worthy of our country. We fail our country.

I'm the first secretary of defense that's had to deal with sequestration. I've prepared two budgets that deal with sequestration. And you bring the chiefs together, the leadership of this enterprise together, to work through, how do we then take these cuts? Where do we apply those cuts? Readiness is the first thing that suffers.

The Bush administration must understand that each American has a right to question our policies in Iraq and elsewhere, and should not be demonized or condemned for disagreeing with them. Suggesting that to challenge and criticize policy is undermining and hurting our troops is not democratic, nor what this country has stood for over 200 years.

We can't ... take that piece of reality in this business and set that aside and say, well, that doesn't count. And the Republicans on my side understand that the majority is in fact up for grabs next year. So there's not a decision made up here that doesn't have that factor coursing through that current.

No border that touches Israel is always secure.

If we have to continue to live under sequestration, it will have a maximum impact on our ability to fulfill the president's strategic guidance. We can't do it all. It's as simple as that, with the limitations of the budget as severe as they are. These deep, abrupt cuts have forced us to make decisions that are not in the interest of America.