The radical elements in Islam are very dangerous. They want to achieve a return to the Islamic purity of the Middle Ages.
BRENT SCOWCROFTSaddam’s ouster will not necessarily lead to the same result, since Iraq lacks democratic traditions. Democracy doesn’t just consist of holding elections.
More Brent Scowcroft Quotes
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I don’t think the Chinese look out at the world and want to overturn the system.
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Who is the guarantor, if there is one, of a more stable world? It’s the United States.
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The Iraqis need help establishing a government. We have to provide them with security.
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But the central point is that any campaign against Iraq, whatever the strategy, cost and risks, is certain to divert us for some indefinite period from our war on terrorism.
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If you look back at the first Gulf war, the Arabs sent forces, they sent money. So their interests in Iraq are clear, but they’re nowhere to be seen now. Why? Because right now, it’s dangerous to be seen as supporting the United States.
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Much of what we know about mathematics and trade comes from the Arabs. Then came stagnation, and now they’re the West’s whipping boy. This is a problem that cannot be solved overnight, and certainly not militarily.
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America wants to work with friends, with allies, with people of good will, to make this a better world.
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It’s not for nothing that the Iranians are known as rug merchants. They are.
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But, if you believe we should go around the world overturning regimes to make little United States, I don’t agree with that, because I don’t think we’re capable of doing that.
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It is beyond dispute that Saddam Hussein is a menace.
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Saddam’s ouster will not necessarily lead to the same result, since Iraq lacks democratic traditions. Democracy doesn’t just consist of holding elections.
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If Iraq were to descend into chaos, the Europeans would feel the effects just as much as we would.
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Progress is only possible if the United States and its allies work together.
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Since the days of Peter the Great, Russians have been maybe Europeans who didn’t share in the enlightenment and the reformation, or are they Mongol Asians with the European veneer. And they’ve gone back and forth.
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I’m afraid that the United States is more isolated today than at any other time in my memory.
BRENT SCOWCROFT