Frank Carlucci Quotes

Mr. Speaker, in the years since we enacted our attack against Iraq, the threat from Iran has only grown more difficult, and our capacity to meet that threat actually has diminished. It is one of the reasons many of us opposed that action against Iraq.

The security [of European national is dependent on the effective intelligence of their neighbors.

There should be no doubt why Israel, our best friend and greatest ally in the Middle East, has determined that Iran poses an existential threat.

Why give Russia or Syria any reason to doubt that Obama would use force?

The threat from Iran is, of course, their stated objective to destroy our strong ally Israel. That's a threat, a serious threat. It's a threat to world peace; it's a threat, in essence, to a strong alliance. I made it clear, I'll make it clear again, that we will use military might to protect our ally, Israel.

I believe we have to take this step by step to try to reign in Iranian aggression, their support for terrorism and the other bad behavior that can come back and haunt us.

We need to deter Putin from further actions because this is a very real threat.

Iran poses the most serious long-term threat to regional stability.

The question is the morning after. What sort of Iraq do we wake up to after the bombing? What happens in the region? What impact could it have? These are questions leaders I have spoken to have posed.

Many defense experts have predicted that we face no greater threat from a single country than from Iran.

I believe the military should be wary of diplomacy until war is declared; then the State Department should keep its nose out and let the military do whatever is necessary to win.

The regional security in the Middle East cannot be further compromised by an Iranian loose cannon.

Preemption is the right of any nation in order to preserve its National Security; however, preemptive war is a tactic, not a strategy. When used as a strategy preemption dilutes diplomacy, creates an atmosphere of distrust, and promotes regional instability.

Going to war against Iran - whether one calls such a move 'surgical' or 'total' - would be an extremely serious undertaking; with worldwide economic, military, diplomatic and human ramifications in both the short- and the long-term.

Historically, defense spending cuts have preceded increased international turmoil as America's global enemies sense a failure of will.

You should never take military intervention off the table. When you do so, you give an out to a rogue nation or rogue actors.

Looking back over my more than a half century in intelligence, I have not experienced a time when we've been beset by more crises and threats around the globe.

A war initiated by faulty intelligence should not to complicated by a premature pull out of our troops.

The problem was you didn’t have an approach against Al Qaeda because you didn’t have an approach against Afghanistan. And you didn’ have an approach against Afghanistan because you didn’t have an approach against Pakistan. And until we could get that right, we didn’t have a policy.

The conflict in the Middle East is complex, multi-faceted, and unlikely to be resolved anytime soon.

Israel will not tolerate Iran developing nuclear power, even if Iran claims it is for peaceful purposes. If there is an attack, oil prices will go through the roof.

Being on the Intelligence Committee made me more of a hawk.

You just hope that we haven't soured an entire generation on the necessity, from time to time, of using force because Iraq has been such a debacle. That would be tragic because Iran is a grave threat.

Everyone knows: if Russia threatens Ukraine and also has its sights on other states, this concerns the global security of Europe.

The military can buy our diplomats some time.