David Letterman Quotes

Politicization led to an intelligence output that obscured understanding of al Qaeda’s sources of strength and support.

John Walker, while he was in Afghanistan, told people his goal was to have four wives. ... Do we need any further proof that this guy is out of his mind? Four wives? That's how al Qaeda gets you to become a suicide bomber.

Most ISIS members are irreconcilable. Once they've bitten that bug, that cultish bug, they would prefer to die. They're going to be given the opportunity, no one's going to get out alive from Iraq and Syria now. They make sure everyone's a suicide bomber now.

We have an obligation to go after Al Qaeda wherever they are.

People don’t get radicalized overnight. It’s a process that takes 3 or 4 years.

When I was commander of Central Command, obviously we were very concerned about the developments in Yemen, the developments in Somalia and elsewhere, in Africa and so forth. But the al Qaeda senior leadership is under unprecedented pressure.

The condition that the Taliban part with al Qaeda is not just a condition, it is an objective. We must convince them that al Qaeda ideology and dogma will not help them.

ISIL are already using the Internet for hideous propaganda purposes - for radicalisation, for operational planning, too.

Violent extremism is going viral, but our response to it is moving at bureaucratic, sluggish speed.

Because 9/11 was carried out by 19 foreign-born Arab hijackers, many assume that all terrorists who attack the West are foreigners.

The poor people of the world tend to be the places that al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups can recruit.

When Canada works to counter extremism and terrorism, particularly in the Middle East, Israel is always a natural partner and a close ally.

Mateen pledged allegiance to ISIS during his attack, the worst terror attack on American soil since 9/11.

We want to go further than preventing people from becoming terrorists and focus on a broader approach to counter-extremism - both violent and non-violent.

Al Qaeda asks its recruits to establish their bona fides as a condition of membership, even requiring answers to a long questionnaire. But ISIS has democratized and globalized jihad by lowering the entry bar to an eve-of-destruction YouTube pledge of allegiance to the caliphate - and even that could probably be waived.

First of all, radical beliefs are not a predictor of terrorist behavior: most people who hold radical beliefs never become terrorists, and some terrorists don't hold radical beliefs.

The horror and tragedy that was 9/11 did many things; one of them was to galvanize this country and much of the world against terrorists and those who support them.

In some ways, the best novel about terrorism, though it's not a novel, is 'The Looming Tower' by Lawrence Wright or 'Perfect Soldiers' by Terry McDermott.

Global issues require common responses: Only together we can create the conditions to defeat Daesh and al Qaeda, block channels for terrorist financing, tackle foreign terrorist fighters.

Less about politics, 'The Path to 9/11' focused on the emergence of radical Islamic terror as a clear and present American threat.

Success means eliminating Al Qaeda's ability to launch terrorist attacks against the United States and our allies.

The soldiers kill suicide bombers. Think about that. When a guys whole thing in life is to kill himself and you get there first... you are halling ass my friends.

Saudi Arabia might proceed toward Sharia slower than Al-Qaeda wants. Al-Qaeda wants pedal-to-the-metal, nothing else in focus, we’re heading to Sharia, and the Saudis might not be going there fast enough, so Al-Qaeda hits them.

You've got problems in Central Asia. And you've got problems within our own communities back home. So if we end up saying, look, this has nothing to do with Islam or it's got no connection with that broader question, then we look, frankly, as if we're in denial about the problem. And the interesting thing in the Middle East is that they have absolutely no problem there in identifying that as Islamist extremism and calling it that.

The fact that we have not had a terrorist attack in this country in the last six years is not a cause for complacency or a time to celebrate the end of the struggle. The threat is not going away. The enemy has not lost interest. ...Fundamentally, we're in a struggle about ideology. Terrorists want to remake the world in their own image and it is the image that is intolerant of the kinds of institutions that we cherish.