Quotes from Paul Wolfowitz

That sense of what happened in Europe in World War II has shaped a lot of my views.

The cost of the high-cost economy remains too high.

The American people are pretty impressive in their ability to keep after something if they think it is doable.

No one argues that we should have imposed a dictatorship in Afghanistan having liberated the country. Similarly, we weren't about to impose a dictatorship in Iraq having liberated the country.

I mean, we're going to probably debate the Iraq war for at least as long as I'm alive.

I like globalization; I want to say it works, but it is hard to say that when six hundred million people are slipping backwards.

I certainly don't like a label that suggests I believe that the military is the solution to most of the world's problems.

History is just littered with problems that were solved that were supposed to be impossible.

Poles understand perhaps better than anyone the consequences of making toothless warnings to brutal tyrants and terrorist regimes.

Generally speaking, the stronger the connection between the financing and the ultimate beneficiary, the better the result.

If greater openness is a key to economic success, I believe there is increasingly a need for openness in the political sphere as well.

Look, I think the public generally understands that what's at stake in Afghanistan is American security, number one.

I think it's a mistake to rely too much on any one economic factor. It's why investors try to spread their portfolio round.

China, in the future, is going to have even more nuclear capability than it has had in the past. I don't believe that they have anything to fear from the United States, and I frankly don't believe they do fear the United States.

The most striking thing is that even before Osama bin Laden was killed, he seemed largely irrelevant to the Arab Spring.

Public action should seek to expand the set of opportunities of those who have the least voice and fewest resources and capabilities.

The internal affairs of other countries has a big impact on American interests.

For one thing I tend not to see myself in various moulds that people fit me into.

Before September 11, terrorism was viewed as something ugly but you lived with it.

I'm constantly asking for alternative views on most things that come to me.

We did not go to war in Afghanistan or in Iraq to, quote, 'impose democracy.' We went to war in both places because we saw those regimes as a threat to the United States.

One of the things that ultimately led me to leave mathematics and go into political science was thinking I could prevent nuclear war.

It's wonderful that so many people want to contribute to fighting aids or malaria. But, if somebody isn't paying attention to the overall health system in the country, a whole lot of money can be wasted.

That sense of what happened in Europe in World War II has shaped a lot of my views.