Quotes from Jack Keane

Afghanistan remains an opportunity to deal al Qaeda a vital strategic blow, especially since we have abandoned all operations - including counterterrorism operations - in Iraq.

The Pentagon is actually a 10-story building, five up and five down.

'Duty' is a refreshingly honest memoir and a moving one. Mr. Gates scrupulously identifies his flaws and mistakes: He waited too long, for example, for the military bureaucracy to fix critical supply issues like the drones needed in Iraq and took three years to replace a dysfunctional command structure in Afghanistan.

United States and our allied partners need to wake up. ISIS is at war with us and civilization.

We have a sufficient political class, and the military doesn't have to get involved in high national office. The days of doing that, post-Civil War and post-World War II, are gone.

By the end of 2008, clearly the Al Qaeda and Sunni insurgency had been relatively stabilized. And in the Al Qaeda's mind, they were defeated.

I believe, for a long time, protracted wars test the will of any democracy, to be sure, and people will underwrite a protracted war if they see some progress. But if they don't see progress, and it appears to be futile and useless, then that political support begins to evaporate rather quickly.

Only four secretaries of defense served longer than Robert M. Gates. Many others were as dedicated; many sacrificed a great deal. Alone among them all, however, Mr. Gates had the task of turning around two wars that the U.S. was losing.

The fact that we walked away from the Middle East, as distasteful as it was for us to stay involved and prevent wars, based on our long involvement there, we have helped to create and provide a foundation. Obviously for ISIS and also for the absolute barbarianism and human catastrophe that Assad impacted on his people.

The thing I have in common with Donald Trump is, about a dozen years ago, we got a 'Man of the Year' award in New York City, the Hotel Plaza, from the USO.

I watched the Bush administration overreact to the Clinton administration, who believed they did too much nation building, sustaining other countries, and that's why we never put the commitment on Afghanistan and Iraq that should have been in there under their policy leadership.

Russia, their number one client in the Middle East is Syria; that is their foothold in the Middle East. They want to have influence there.

The issue with Syria, I think for many of us, has always been about Iran. This is an anchor point for them in terms of regional domination. It means a lot to them. They are all in here.

In 2011, General Alston, four-star commander in Iraq, recommended to the President, a force level of over 20,000. The President rejected it and pulled out all the forces with what is now known as a disastrous consequence in Syria.

There are very few fighters in the ISIS organization in Iraq and Syria coming from the United States; most of them have either come from a region of the Middle East or from Europe.

The only people that have ever fought ISIS in Syria is not the regime; it is the Free Syrian Army.

Here's the problem the Free Syrian Army has. They really want to topple the regime in Damascus, and this is where most of the fight takes place, between Aleppo and Damascus for the Free Syrian Army.

We should be robustly assisting the Free Syrian Army with equipment and also with training.

If Assad continues to conduct strikes against the Free Syrian Army at will, it would be very difficult for them to have any success against ISIS.

Despite the obvious intelligence and security failures that contributed to the attack against the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, the reality is that in one night, an al Qaeda-affiliated group destroyed a diplomatic post, killed a U.S. ambassador and three other Americans, and forced an end to clandestine U.S. activity in the area.

In the early 2009, a campaign plan developed by Petraeus and General McChrystal to defeat the Taliban, they required a minimum force of 40,000. President Obama rejected that recommendation and provided 25 percent less. He also decided he would pull the force out in 12 to 15 months.

The Taliban has not, in my judgment, in any significant way changed their fundamental goal and objective, which is to take over Afghanistan and return to running that country. It doesn't mean that we shouldn't have negotiation talks with them. I think we should. But we've got to be clear-eyed about it.

I have a close association with Gen. Petraeus... What you get in Dave Petraeus is a very unique officer, a combination of intelligence, extraordinary depth of knowledge and understanding.

Radical Islamists spread from Western Africa through the Middle East, all the way to South Asia to sub-Indian continent.