Quotes About Diplomacy

If Khrushchev had not, surprisingly, initiated an abrupt, humiliating withdrawal of his missiles Sunday morning—without even waiting for an official American response to his proposal of Saturday morning, which Kennedy had argued to his advisors was "very reasonable"—there was every likelihood of the fuse to all-out war being lit by that afternoon.

York posed the question, how many nuclear weapons are needed to deter an adversary rational enough to be deterred? Concurring with Bundy's judgment—as who would not?—he answered his question, "somewhere in the range of 1, 10, or 100 … closer to 1 than it is to 100." In 1986, the U.S. had 23,317 nuclear warheads and Russia had 40,159, for a total of 63,836 weapons.76

THE BEGIN YEARS HAD not been easy ones for Israel, but they had been important. Israel had made peace with its once most potent enemy, Egypt. It had made clear that it would not tolerate weapons of mass destruction in the hands of its sworn enemies. It had shown that it would go to war—even a war that many Israelis eventually opposed—to protect the rights of its citizens and children to live normal lives and not to sleep in bomb shelters.

I have always viewed my role as a sort of ambassador or bridge between groups to help provide a dialog.

I spend every day up at the United Nations where I have to interact with 192 other countries. I know how well the United States is viewed.

The Obama administration has been trying out a new policy toward Syria since the day it came to office. The Bush cold shoulder was viewed as a primitive reaction, now to be replaced by sophisticated diplomacy. Outreach would substitute for isolation.

Robert Mugabe is not representative of who we are, what we stand for, or how we want to be viewed by the rest of world. We are peace-loving people, respectful of foreign representatives, who want the country to be a prosperous, productive. and responsible member of the global community.

Honours can generate a lot of income for the nation because they are viewed as so prestigious internationally.

Even though I've had the odd terse word to say about Donald Trump, I still get invited to events at the U.S. embassy. I always attend, because as long as they're prepared to hear the opposite viewpoint, then I'll never miss that chance when I can.

Traditionally, diplomacy was done in an environment of information scarcity. Ambassadors would send back telegrams to foreign ministries, comfortable in the knowledge that their views of a country would be the only source of information the minister would see.

In 1996, Al Jazeera was the first TV station in the Arab world to allow Israelis to appear on the screen and express their views and address the Arab world. Before that, Arab broadcasters did not allow what was perceived as the enemy to appear on the screen.

I think President Obama views Israel as a problem that needs to be solved.

The French have a very deep knowledge of Islam in many areas, and we can exchange views.

The United States is our best friend, and our relations are excellent. Our relations will be strengthened even more, despite our differences in views.

We need to listen to the views and respect the collective will of our democratic allies. When we believe that international action is necessary, whether military, economic, or diplomatic, we will try to persuade our friends that we are right. But we, in return, must also be willing to be persuaded by them.

I'm not going to tell the American president how to run America, but I think it is important that when friends are speaking to each other that they are able to be very frank in the views that are exchanged, and I certainly will be doing that.

When developing countries go to the WTO and register their protest over things, they should be heard. Their views should be considered by the rich countries.

It's the right and also the responsibility of member states to express their views. And my role as the present of the General Assembly is not to comment on this. I'm here to protect and respect the rules.

You cannot force a state to be demilitarized. Even if a state enters a treaty where it commits to be demilitarized, there's no way to reverse statehood if it violates it.

In 2012, General Dempsey, General Petraeus directed the CIA, Secretary Panetta and Secretary Clinton recommended to the president to robustly arm and train the Syrian moderates. He says no. In 2013, conduct a military strike, same national security team, against the Assad regime because he violated the chemical red line. He says no.

We should forcefully call out China whenever it violates international standards.

Canada has a stand on human rights in many places, just not when Donald Trump violates them in Latino neighbourhoods.

But, although America cannot be justly charged with violating the rights of Turkey, Turkey nevertheless can be justly charged with violating the rights of America.

The causes of the China Incident were the exclusion and insult of Japan throughout China, the exclusion of Japanese goods, the persecution of Japanese residents in China, and the illegal violation of Japanese rights.