Iraq is no diversion. It is a place where civilization is taking a decisive stand against chaos and terror, we must not waver.

Some have argued that confronting the threat from Iraq could detract from the war against terror. To the contrary, confronting the threat posed by Iraq is crucial to winning the war on terror.

It was the Law of the Sea, they said. Civilization ends at the waterline. Beyond that, we all enter the food chain, and not always right at the top.

We are not without empathetic terror when we open Pascal’s ‚Pensees‘ and read, ‚I am the great silent spaces between worlds.‘

To walk through the ruined cities of Germany is to feel an actual doubt about the continuity of civilization.

The best security for civilization is the dwelling, and upon properly appointed and becoming dwellings depends, more than anything else, the improvement of mankind.

Spaniards were condemned for appeasing terrorism by voting for withdrawing troops from Iraq in the absence of U.N. authorization – that is, for taking a stand rather like that of 70 percent of Americans, who called for the U.N. to take the leading role in Iraq.

When Nirvana became popular, you could very easily slip and get lost during that storm. I fortunately had really heavy anchors – old friends, family.

Any change is resisted because bureaucrats have a vested interest in the chaos in which they exist.

Saddam Hussein is a homicidal dictator who is addicted to weapons of mass destruction.

If your payloads cost hundreds of millions of dollars, they actually cost more than the launch. It puts a lot of pressure on the launch vehicle not to change, to be very stable. Reliability becomes much more important than the cost. It’s hard to get off of that equilibrium.

I have spent the greater part of my life in a hotel room with seven or eight kids, looking after everyone, sorting out fights, wiping noses, handing out towels, not having a clean towel left for me.

With all the… success that I’ve been lucky enough to get? That doesn’t happen unless the home life is solid.

In an interconnected age when opportunistic adversaries can work in tandem to destroy stability and prosperity, our country needs to regain its strategic footing. We need to bring the clarity to our efforts before we lose the confidence of the American people and the support of potential allies.

The assumption is that your personal life has to be a mess to create, but how much chaos can you allow in before it takes over?

Cultures, for better or worse, are very stable.

The level of destruction and terror and violence carried out by the powerful states far exceeds anything that can imaginably can be done by groups that are called terrorists and subnational groups.

Debt is part of the human condition. Civilization is based on exchanges – on gifts, trades, loans – and the revenges and insults that come when they are not paid back.

A large majority of Americans believe that the U.N., not the U.S., should take the lead in working with Iraqis to transfer authentic sovereignty as well as in economic reconstruction and maintaining civic order.

No nation should stoke instability in its neighbor’s country.

Chaos was the law of nature; Order was the dream of man.

Increased means and increased leisure are the two civilizers of man.

The development of civilization and industry in general has always shown itself so active in the destruction of forests that everything that has been done for their conservation and production is completely insignificant in comparison.

What makes you a SEAL, what makes you a SEAL is being a good tactician on the battle field, understanding how to shoot, move, and communicate, knowing small unit maneuver warfare. That’s what makes a good SEAL, and so that is the course of instruction that I taught, was getting SEAL platoons ready for deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan.

As I write, highly civilized human beings are flying overhead, trying to kill me.

I am the commander in chief of the United States armed forces, and Iraq is gonna have to ultimately provide for its own security.

There is nothing so stable as change.

It was like being in the eye of a hurricane. You’d wake up in a concert and think, Wow, how did I get here?

People respond in accordance to how you relate to them. If you approach them on the basis of violence, that’s how they’ll react. But if you say, ‚We want peace, we want stability,‘ we can then do a lot of things that will contribute towards the progress of our society.

I hope I’m wrong, but I am afraid that Iraq is going to turn out to be the greatest disaster in American foreign policy – worse than Vietnam, not in the number who died, but in terms of its unintended consequences and its reverberation throughout the region.

A particularly beautiful woman is a source of terror. As a rule, a beautiful woman is a terrible disappointment.

The diversity of India, of our civilization, is actually a thing of beauty, which is something we are extremely proud of.

God isn’t compatible with machinery and scientific medicine and universal happiness. You must make your choice. Our civilization has chosen machinery and medicine and happiness.

Prime Minister Maliki, released from American restraint, acted on his worst instincts, creating enormous distrust in Iraq’s Kurdish population and deeply embittering Sunnis in western Iraq’s Al Anbar, who lost any confidence in a Baghdad government they saw as adversarial.

Our peace shall stand as firm as rocky mountains.

All empires come to an end, and the American one is no exception.

I had faith in Israel before it was established, I have in it now. I believe it has a glorious future before it – not just another sovereign nation, but as an embodiment of the great ideals of our civilization.

If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.

Our priority is to go after ISIL. And so what we have said is that we are not engaging in a military action against the Syrian regime. We are going after ISIL facilities and personnel who are using Syria as a safe haven, in service of our strategy in Iraq.

Move fast with stable infrastructure.

The basis of optimism is sheer terror.

Senator McCain is Israel’s most unconditional ally in Mossad’s machinations, something that even his worst adversaries would have been able to imagine. McCain participated alongside this secret service in the creation of the Islamic State, which has appropriated a considerable part of Iraq as well as a third of Syria, according to its affirmations.

Everybody has a job to do. There are people in Iraq on both sides of this war who do what they do for religious reasons, and they feel with God on their side. Some people are good at annihilating people. Maybe that’s their gift.

In the twenty-first century, the robot will take the place which slave labor occupied in ancient civilization.

The invasion of Iraq, particularly, gave a big shot in the arm to the jihadi extremists.

One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.

To study history means submitting to chaos and nevertheless retaining faith in order and meaning.

A nation or civilization that continues to produce soft-minded men purchases its own spiritual death on the installment plan.

The United States was seriously defeated in Iraq by Iraqi nationalism – mostly by nonviolent resistance. The United States could kill the insurgents, but they couldn’t deal with half a million people demonstrating in the streets.

Like the experience of warfare, the endurance of grave or terminal illness involves long periods of tedium and anxiety, punctuated by briefer interludes of stark terror and pain.

The Iranian regime, in my mind, is the single most enduring threat to stability and peace in the Middle East.

I have seen how the foundations of the world are laid, and I have not the least doubt that it will stand a good while.

When you decide to get involved in a military operation in a place like Syria, you’ve got to be prepared, as we learned from Iraq and Afghanistan, to become the government, and I’m not sure any country, either the United States or I don’t hear of anyone else, who’s willing to take on that responsibility.

There is precious little in civilization to appeal to a Yeti.

I have thought a sufficient measure of civilization is the influence of good women.

I recognize terror as the finest emotion and so I will try to terrorize the reader. But if I find that I cannot terrify, I will try to horrify, and if I find that I cannot horrify, I’ll go for the gross-out. I’m not proud.

If the tongue had not been framed for articulation, man would still be a beast in the forest.

Two days after the Boston marathon bombings, there was a drone strike in Yemen attacking a peaceful village, which killed a target who could very easily have been apprehended. But, of course, it is just easier to terrorise people. The drones are a terrorist weapon; they not only kill targets but also terrorise other people.

You can’t say civilization don’t advance… in every war they kill you in a new way.

I think you can judge from somebody’s actions a kind of a stability and sense of purpose perhaps created by strong religious roots. I mean, there’s a certain patience, a certain discipline, I think, that religion helps you achieve.

After the chaos and carnage of September 11th, it is not enough to serve our enemies with legal papers.