It makes sense for Japan to pursue a more independent role in the world, following Latin America and others in freeing itself from U.S. domination.

Since I have come to America, I am often asked whether my next novel will be set in America. I don’t think it will. I think I will be living in America for some time to come, but while living in America, I would like to write about Japanese society from the outside.

I consider myself to be as informed on American foreign policy as anyone in America.

I do not believe we will have a war with Iran.

Other than being crazy enough to press a button, there is nothing that Putin can do militarily to fundamentally alter American interests.

The fact is, with every friendship you make, and every bond of trust you establish, you are shaping the image of America projected to the rest of the world. That is so important. So when you study abroad, you’re actually helping to make America stronger.

History shows that, more often than not, loss of sovereignty leads to liberalisation imposed in the interests of the powerful.

In America, there’s a failure to appreciate Europe’s leading role in the world.

A very large majority of the U.S. population is in favor of establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba and has been for a long time with some fluctuations. And even part of the business world is in favor of it, too. But the government won’t allow it.

Can anything be stupider than that a man has the right to kill me because he lives on the other side of a river and his ruler has a quarrel with mine, though I have not quarrelled with him?

Japan’s very interesting. Some people think it copies things. I don’t think that anymore. I think what they do is reinvent things. They will get something that’s already been invented and study it until they thoroughly understand it. In some cases, they understand it better than the original inventor.

A war is a horrible thing, but it’s also a unifier of countries.

I remember being in Japan when Destiny’s Child put out ‚Independent Women,‘ and women there were saying how proud they were to have their own jobs, their own independent thinking, their own goals. It made me feel so good, and I realized that one of my responsibilities was to inspire women in a deeper way.

Following the missile crisis, detente started to gain ground between the United States and the Soviet Union, so the international political climate improved after that.

Take the diplomacy out of war and the thing would fall flat in a week.

When George W. Bush came into office, North Korea had maybe one nuclear weapon and verifiably wasn’t producing any more.

I don’t know why you use a fancy French word like detente when there’s a good English phrase for it – cold war.

Many things shall change in Cuba, but they shall change because of our efforts and despite the United States. Perhaps that empire shall crumble first.

Significant anniversaries are solemnly commemorated – Japan’s attack on the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor, for example.

There is obviously a gap between the public’s perception of the role of U.S. foreign policy and the elite’s perception.

America’s promises do not come with a price tag. We meet our commitments. We bear our burdens. That’s one of the reasons why almost every country on Earth sees America as stronger and more respected today than they did eight years ago when I took office.

I have a scheme for stopping war. It’s this – no nation is allowed to enter a war till they have paid for the last one.

After 2014, we will support a unified Afghanistan as it takes responsibility for its own future.

Russia isn’t going to start a war. They can’t afford it. I think Mr. Putin can be dealt with if we stop screaming at him. You can work with the guy. You just have to know who he is.

I have spoken to Chinese leaders occasionally on human rights, but I’ve always done it in private.

The Russians feared Ike. They didn’t fear me.

Nowhere is it written that there must be conflict between the United States and China.

For 500 years, since European explorers came, Latin American countries had been separated from one another. They had very limited relations. Integration is a prerequisite for independence.

For more than four decades, the Libyan people have been ruled by a tyrant – Moammar Gaddafi. He has denied his people freedom, exploited their wealth, murdered opponents at home and abroad, and terrorized innocent people around the world – including Americans who were killed by Libyan agents.

Every nation ridicules other nations, and all are right.

In 1963, the U.N. Security Council declared a voluntary arms embargo on South Africa. That was extended to a mandatory embargo in 1977. And that was followed by economic sanctions and other measures – sometimes officials, countries, cities, towns – some organized by popular movements.

‚Kiss Land‘ is the story after ‚Trilogy‘; it’s pretty much the second chapter of my life. The narrative takes place after my first flight; it’s very foreign, very Asian-inspired. When people ask me, ‚Why Japan?‘ I simply tell them it’s the furthest I’ve ever been from home. It really is a different planet.

No country can act wisely simultaneously in every part of the globe at every moment of time.

People in Latin America… love America from afar and emulate America in some ways but also hate a lot of things that America does to them.

To our brothers in Latin America and the world, we must convey that the Cuban people will overcome.

In Japan, the writers have made up a literary community, a circle, a society. I think 90 percent of Japan’s writers live in Tokyo. Naturally, they make a community. There are groups and customs, and so they are tied up in a way.

China and the U.S. need each other very badly. Yes, we should argue about some things, but it’s not an ‚us versus them,‘ it’s an ‚us and them‘ type scenario.

Fifty years of isolating Cuba had failed to promote democracy, setting us back in Latin America. That’s why we restored diplomatic relations, opened the door to travel and commerce, and positioned ourselves to improve the lives of the Cuban people.

Diplomats are just as essential to starting a war as soldiers are for finishing it… You take diplomacy out of war, and the thing would fall flat in a week.

Putin sought to keep Ukraine weak through corruption.

NATO was constructed on the – with the reason, whether one believes it or not, that it was going to defend Western Europe from Russian assault. Once the Berlin Wall fell and the Soviet Union was beginning to collapse, that reason was gone. So, first question: why does NATO exist?

More understand China, then more people will have interest in China and more people will come to China to visit us because I am a tourist ambassador.

The Bush Administration’s failure to be consistently involved in helping Israel achieve peace with the Palestinians has been both wrong for our friendship with Israel, as well as badly damaging to our standing in the Arab world.

All through Latin America, there’s sharp condemnation of the criminal atrocities of Sept. 11. But it’s qualified by the observation that although these are horrible atrocities, they are not unfamiliar.

There are many people in the world who really don’t understand-or say they don’t-what is the great issue between the free world and the Communist world. Let them come to Berlin!

The United States is supplying the most modern and sophisticated weaponry to Israel to the tune of billions of dollars every year.

We have a firm commitment to NATO, we are a part of NATO. We have a firm commitment to Europe. We are a part of Europe.

Saudi Arabia has allowed training on its soil of American forces.

For somebody who loves foreign policy, being Secretary is the best job in the world – but it doesn’t happen twice.

The U.S. is not constructing a palatial embassy, by far the largest in the world and virtually a separate city within Baghdad, and pouring money into military bases, with the intention of leaving Iraq to Iraqis.

I myself have been on my own and utterly independent since I graduated. I haven’t belonged to any company or any system. It isn’t easy to live like this in Japan.

We prefer world law in the age of self-determination to world war in the age of mass extermination.

I often look ridiculous in Japan. There’s really no way to eat in Japan, particularly kaiseki in a traditional ryokan, without offending the Japanese horribly. Every gesture, every movement is just so atrociously wrong, and the more I try, the more hilarious it is.

Foreigners don’t want to invest any more in France – and this is not working.

Yesterday, December seventh, 1941, a date which will live in infamy, the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan. We will gain the inevitable triumph, so help us God.

The governments of the present day have to deal not merely with other governments, with emperors, kings and ministers, but also with the secret societies which have everywhere their unscrupulous agents, and can at the last moment upset all the governments‘ plans.

We should pass the U.N.’s Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism. At least it will clearly establish whom you view as a terrorist and whom you don’t. We need to delink terrorism from religion – to isolate terrorists who use this interchange of arguments between terrorism and religion.

NATO has been a thread throughout my life.

Although I don’t like the way the Chinese do business, I continue to do business in China. I have to. They’re the next world power.

There is no avoiding war; it can only be postponed to the advantage of others.

I play a nobody in Japan.