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John Kerry
28 quotes
“How do you ask a man to be the last man to die in Vietnam? How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 1971 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Testimony before subcommittees of the U.S. Senate, April, 1971
“We feel we have been used in the worst fashion by the administration of this country. ... And we cannot consider ourselves America's best men when we are ashamed of and hated what we were called on to do in Southeast Asia.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 1971 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Testimony before subcommittees of the U.S. Senate, April, 1971
“We must recognize that there is no indication that Saddam Hussein has any intention of relenting. So we have an obligation of enormous consequence, an obligation to guarantee that Saddam Hussein cannot ignore the United Nations. He cannot be permitted to go unobserved and unimpeded toward his horrific objective of amassing a stockpile of weapons of mass destruction.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 1997 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Speech to the floor of the Senate, Congressional Record, November 9, 1997
“If Saddam Hussein is unwilling to bend to the international community's already existing order, then he will have invited enforcement, even if that enforcement is mostly at the hands of the United States, a right we retain even if the Security Council fails to act.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2002 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: New York Times op-ed, September 6, 2002
“We need a new approach to national security - a bold, progressive internationalism that stands in stark contrast to the too often belligerent and myopic unilateralism of the Bush Administration.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2003 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Remarks at Georgetown University, January 23, 2003
“If you don't believe...Saddam Hussein is a threat with nuclear weapons, then you shouldn't vote for me.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2003 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: usatoday.com, February 11, 2003
“I said at the time I would have preferred if we had given diplomacy a greater opportunity, but I think it was the right decision to disarm Saddam Hussein, and when the president made the decision, I supported him, and I support the fact that we did disarm him.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2003 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Democratic Presidential Debate May 13, 2003
“I voted to hold Saddam Hussein accountable. I knew we had to hold him accountable. There's never been a doubt about that. But I also know that if we had done this with a sufficient number of troops, if we had done this in a globalized way, if we had brought more people to the table, we might have caught Saddam Hussein sooner. We might have had less loss of life. We would be in a stronger position today with respect to what we're doing.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2003 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 14 December 2003, Fox News Sunday
“We're going to keep pounding. These guys [Bush Administration] are the most crooked, you know, lying group I've ever seen. It's scary.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2004 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Kerry uttered these words, not knowing there was a microphone recording it March 12, 2004
“I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it. ... Joe [Biden] and I brought an amendment to the $87 billion, and we said, `This should be paid for now, not adding to the deficit'.... The president said no; the Republicans voted no.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2004 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: San Francisco Chronicle, March 21, 2004 pE2
“America must always be the world's paramount military power, but we can magnify our power through alliances.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2004 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: May 27, 2004
“I'm John Kerry and I'm reporting for duty.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2004 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Acceptance Speech at Democratic National Convention, July 29, 2004
“It's the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2004 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Sept 6, 2004
“There is some schedule showing what you (need) to do to get Iraqis standing up and defending themselves which is now suddenly beginning to happen, so there are some signs of progress.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2005 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: September 27, 2005
“We're here to talk about education. But I want to say something before that....You know, education, if you make the most of it and you study hard and you do your homework and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2006 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Speech to California students, 31 October 2006
“I'm sick and tired of these despicable Republican attacks that always seem to come from those who never can be found to serve in war, but love to attack those who did. I'm not going to be lectured by a stuffed suit White House mouthpiece standing behind a podium.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2006 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Unidentified 31 October 2006 statement
“KERRY: I have had conversations with leaders.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2004 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: March 2004 exchange
“We have an electorate that doesn't always pay that much attention to what's going on so people are influenced by a simple slogan rather than the facts or truth or what's happening.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2010 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: September 27, 2010.
“So my judgment is that Syria will move; Syria will change, as it embraces a legitimate relationship with the United States and the West and economic opportunity that comes with it and the participation that comes with it.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2011 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Speech at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, March 16, 2011.
“After Mitt Romney said it would be naive to go into Pakistan to pursue the terrorists, it took President Obama, against the advice of many, to give that order and finally rid this earth of Osama bin Laden. Ask Osama bin Laden if he is better off now than he was four years ago!”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2012 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: September 6, 2012 John Kerry’s speech to the Democratic National Convention, 2012
“What we saw in Syria last week should shock the conscience of the world. It defies any code of morality. Make no mistake, President Obama believes there must be accountability for those who would use the world's most heinous weapons against the world's most vulnerable people.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2013 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Syria chemical attack undeniable, says John Kerry, August 26, 2013
“Now, I know there are still a few who insist that climate change is one big hoax, even a political conspiracy. My friends, these people are so out of touch with science that they believe rising sea levels don’t matter, because, in their view, the extra water is just going to spill out over the sides of a flat Earth.” –”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2015 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: December 9, 2015, Paris. Source: http://www.democracynow.org/2015/12/9/it_is_not_enough_despite_promise
“Years ago when I left college, I went to war. And I learned in war the price that is paid when diplomacy fails. And I made a decision that if I ever was lucky enough to be in a position to make a difference, I would try to do so.”
John Kerry (born 1943) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Perhaps the media would do us all a service if they didn't cover it quite as much. People wouldn't know what's going on.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2016 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: On terrorism — Press Availability in Dhaka, Bangladesh (29 August 2016)
“Regrettably, some seem to believe that the US friendship means the US must accept any policy regardless all our interests, our own words, our own position, our own principles, even after urging again and again that the policy must change... Friends need to tell each other the hard truth and friendships require mutual respect.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2016 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: On UNSC resolution 2334, Kerry Blasts Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu — (December 2016)
“You know there’s a lot of discussion now about how you curb those entities in order to guarantee that you’re going to have some accountability on facts, etc. But look, if people only go to one source, and the source they go to is sick, and, you know, has an agenda, and they’re putting out disinformation, our First Amendment stands as a major block to be able to just, you know, hammer it out of existence.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2024 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: John Kerry’s speech at the World Economic Forum Sustainable Development Impact Meetings in New York City, (September 25, 2024) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amJQoNilH1Q
“There are all kinds of atrocities, and I would have to say that, yes, yes, I committed the same kind of atrocities as thousands of other soldiers have committed in that I took part in shootings in free fire zones. I conducted harassment and interdiction fire. I used 50-caliber machine guns, which we were granted and ordered to use, which were our only weapon against people. I took part in search and destroy missions, in the burning of villages. All of this is contrary to the laws of warfare, all of this is contrary to the Geneva Conventions and all of this is ordered as a matter of written established policy by the government of the United States from the top down. And I believe that the men who designed these, the men who designed the free fire zone, the men who ordered us, the men who signed off the air raid strike areas, I think these men, by the letter of the law, the same letter of the law that tried Lieutenant [[William Calley|[William] Calley]], are war criminals.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 1971 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Testimony before subcommittees of the U.S. Senate, April, 1971
“There's something different about what happened from Charlie Hebdo, and I think everybody would feel that. There was a sort of particularized focus and perhaps even a legitimacy in terms of — not a legitimacy, but a rationale that you could attach yourself to somehow and say, okay, they're really angry because of this and that. This Friday was absolutely indiscriminate. It wasn't to aggrieve one particular sense of wrong. It was to terrorize people. It was to attack everything that we do stand for. That's not an exaggeration. It was to assault all sense of nationhood and nation-state and rule of law and decency, dignity, and just put fear into the community and say, “Here we are.” And for what? What's the platform? What's the grievance? That we're not who they are? They kill people because of who they are and they kill people because of what they believe. And it's indiscriminate. They kill Shia. They kill Yezidis. They kill Christians. They kill Druze. They kill Ismaili. They kill anybody who isn't them and doesn't pledge to be that. And they carry with them the greatest public display of misogyny that I've ever seen, not to mention a false claim regarding Islam. It has nothing to do with Islam; it has everything to do with criminality, with terror, with abuse, with psychopathism — I mean, you name it. And that's why when some people — I even had a member of my own family email me and say, “More bombs aren’t the solution,” they said. Well, in principle, no. In principle, if you can educate and change people and provide jobs and make a difference if that's what they want, sure. But in this case, that's not what's happening. This is just raw terror to set up a caliphate to expand and expand and spread one notion of how you live and who you have to be. That is the antithesis of everything that brought our countries together — why Lafayette came to America to help us find liberty, and all of the evolutions of the struggles of France, the governments, to find the liberte, egalite, fraternite, and make it real in life every day. And all of that peacefulness was shattered in the span of an hour-plus on Friday night when people were going about their normal business. And they purposefully chose a concert, chose restaurants, chose places where people engage in social dialogue and exchange, and they object to that too. So this is not a situation where we have a choice. We have been at war with these guys since last year. President Obama said that very clearly. And every single country — not just in the region, but around the world — is opposed to what they are doing to the norms of human behavior and the standards by which we try to live.”
John Kerry (born 1943) first seen 2015 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Remarks to the Staff and Families of U.S. Embassy, Paris" (17 November 2015) on the November 2015 Paris attacks; also quoted in "John Kerry: Charlie Hebdo Attack Had ‘Legitimacy,’ ‘Rationale’ Behind It" by Alex Griswold…