Bush Foreign Policy Quotes & Sayings

I can think of no faster way to unite the American people behind George W. Bush than a terrorist attack on an American target overseas. And I believe George W. Bush will quickly unite the American people through his foreign policy. — Henry A. Kissinger

I would never use God to promote foreign policy decisions. I recognize that in the eyes of an almighty, I am a lowly sinner, and I ask for strength and wisdom and I pray for calmness when the seas are storming, and I pray for others. — George W. Bush

I believe that this president [George W. Bush], regrettably, rushed us into a war, made decisions about foreign policy, pushed alliances away. And, as a result, America is now bearing this extraordinary burden where we are not as safe as we ought to be. — John F. Kerry

As a Texas loyalist who followed Bush to Washington with great hope and personal affection and as a proud member of his administration, I was all too ready to give him and his highly experienced foreign policy advisers the benefit of the doubt on Iraq. Unfortunately, subsequent events have showed that our willingness to trust the judgment of Bush and his team was misplaced. — Scott McClellan

Historians evaluating George W. Bush's first term will focus on foreign policy and, most of all, 9/11. I think they will criticize him for his early reaction, for not returning at once to Washington, D.C. — Robert Dallek

Here's a little thought experiment. Imagine that, on September 11, 2001, when the Twin Towers came down, the President of the United States was not George W. Bush, but Ann Coulter. What would have happened then? On September 12, President Coulter would have ordered the US military forces to drop 35 nuclear bombs throughout the Middle East, killing all of our actual and potential enemy combatants, and their wives and children. On September 13, the war would have been over and won, without a single American life lost. — Satoshi Kanazawa

One of the extraordinary features of the Blair government has been its slavish support for the central tenets of Bush's foreign policy - above all, the war in Iraq. During the Cold War, the Wilson government resisted the suggestion that it should send troops to Vietnam. — Martin Jacques

George Bush has shown great skill at disguising an incredibly weak foreign policy. — Brad Sherman

I will have a foreign-handed foreign policy. — George W. Bush

It is regrettable that Senator Kennedy has chosen Veteran's Day to continue leveling baseless and false attacks that send the wrong signal to our troops and our enemy during a time of war. It is also regrettable that Senator Kennedy has found more time to say negative things about President Bush then he ever did about Saddam Hussein. If America were to follow Senator Kennedy's foreign policy, Saddam Hussein would not only still be in power, he would be oppressing and occupying Kuwait. — Scott McClellan

Bush the Elder's stature as president grows with every passing year. He was the finest foreign policy president I've ever covered and a man who defied his party on tax increases while imposing budget restrictions on the Democrats. — Joe Klein

Two months ago Donald Trump said that ISIS was not our fight. Just two months ago he said that Hillary Clinton would be a great negotiator with Iran. And he gets his foreign policy experience from the shows. — Jeb Bush

This foreign policy stuff is a little frustrating. — George W. Bush

George W. Bush promised us a foreign policy with humility. Instead, he has brought us humiliation in the eyes of the world. He promised to restore honor and integrity to the White House. Instead, he has brought deep dishonor to our country and built a durable reputation as the most dishonest president since Richard M. Nixon. — Al Gore

When the president during the campaign
said he was against nation building,
I didn't realize he meant our nation. — Al Franken

A central claim of the Bush administration's foreign policy is that the spread of democracy in the Middle East is the cure for terrorism. — Timothy Garton Ash

The focus ought to be on the single fact that Hillary Clinton wants to double down on a failed foreign policy and we need to be united to defeat that because we're going to be in a place that is far less secure than it is today. — Jeb Bush

There's a normal tendency in the campaign, during a crisis, for the country to rally around the White House. That may help Al Gore in this campaign, but on the other hand, George W. Bush handled himself so well the other night on foreign policy that I think it fortified him just before this crisis broke. — David Gergen

The Mars Polar Lander has been quieter than George W. Bush after a foreign policy question. — David Letterman

Kissinger-type foreign policy is clearly, in my view, the proper tilt for us in the future, and he [Donald Trump] gets it. And some of our members, I guess, have been so deeply committed to the [George W.]Bush agenda, the neo-conservative agenda, that it's harder for them to acknowledge that. But I acknowledge it. — Jeff Sessions

I'm proud of the fact that I stood up early and unequivocally in opposition to Bush's foreign policy. That opposition hasn't changed. — Barack Obama

So the Bush-Obama administration has taken a fiscal stance diametrically opposed to that of the patron saint of free enterprise. While escalating war in Afghanistan and maintaining over 850 military bases around the world, the administration has run up the national debt that Smith decried. By shifting the tax burden off property and off rent-seeking monopolies - above all, off the financial sector - this policy has raised America's cost of living and doing business, thereby undercutting its competitive power and running up larger and larger foreign debt. — Michael Hudson

Unlike George Bush and his friends at the big oil companies, I'm going to work for a real energy policy for this country that decreases America's dependence on foreign oil and helps lower the costs to American families. — John F. Kerry

No matter the good news anywhere else, these nuke-hungry rogue states will provide grounds for bad-mouthing Bush foreign policy. — Rich Lowry

I'm a war president. I make decisions here in the Oval Office and foreign policy matters with war on my mind. — George W. Bush

The time has passed in America when this party can be the party of compassion and let the executive branch run foreign policy. It won't work. We have to be the party that can stand toe to toe with George W. Bush on national security, as well as the party of compassion. — Wesley Clark

American foreign policy had still not recovered from its victory over communism when George W. Bush and Condoleezza Rice took over at the White House in 2001. — Russell Baker

I focus most of my attention on Hillary Clinton and her disastrous policies. I mean, there's a real danger in this election. Electing Hillary Clinton in an era where we now are so pessimistic about the future, would double down on [Barack] Obama economics and a failed foreign policy - so most of my attention is about my record and about defeating Hillary Clinton. — Jeb Bush

Watch out Mr. Bush! With the exception of economic policy and energy policy and social issues and tax policy and foreign policy and supreme court appointments and Rove-style politics, we're coming in there to shake things up! — Tom Toles

Bush humble foreign policy was hijacked into nation-building. — Ron Paul

Bob Gates has unusual standing in the debate about the Obama administration's foreign policy: He was defense secretary for both a hawkish President George W. Bush and a wary President Obama. He understood Bush's desire to project power and Obama's skepticism. — David Ignatius

In inventing [General Juan Manuel de] Rosas' self-justification, I have taken the liberty of drawing almost exclusively on the words of Tony Blair, and the various self-justifications he produced to defend his foreign policy adventures with George Bush in the Middle East and the Central Asia. — Harry Thompson

There should be full engagement to protect our country from a grave threat, which is the weakest foreign policy since Jimmy Carter. — Jeb Bush

."I don't have the foggiest idea about what I think about international, foreign policy." — George W. Bush

During the election campaign of 2000, it was generally thought that then-governor Bush didn't know much about foreign policy or national security affairs, and that Colin Powell would lead on that front, while the president's main concern would be domestic. — Elliott Abrams

The fundamental question is: 'Will I be a successful president when it comes to foreign policy?' I will be, but until I'm the president, it's going to be hard for me to verify that I think I'll be more effective. — George W. Bush

I really think [the Bush Administration]'s foreign policy agenda is to spread irony through the world. — Jon Stewart

Many Americans, and many more people around the world, have been outraged by what they see as President George W. Bush's radical reordering of American foreign policy. — Stephen Kinzer

Since the Bush-Cheney Administration took office in January 2001, controlling the major oil and natural gas fields of the world had been the primary, though undeclared, priority of US foreign policy ... Not only the invasion of Iraq, but also the toppling of the Taliban in Afghanistan, had nothing to do with 'democracy,' and everything to do with pipeline control across Central Asia and the militarization of the Middle East. — F. William Engdahl

American foreign policy must be more than the management of crisis. It must have a great and guiding goal: to turn this time of American influence into generations of democratic peace. — George W. Bush

There are legitimate, even powerful arguments, to be made against the Bush administration's foreign policy. But those arguments are complicated, hard to explain, and, in the end, not all that sensational. — Tucker Carlson

There's this kind of almost - kind of a weird kind of elitism that says well maybe - maybe certain people in certain parts of the world shouldn't be free; maybe it's best just to let them sit in these tyrannical societies. And our foreign policy rejects that concept. And we don't accept it. And so we're working. — George W. Bush

People often ask me where I stand politically. It's not that I disagree with Bush's economic policy or his foreign policy, it's that I believe he was a child of Satan sent here to destroy the planet Earth. Little to the left. — Bill Hicks

Bush promised a foreign policy of humility and a domestic policy of compassion. He has given us a foreign policy of arrogance and a domestic policy that is cynical, myopic and cruel. — Joe Klein