Don't create more enemies than you take out by some immoral act.

Putin goes to bed at night knowing he can break all the rules, and the West will follow all the rules.

For a sitting U.S. president to see our allies as freeloaders is nuts.

The U.S. military is not war weary. Our military draws strength from confronting our enemies when clear policy objectives are set and we are fully resourced for the fight.

Gains achieved at great cost against our enemy in Afghanistan are reversible.

I would storm the gates of Hell if Third Marine Air Wing was overhead.

We all recognize that the Mid-east is dissolving into crises, and we know terrorism did not start with 9-11.

You stay teachable most by reading books. By reading what other people went through.

There is only one 'retirement plan' for terrorists.

The Marines have landed, and we now own a piece of Afghanistan.

I'm on record that it didn't really traumatize me to do away with some people.

No one gives a damn what Iran thinks on any significant issue. The only reason Iran is at the big boys' table is because of their nuclear weapons program.

Ultimately, a real understanding of history means that we face nothing new under the sun.

There is one way to have a short but exciting conversation with me, and that is to move too slow.

Wherever the enemy wants to fight, we will follow him to the ends of the Earth. We'll adapt, we'll train, we'll advise, we'll mentor, and we'll fight, and we'll fight well.

I don't have the best track record with quotes.

The Army was always big on Clausewitz, the Prussian; the Navy on Alfred Thayer Mahan, the American; and the Air Force on Giulio Douhet, the Italian. But the Marine Corps has always been more Eastern-oriented. I am much more comfortable with Sun-tzu and his approach to warfare.

You must reward the kind of behavior that you want.

I've had some 'riotous excursions of the human spirit' alongside the young Sailors and Marines, and it's time to leave the stage to the young leaders who got their rank the old-fashioned way - they earned their stripes in combat.

PowerPoint makes us stupid.

I've always found, give me a pack of cigarettes and a couple of beers, and I do better with that than I do with torture.

It's not an easy course. It's not designed to be. We're not here to get you in touch with your inner child.

There are going to be good days and bad days. Bottom line.

I believe that many of my young guys lived because I didn't waste their lives because I didn't have the vision in my mind of how to destroy the enemy at least cost to our guys and to the innocents on the battlefields.