Top 100 Obama War Quotes
#1. It is Barack Obama who is at war with this country. Recent events prove it. This is not a cliche. It's not a figure of speech. Obama is at war with the U.S. economy.
Rush Limbaugh
#2. We are a resilient country. We've been through a Civil War; we've been through two World Wars. We've been through a Great Depression; we even made it through Jimmy Carter! We will make it through the Obama years!
Rick Perry
#3. Peace is not just the absence of war. True peace depends upon creating the opportunity that makes life worth living. And to do that, we must confront the common enemies of human beings: nuclear weapons and poverty; ignorance and disease.
Barack Obama
#4. We are not at war with Islam. We are at war with people who have perverted Islam.
Barack Obama
#5. As I've said, there were patriots who supported this war, and patriots who opposed it. And all of us are united in appreciation for our servicemen and women, and our hopes for Iraqis' future.
Barack Obama
#6. Don't kid yourself. President Obama's decision to withdraw 33,000 troops from Afghanistan before he stands for reelection is not driven by the United States' 'position of strength' in the war zone as much as it is by grim economic and political realities at home.
Ron Fournier
#7. Weapons that were designed for soldiers in war theaters don't belong on our streets.
Barack Obama
#8. The alternative, no limits on Iran's nuclear program, no inspections, an Iran that's closer to a nuclear weapon, the risk of regional nuclear arms race, and the greater risk of war - all that would endanger our [American] security.
Barack Obama
#9. When Lincoln ran into trouble during the Civil War, he got new generals. He brought in Grant. I hope that President Obama will bring in some new generals on the financial front.
Marcy Kaptur
#10. Lyndon Johnson is not a comfortable model for President Obama to imitate. He is an all-but-forgotten president - pilloried for the failed war in Vietnam and criticized for grandiose reforms conservatives denounce as the epitome of federal social engineering that costs too much and does too little.
Robert Dallek
#11. [Barack] Obama believes you can hold enemy combatants, unlawful enemy combatants at Gitmo without a criminal trial because this is law of war detention.
Chris Matthews
#12. Their foreign policy is so disjointed, confusing, and chaotic that, really, people need to reexamine those who want to be involved in every war.
Barack Obama
#13. McChrystal had organized a jaw-dropping counterterrorism campaign inside Iraq, but the tactical successes did not translate into a strategic victory. This was why counterinsurgency - blanketing the population in safety and winning them over - was necessary.
Bob Woodward
#14. We know the candidate Barack Obama, what he was like - the anti-war government nig- uh, the - America was a source for division around the world, that what we were doing was wrong.
Rick Santorum
#15. In Iraq and Syria, American leadership - including our military power - is stopping ISIL's advance, instead of getting dragged into another ground war in the Middle East, we are leading a broad coalition, including Arab nations, to degrade and ultimately destroy this terrorist group.
Barack Obama
#16. So Americans understand the costs of war. Yet as a country, we will never tolerate our security being threatened, nor stand idly by when our people have been killed. We will be relentless in defense of our citizens and our friends and allies. We will be true to the values that make us who we are.
Barack Obama
#17. The best power of all is to be free, but Obama is not a free person. He is a prisoner of a military system. He talked about closing Guantanamo and ending the war in Iraq. Now he's taken on another war. What's happening?
Adolfo Perez Esquivel
#18. As you travel through the Middle East what keeps on striking home to me is how similar everyone is, and yet the degree to which we can find differences to fight wars over. It requires a great deal of empathy, I think, between various sides to overcome this history and live in peace.
Barack Obama
#19. Obama is not a brown-skinned anti-war socialist who gives away free healthcare. You're thinking of Jesus.
John Fugelsang
#20. And it's safe to assume that those in power would think longer and harder about launching a war if they envisioned their own sons and daughters in harm's way.
Barack Obama
#21. We remember the specter of sectarian violence
al Qaeda's attacks on mosques and pilgrims, militias that carried out campaigns of intimidation and campaigns of assassination. And in the face of ancient divisions, you stood firm to help those Iraqis who put their faith in the future.
Barack Obama
#22. But do I think that our actions in anyway violate the War Powers Resolution, the answer is no.
Barack Obama
#23. So here's what I want you to know, and here's what I want all our men and women in uniform to know: Because of you, we are ending these wars in a way that will make America stronger and the world more secure. Because of you.
Barack Obama
#24. He wants Obama to do one thing, call him ... He said, if you can, Dennis, I don't want to do war. I don't want to do war. He said that to me.
Dennis Rodman
#25. [I]f you look at United States history since World War II, you find that of the 10 presidents who preceded Barack Obama, seven left office with a debt ratio lower than when they came in. Who were the three exceptions? Ronald Reagan and the two George Bushes.
Paul Krugman
#26. So don't get cynical. Cynicism didn't put a man on the moon. Cynicism has never won a war, or cured a disease, or built a business, or fed a young mind. Cynicism is a choice. And hope will always be a better choice.
Barack Obama
#27. The war against ISIS will pose many new challenges for the next commander-in-chief. The last two presidents [George W. Bush and Barack Obama] pursued a Middle East policy that supported toppling dictators to try to promote democracy.
Wolf Blitzer
#28. As we speak, Iran has rolled back its nuclear program, shipped out its uranium stockpile, and the world has avoided another war.
Barack Obama
#29. A number I'd love to know: the % of those now saying 'we have to vote Obama to stop an attack on Iran' who will support one if Obama does it.
Glenn Greenwald
#30. If Obama commits thermonuclear war, I won't have to worry about November and neither will you.
Kesha Rogers
#31. As you know, John McCain is an older, white-haired man who has been in the Senate for over twenty years, voted for the Iraq War, and said Barack Obama did not have the experience to be president. I'm sorry, that's our intro for next week when Joe Biden is on, I got confused.
Jay Leno
#32. We will send an additional 475 service members to Iraq. As I have said before, these American forces will not have a combat mission - we will not get dragged into another ground war in Iraq. But they are needed to support Iraqi and Kurdish forces with training, intelligence and equipment.
Barack Obama
#33. Barack Obama can give an entire speech about the wars America is fighting, and never use the word "victory" except when he's talking about his own campaign.
Sarah Palin
#34. I wouldn't consider them acts of war, but I would consider them acts of property damage, commercial theft that are serious.
Barack Obama
#35. There are patriots who opposed the war in Iraq and there are patriots who supported the war in Iraq. We are one people, all of us pledging allegiance to the stars and stripes, all of us defending the United States of America.
Barack Obama
#36. Tough talk often draws headlines, but war rarely conforms to slogans.
Barack Obama
#37. I find it significant that most of the people who believe in just war have never fought in one; examples: Barack W. Bush and George H. Obama.
Michel Templet
#38. I agree with Pres. Barack Obama, Iraqis need a political solution. No war in Iraq!
Barbara Lee
#39. Let me tell you another place to look for some savings. We are currently spending $10 billion a month in Iraq when they have a $79 billion surplus. It seems to me that if we're going to be strong at home as well as strong abroad, that we have to look at bringing that war to a close.
Barack Obama
#40. Obama and the Democrats were so critical of what Bush did, the interrogations, the secret prisons, Guantanamo and all of that, and even the war on terror. Obama won't use the word. He's made war on the war on terror.
Charles Krauthammer
#41. We remember the surge and we remember the Awakening
when the abyss of chaos turned toward the promise of reconciliation. By battling and building block by block in Baghdad, by bringing tribes into the fold and partnering with the Iraqi army and police, you helped turn the tide toward peace.
Barack Obama
#42. Our enemies are fully aware that they can use oil as a weapon against America. And if we don't take this threat as seriously as the bombs they build or the guns they buy, we will be fighting the War on Terror with one hand tied behind our back.
Barack Obama
#43. FDR, JFK, LBJ [all Democratic presidents ] we have a pretty long list of presidents who maybe were not entirely forthcoming with intelligence information before they went to war, so I'd be cautious against making legal cases against the administration.
Barack Obama
#44. It is harder to end a war, than begin one.
Barack Obama
#45. I stand before you tonight as a young American, a proud American, of a generation born as the Cold War receded, shaped by the tragedy of 9/11, connected by the digital revolution and determined to re-elect the man who will make the 21st century another American century - President Barack Obama.
Julian Castro
#46. Weapons of war have no place on our streets
Barack Obama
#47. Most Americans believe that escalation will not bring the war in Iraq to a responsible end, and that's why I've proposed not just a troop cap, but a phased redeployment that will start bringing our troops home.
Barack Obama
#48. I wonder, sometimes, whether men and women in fact are capable of learning from history
whether we progress from one stage to the next in an upward course or whether we just ride the cycles of boom and bust, war and peace, ascent and decline.
Barack Obama
#49. When Mitt Romney talked about Putin expanding his sphere of influence, Obama mocked and said, 'The Cold War has been over 20 years, nothing to be worried about' ... We keep making that mistake with Putin.
Ted Cruz
#50. I am not opposed to all wars. I'm opposed to dumb wars.
Barack Obama
#51. In the end, no amount of American forces can solve the political differences that lie at the heart of somebody else's civil war.
Barack Obama
#52. I'm very disappointed in Obama. I was very much in support of him in the beginning, but I cannot support war. I cannot support droning. I cannot support capitulating to the banks.
Alice Walker
#53. No deal means a greater chance of more war in the Middle East ...
Barack Obama
#54. The fact that presidents have done something does not necessarily make it right or constitutional.
Chris Edelson
#55. America is not - and never will be - at war with Islam. We will, however, relentlessly confront violent extremists.
Barack Obama
#57. My goal is not to resolve conflicts and tensions in the region through more war. My goal is to make sure that, you know, we are able to negotiate a deal that we can verify.
Barack Obama
#58. In critical ways, Obama has reversed not just Bush policy but every president's approach to the world since the Second World War, save for that of his soulmate Jimmy Carter.
Elliott Abrams
#59. Obama said, 'I welcome debate among my team, but I won't tolerate division.
Bob Woodward
#61. What I could not support was "a dumb war, a rash war, a war based not on reason but on passion, not on principle but on politics".
Barack Obama
#62. Oh, the naive Obama State Department. They say we can't kill our way out of war. Really? Tell that to the Nazis. Oh wait, you can't. They're dead. We killed 'em.
Sarah Palin
#63. Obama had campaigned against Bush's ideas and approaches. But, Donilon, for one, thought that Obama had perhaps underestimated the extent to which he had inherited George W. Bush's presidency - the apparatus, personnel and mind-set of war making.
Bob Woodward
#64. I'm not saying that George W. Bush did everything right. But even if you take a skeptical view of his Iraq war, [Barack] Obama made the more serious error of withdrawing his troops from Iraq early.
Garry Kasparov
#65. Peace is far more preferable to war. [ ... ] I believe that peace is the only path to true security. [ ... ] And there is no question that the only path to peace is through negotiations .
Barack Obama
#66. Raising taxes is the last thing we should do amid the weakest economic recovery since World War II. Unfortunately, even if we avoid the full 'Taxmageddon' scenario, President Obama's health care law also contains a new surtax on investment that will take effect in 2013.
John Cornyn
#67. If the thumbnail version of the Iraq war was that Bush lied about WMD, the thumbnail version of Obama's war in Afghanistan is that the generals pushed him into a war he didn't want to fight.
Michael Hastings
#68. Young people: I understand this is important to you, but as you be thinking about climate change, the economy and jobs, war and peace, maybe way at the bottom you should be thinking about marijuana.
Barack Obama
#69. Where the stakes are the highest, in the war on terror, we cannot possibly succeed without extraordinary international cooperation. Effective international police actions require the highest degree of intelligence sharing, planning and collaborative enforcement.
Barack Obama
#70. As president I would actually name the enemy, radical Islamic terrorists. We've got a president [ Barack Obama] who wants to apologize for America and wants to criticize medieval Christian and wants to wage war on junk food. He won't even say the words "radical Islamic terrorists."
Bobby Jindal
#71. I give [Barack Obama] a 10 [on a scale of 1 to 10] because he's not God, and he inherited a couple of wars, and a financial mess.I want to see him curse somebody out on TV. You can't finesse a bull. He's gotta throw down. He's in the shark tank.
Tracy Morgan
#72. With the likely nominations of Barack Obama by the Democrats and John McCain by the Republicans, one of these two parties is headed for a 2009 crack-up that could prove as messy as any party civil war in recent history.
Chuck Todd
#73. I find it amusing that those who helped to authorize and engineer the biggest foreign policy disaster in our generation are now criticizing me for making sure that we are on the right battlefield and not the wrong battlefield in the war against terrorism.
Barack Obama
#74. The soldier 's courage and sacrifice is full of glory , expressing devotion to country , to cause, to comrades in arms. But war itself is never glorious , and we must never trumpet it as such.
Barack Obama
#75. Last week John McCain said the fundamentals of our economy are strong. This week, he said it's the worst crisis since World War II. So he suspended his campaign, unless you count doing interviews, airing attack ads, sending out surrogates on TV to attack Obama.
Bill Maher
#76. While President Obama was starting and expanding unconstitutiona l wars overseas, Bradley Manning, whose actions have caused exactly zero deaths, was shining light on the truth behind these wars.
Ron Paul
#77. See, that's why Barack's running: to end the war in Iraq responsibly - to build an economy that lifts every family, to make sure health care is available for every American - and to make sure that every child in this nation has a world-class education all the way from preschool to college.
Michelle Obama
#78. President Obama is asking Congress to support a military strike in Syria. If they approve, it will be the first time Congress has officially declared war since Obamacare.
Jay Leno
#79. Operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and the war on terrorism have reduced the pace of military transformation and have revealed our lack of preparation for defensive and stability operations. This Administration has overextended our military.
Barack Obama
#80. The War on Drugs has been an utter failure. We need to rethink and decriminalize our marijuana laws.
Barack Obama
#81. There's a real question at stake now. Is President Obama creating a civil war in our own country?
Jon Voight
#82. Now that Obama is at war in a 3rd country, does that mean he has to give back his Nobel Peace Prize?
Mort Sahl
#83. Barack Obama is not Harry Truman, who dropped the A-bomb on Japan to stop World War II. Barack Obama is not John F. Kennedy, who lowered marginal tax rates to get economic growth and job creation. Barack Obama and the far left, they are a completely different ball of wax.
Monica Crowley
#84. Terrorist', noun: 1. Someone my government tells me is a terrorist; 2. Someone my President decides to kill.
Glenn Greenwald
#85. Having the United Kingdom in the European Union gives us much greater confidence about the strength of the transatlantic union and is part of the cornerstone of institutions built after World War II that has made the world safer and more prosperous.
Barack Obama
#86. Obama has committed the U.S. to war on the Islamic State. To then allow within a month an allied enclave to be overrun - and perhaps annihilated - would be a major blow.
Charles Krauthammer
#87. George W. Bush was a very bad president. The Iraq war was a big mistake. The U.S.A. needed a political change. I hoped Barack Obama could be a good president, but I'm disappointed. He hasn't done well.
Marc Rich
#88. I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank.
Barack Obama
#89. I don't oppose all wars. What I am opposed to is a dumb war. What I am opposed to is a rash war.
Barack Obama
#90. Guerrilla war is a test of wills. Obama's actual objectives - rollback in Iraq, containment in Syria - are not unreasonable. But they require commitment and determination. In other words, will. You can't just make one speech declaring war, then disappear and go fundraising.
Charles Krauthammer
#91. There are war-torn countries, people full of poverty, who still voted 60, 70 percent. If here in the United States of America, we voted at 60 percent, 70 percent, it would transform our politics.
Barack Obama
#92. We're fighting three wars now. Imagine how many we'd be fighting if President Obama hadn't won the Nobel Peace Prize.
Jay Leno
#93. A lot has happened over the years. And while this nation has been tested by war, and it's been tested by recession and all manner of challenges - I stand before you again tonight, after almost two terms as your president, to tell you I am more optimistic about the future of America than ever before.
Barack Obama
#94. We've achieved this historic progress through diplomacy, without resorting to another war in the Middle East. I want to also point out that by working with Iran on this nuclear deal, we were better able to address other issues.
Barack Obama
#95. This is an extraordinary achievement, nearly nine years in the making.
Barack Obama
#96. I know what the counterterrorism feels like because I was there. But I also operated within limits. And within the United States government, we've decided long ago that there are limits on what we're going to do in the war against terrorism.
Barack Obama
#97. The United States is not, and never will be, at war with Islam.
Barack Obama
#98. We remember the grind of the insurgency
the roadside bombs, the sniper fire, the suicide attacks. From the 'triangle of death' to the fight for Ramadi; from Mosul in the north to Basra in the south
your will proved stronger than the terror of those who tried to break it.
Barack Obama
#99. They, and we, are the legacies of an unbroken chain of proud men and women who served their country with honor, who waged war so that we might know peace, who braved hardship so that we might know opportunity, who paid the ultimate price so that we might know freedom.
Barack Obama
#100. I think Ronald Reagan changed the trajectory of America in a way that Richard Nixon did not and in a way that Bill Clinton did not. He put us on a fundamentally different path because the country was ready for it.
Barack Obama
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