Quotes

Each success only buys an admission ticket to a more difficult problem.

I want to thank you for stopping the applause. It is impossible for me to look humble for any period of time.

The illegal we do immediately. The unconstitutional takes a little longer.

Nobody will ever win the battle of the sexes. There's too much fraternizing with the enemy.

Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac.

Military men are dumb, stupid animals to be used as pawns for foreign policy.

[on Xi Jinping, the new President of China, 2013] Xi is convinced his generation's hardships gave it the strength to face the challenges of adapting China to the consequences of its success. He has put forward a sweeping reform program designed to move millions to the cities, streamline bureaucracy, reorient the economy away state-owned enterprises and fight corruption.

[to Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping] I think if we drink enough Moutai, we can solve anything.

The most fundamental problem of politics is not the control of wickedness but the limitation of righteousness.

The nice thing about being a celebrity is that when you bore people, they think it's their fault.

On the occasion of Helmut's [Helmut Schmidt] 90th birthday celebration given in Hamburg by Die Zeit, I pointed out that when I was a boy, it never occurred to me that one day I might participate at the birthday of a German Chancellor. But that was before I knew that smoking four packs of cigarettes and consuming ten Coca-Colas a day guaranteed longevity.

[April 2023] If I talked to Vladimir Putin, I would tell him that he, too, is safer with Ukraine in NATO.

[17 January 2023; on 2022 Russo-Ukrainian war, and Ukraine's NATO aspirations] Before this war, I was opposed to membership of Ukraine in NATO because I feared that it would start exactly the process that we have seen now. Now that this process has reached this level, the idea of a neutral Ukraine under these conditions is no longer meaningful. I believe Ukrainian membership in NATO would be an appropriate outcome.

[April 2023] We have now armed Ukraine to a point where it will be the best-armed country and with the least strategically experienced leadership in Europe. If the war ends like it probably will, with Russia losing many of its gains, but retaining Sevastopol, we may have a dissatisfied Russia, but also a dissatisfied Ukraine -- in other words, a balance of dissatisfaction. So, for the safety of Europe, it is better to have Ukraine in NATO, where it cannot make national decisions on territorial claims.

[April 2023] I have never met a Russian leader who said anything good about China. And I've never met a Chinese leader who said anything good about Russia, they are sort of treated with contempt.

Even a paranoid can have enemies.

Power is the great aphrodisiac.

We are all the President's men.

Ninety percent of the politicians give the other ten percent a bad reputation.

The essence of Richard Nixon is loneliness.

I don't see why we need to stand by and watch a country go Communist due to the irresponsibility of its people. The issues are much too important for the Chilean voters to be left to decide for themselves.

It is not a matter of what is true that counts, but a matter of what is perceived to be true.