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Diplomacy Quotes
"Why are we, as a nation so obsessed with foreign things? Is it a legacy of our colonial years? We want foreign television sets. We want foreign shirts. We want foreign technology. Why this obsession with everything imported?"
63
"I was a member of the Politburo for seven years, a foreign minister."
62
"Our strategic dialogue with China can both protect American interests and uphold our principles, provided we are honest about our differences on human rights and other issues and provided we use a mix of targeted incentives and sanctions to narrow these differences."
54
"The League is very well when sparrows shout, but no good at all when eagles fall out."
46
"Prospects of normalizing our relations with Russia look good."
45
"I think my resignation was the only way to avoid bloodshed."
34
"Economic sanctions rarely achieve the desired results."
30
"A sincere diplomat is like dry water or wooden iron."
25
"I don't think that anybody should be ruling in or ruling out anything while we are conducting diplomacy."
23
"I cannot conceive of Israel withdrawing if Arab states do not recognize Israel, within secure borders."
23
"Tact is the discrimination of differences. It consists in conscious deviations."
23
"Let us move from the era of confrontation to the era of negotiation."
23
"The world will not accept dictatorship or domination."
20
"Discourage litigation. Persuade your neighbors to compromise whenever you can. As a peacemaker the lawyer has superior opportunity of being a good man. There will still be business enough."
20
"Euphemisms are unpleasant truths wearing diplomatic cologne."
19
"In terms of weapons, the best disarmament tool so far is nuclear energy. We have been taking down the Russian warheads, turning it into electricity. 10 percent of American electricity comes from decommissioned warheads."
19
"If any foreign minister begins to defend to the death a "peace conference," you can be sure his government has already placed its orders for new battleships and airplanes."
19
"The only way to get the best of an argument is to avoid it."
19
"Romania and Bulgaria were particularly irresponsible. If they wanted to diminish their chances of joining Europe they could not have found a better way."
19
"There can be no greater error than to expect, or calculate, upon real favors from nation to nation. It is an illusion which experience must cure, which a just pride ought to discard."
19
"We think it will be shortly afterwards, but it seems a terrible thing to gamble with such big stakes in diplomacy without having your master card in your hand."
17
"Having viewed Europe as an extension and projection of itself, France now finds Europe developing a mind and identity of its own which embraces France but is not controlled by France."
17
"If the United States of America or Britain is having elections, they don't ask for observers from Africa or from Asia. But when we have elections, they want observers."
17
"You learn, just as you learn good manners, how to approach things with a certain amount of diplomacy."
17
"America does not go abroad in search of monsters to destroy."
16
"Players have a great deal of flexibility when conducting diplomatic relations with their allies."
16
"Once the Xerox copier was invented, diplomacy died."
16
"But the United States did not keep its word. Is an American's word reliable these days?"
15
"I think there is a good deal of promise in those discussions as well. I think there is a range of matters that might be discussed between NATO and Russia that can provide a mechanism for talking through these issues, a way to give reassurance on these issues."
15
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