I think we can make a contribution to their [Saudi Arabia] thinking as they decide how they should deal with the economic and social challenges that they are facing.

My responsibility, our responsibility as lucky Americans, is to try to give back to this country as much as it has given us, as we continue our American journey together.

The one thing the terrorists cannot do -- not one of them, not 10 of them, not 10,000 of them -- they cannot change who we are.

We now believe it is appropriate for Saddam Hussein to be forced to change, either by the threat of war, and therefore that compels him to cooperate. If he cooperates, then the basis of changed regime policy has shifted because his regime has, in fact, changed its policy to one of cooperation. So if he cooperates, then that is different than if he does not cooperate.

The United States is not looking for a way to launch war.

Our senior officers knew the war was going badly. Yet they bowed to groupthink pressure and kept up pretenses. ...Many of my generation, the career captains, majors, and lieutenant colonels seasoned in that war, vowed that when our turn came to call the shots, we would not quietly acquiesce in halfhearted warfare for half-baked reasons that the American people could not understand.

My own experience is that you get as much information as you can and then you pay attention to your intuition, to your informed instinct.