The problem here is that there will always be some uncertainty about how quickly Saddam can acquire nuclear weapons. But we don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud.

It's bad policy to speculate on what you'll do if a plan fails when you're trying to make a plan work.

In light of 50 years of bondage of Eastern Europe, [invading the Soviet Union in 1948 to prevent it from acquiring nuclear weapons] was probably a reasonable thing to do.

Everyone wants Russia to be a prosperous, democratic state that is fully integrated.

I never found anybody I wanted to spend my life with. People say, "Didn't you want to get married?" Well, sure, but it's not abstract, there has to be someone you want to marry. I'm pretty traditional. Marriage would have to come first, before kids.

Power is nothing unless you can turn it into influence.

Well, there's been plenty of ultimatums, and one thing that we better be very clear is that we can't continue to have the kind of defiance of the United Nations, the defiance of the international community that we've had.