I wouldn't even know - and I spent three years in the CIA - I wouldn't even know how you'd start a covert action program in a place like Iran. It would be extraordinarily difficult.

There's clearly something to be said for success and following through on your commitments.

The problem is that neither the M1 nor the M60 or indeed neither any tank, has sufficient ground pressure to drive a [bulldozer] blade into even marginally hard ground. They are not bulldozers, they are tanks, whether you are talking about the M1 or the M60's. So if you are going to dig in a tank, you need to have some kind of equipment.

It took us 50 months in Germany, post World War II to go from the end of the war to a national election.

And I argued with that intelligence estimate and I think it is a responsibility of policymakers to use their best judgment on the basis of the intelligence they've received.

Look at what the Omar of Qatar is doing, for example - the King of Morocco, Jordan, Bahrain. There are reform movements taking place, efforts to broaden the political participation of the populations of the region.

We went into Iraq because Iraq posed a threat to the stability of the region and was engaged in the process of trying to develop weapons of mass destruction and had links to terrorists.