The absence of a focal enemy, which is what the Cold War had provided; the complexity of the developments that are occurring that mean that the world is just extremely complicated - lots of different and competing stories and strands; the continuing reality of megaterrorism; and the dysfunctionality of our politics that has neglected the foundations of the U.S. role in the world; have altogether left us somewhat confused.

If the Britain and France had done what they were obliged to do under the treaty and sent troops to enforce the treaty when Hitler remilitarized the Rhineland, the German general staff would have turned Hitler out. And one would not have had a cause for war, and you wouldn't have had World War II.

I think we should be organized in something called an Alliance Against Nuclear Terrorism. In the same way that NATO was the great alliance of the Cold War and served a great purpose then, we need now, in the war on terrorism, a new alliance, the mission of which would be to minimize the risk of nuclear terrorist attacks, and the members would agree to sign on to the gold standard.

When we succeeded in winning the Cold War, escaping a nuclear Armageddon that could have killed us all, the U.S. inevitably had a serious problem about an encore: what now for our place in the world?

Given that the Al Qaeda core has been significantly destroyed or disabled, and that the leadership seems to be essentially on the run or in hiding, it would lead me to think that probably it is one of the less centralized groups that might be the greatest danger.

There are two great tragedies in life: one is to fail to achieve one's grandest ambitions, and the other one is to succeed.

The fact that there are now many entities that may have some loose affiliation with a former core Al Qaeda - or who have decided to fashion themselves as an affiliate or follower in the Al Qaeda jihadist tradition - as well as groups that are just inspired by the concept that they could also be the perpetrators of mass killing, means that there is a spectrum of threats.