Once ISIS is defeated, there is a larger effort under way to make certain that we don't just sprout a new enemy. We know ISIS is going to go down. We have had success on the battlefield. We have freed millions of people from being under their control.

The first time you blow someone away is not an insignificant event.

No war is over until the enemy says it's over. We may think it over, we may declare it over, but in fact, the enemy gets a vote.

2017 is going to be another tough year for the valiant Afghan Security Forces and the international troops who have stood and will continue to stand shoulder to shoulder with Afghanistan against terrorism.

The importance of strengthening Euro-Atlantic security: the growing dangers pile pressure on our rules-based international system, so we need to do more to strengthen NATO, the bedrock of our defense - not just upping spending, but making the alliance more agile and more capable of tackling dangers from all directions.

There is no corporation in the world that would, in a competitive environment, try and concentrate all decisions at the corporate level.

The United States has been essentially engaged in an ongoing war that most people date from 2001. That war has taken us to Afghanistan, to Iraq, in a lesser way to other countries - Libya, Somalia, Yemen.