I think we can get respect for Parliament back providing governments and oppositions are frank.

Give the Germans five deutschmarks and they will save it. But give the British £5 and they will borrow £25 and spend it.

I think the majority of the British people are still sanguine about the need for war.

I mean if you have ever found a politician who says, 'No, no, I would do everything exactly as I did,' then you can tell when he is lying because his lips are moving.

Political suicide can end a career.

If you look back historically, admittedly a long time ago, there were three Afghan wars in which Britain didn't even come a good second. In more recent years the Russians were there with 120,000 men for ten years.

Whatever efforts for peace President Gorbachev had in mind, they were pretty substantially undercut very swiftly by Saddam Hussein.