The Western alliance should have supported the Sunni opposition against the Assad regime from the beginning. As far as Iraq is concerned, if it had stayed stable the way it was in 2008, IS would not have been able to expand in Iraq the way they did. The mistake was that Barack Obama withdrew the armed forces from Iraq too fast.

Firing employees, that's unfortunately part of doing business.

The use of force to liberate people is very different from the use of force to suppress or control them, or even to defeat them.

China, in the future, is going to have even more nuclear capability than it has had in the past. I don't believe that they have anything to fear from the United States, and I frankly don't believe they do fear the United States.

Jobs are a priority for every country. Doing more to improve regulation and help entrepreneurs is the key to creating jobs - and more growth.

Iraq has no history of ethnic conflict.

That sense of what happened in Europe in World War II has shaped a lot of my views.