For one thing I tend not to see myself in various moulds that people fit me into.

It's hard to conceive that it would take more forces to provide stability in post-Saddam Iraq than it would take to conduct the war itself and secure the surrender of Saddam's security forces and his army. Hard to imagine.

I told my father I had to try political science for a year. He thought I was throwing my life away.

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.

I certainly think it's important to speak up and say how unacceptable Donald Trump is. I'm always more than willing to do that.

If a cat sits on a hot stove once, it will never sit on a cold one either.

We did not go to war in Afghanistan or in Iraq to, quote, 'impose democracy.' We went to war in both places because we saw those regimes as a threat to the United States.