Congress is best viewed from a distance - the farther the better - because up close, it is truly ugly.

There is no international problem that can be addressed or solved without the engagement and leadership of the United States and everybody in the world knows that, its just fact of life. So sometimes I think we could conduct ourselves with a little more humility.

My one concern is that Hu Jintao may overestimate how much power China has in Pyongyang. They have - they do have influence, and they do have companies, and they do have economic relationships that could make life much more difficult in the north. Their balancing act is, "How much worse can we make it in the north without creating that which scares us more than anything, which is a collapse in the north." And then what happens to all those nuclear weapons. So they're going to work very hard to avoid that.

If Iraq and Afghanistan have taught us anything in recent history, it is the unpredictability of war and that these things are easier to get into than to get out of, and, frankly, the facile way in which too many people talk about, 'Well, let's just go attack them.

You know, if I were an - if I were a Taliban, I'd say, 'What did al-Qaida ever do for me except get me kicked out of Afghanistan?'

Well, I've ruffled a few feathers at all the institutions I've led. But I think that's part of leadership.

I think in the policies that have been followed since the president Donald Trump came into office, there really hasn't been any slack cut for the Russians. And I think one of the things that has surprised people has been that the relationship between the United States and Russia has in fact deteriorated since the election.