Top Richard Holbrooke Quotes

Richard Holbrooke Biography

Richard Charles Albert Holbrooke (April 24, 1941 – December 13, 2010) was an American diplomat, magazine editor, author, professor, Peace Corps official, and investment banker.

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Richard Holbrooke Quotes

I still believe in the possibility of the United States, with all its will and all its strength, and I don't just mean military, persevering against any challenge. I still believe in that.

Military, Believe, Mean, Strength, Challenge

Diplomacy is like jazz: endless variations on a theme.

Endless, Jazz, Theme, Variation

Our enemy is Al Qaeda and its allies, people who have publicly said they wish to attack the United States again, people who have publicly called on nuclear physicists and engineers to help them gain access to nuclear weapons, which, as the whole world knows, Pakistan has.

Enemy, People, Wish, World

Bureaucracies have a natural tendency not to cooperate, coordinate or consolidate with each other. They won't cooperate with each other - unless they are forced to do so by political level authority.

Bureaucracies, Government, Levels, Natural, Political, Tendency

In diplomacy, as in life itself, one often learns more from failures than from successes. Triumphs will seem, in retrospect, to be foreordained, a series of brilliant actions and decisions that may in fact have been lucky or inadvertent, whereas failures illuminate paths and pitfalls to be avoided.

Actions, Avoided, Decision, Fact, Facts, Pitfalls

It's an improvisation on a theme. You know where you want to go, but you don't know how to get there. It's not linear.

Improvisation, Know, Linear, Theme, Want

As countries grapple with modernization, people who are left behind tend to hold firmer and firmer to their view of the evil of modernity.

Country, Firmer, Modernization, People, View, Views

MEMRI allows an audience far beyond the Arabic-speaking world to observe the wide variety of Arab voices speaking through the media, schoolbooks, and pulpits to their own people. What one hears is often astonishing, sometimes frightening, and always important. Most importantly, it includes the newly-emerging liberal voices of reform and hope, as well as disturbing echoes of ancient hatreds. Without the valuable research of MEMRI, the non-Arabic speaking world would not have this indispensable window.

Arab, Audience, Echoes, Media, Pulpits, Voice

A peace deal requires agreements, and you don't make agreements with your friends, you make agreements with your enemies.

Agreement, Agreements, Deals, Enemy, Peace, Requires

Know something about something. Don’t just present your wonderful self to the world. Constantly amass knowledge and offer it around.

Amass, Self, Wonderful, World

Nothing generates more heat in the government than the question of who is chosen to participate in important meetings.

Government, Heat, Important, Question

I think history is continuous. It doesn't begin or end on Pearl Harbor Day or the day Lyndon Johnson withdraws from the presidency or on 9
11. You have to learn from the past but not be imprisoned by it. You need to take counsel of history but never be imprisoned by it.

Begin, Harbor, Needs, Past, Pearl, Thinking

The World War II generation believed the United States could do anything - anything. . . And Vietnam was a shattering experience for everyone.

Everyone, Experience, Generations, United States, Vietnam, War

I tell you," he [Milosevic] continued, "Izetbegovic has earned Sarajevo by not abandoning it. He's one tough guy. It's his". These words were probably the most astonishing and unexpected of the conference.

Guy, Unexpected, Tough, Izetbegovic, Milosevic

Richard Holbrooke Biography

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