Tim Walz on Homeland Security : Aug 6, 2024
Retired after 24 years in National Guard,to run for Congress

JD Vance on Homeland Security : Jul 29, 2024
Don't fight for abstractions; fight for people's homes

"People will not fight for abstractions, but they will fight for their home. And if this movement of ours is going to succeed, and if this country is going to thrive, our leaders have to remember that America is a nation, and its citizens deserve leaders who put its interests first," he said, as he accepted the GOP nomination for vice president.

Vance has said in the past that the U.S. lacks the military industrial base to defend Ukraine against Russia, and that countering the rise of China should be the priority. The Vance nomination swings the Trump ticket toward Republicans who call their approach "realism and restraint."

JD Vance on War & Peace : Jul 29, 2024
I saw when I went to Iraq that I had been lied to

He essentially accused his colleagues of getting fooled, just like he was when he believed in the Iraq War. "My excuse is that I was a high school senior. What is the excuse of many people who were in this chamber or in the House of Representatives at the time and are now singing the exact same song when it comes to Ukraine? Have we learned nothing?" he said.

Joe Biden on Homeland Security : Jun 27, 2024
Attended 80th anniversary of D-Day in France

TRUMP: That was a made-up quote, "suckers and losers." They made it up. It was in a third-rate magazine that's failing [referring to The Atlantic magazine]. He made that up. He put it in commercials.

BIDEN: You had a four-star general stand at your side, who was on your staff, who said you said it, period [referring to Trump chief of staff John Kelly]. He acknowledged after it that he fired that general. That general got fired because he's the one that acknowledged that that's what he said. He was the one standing with Trump when he said it, number one.[See FactCheck: Yes, The Atlantic reported this].

JD Vance on Foreign Policy : May 15, 2024
Putin is a bad guy, but there's no Domino Theory in Europe

Of the threat of Russian expansion into other European countries, Vance said: "We have to analyze these things in their own historical context. And Vladimir Putin might be a bad guy, and in fact I think he is, but he's not nearly as powerful in relative terms as Hitler‘s Germany was in the late 1930s. So the idea that he poses a risk to the broader European continent is just absurd to me."

JD Vance on Homeland Security : May 15, 2024
Facilitate peace in Russia-Ukraine, instead of US support

"I've been trying to make sure we don't take an escalatory posture," Vance said. The best role for the United States, he said, is to help facilitate a peaceful resolution to the Russian-Ukraine conflict--which Trump claims he could do as president--and "prevent this thing from escalating into World War III."

JD Vance on War & Peace : May 15, 2024
Iraq War was ill-advised years-long overseas entanglement

"Like any self-respecting hillbilly," he had wanted to go to the Middle East to kill terrorists in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on New York City, Vance wrote in his 2016 bestselling memoir "Hillbilly Elegy." He now sees unsettling similarities between the run-up to the Iraq War and current calls for more U.S. support to Ukraine.

Kamala Harris on War & Peace : Feb 16, 2024
US-Iraq partnership role after Defeat ISIS coalition

The Vice President urged the Iraqi government to prevent attacks against US personnel and expressed appreciation for efforts to date. She stated that the US has no higher priority than the safety of US personnel, and will act, as needed, in self-defense.

The leaders also discussed the importance of continuing the US-Iraq Higher Military Commission, which will enable the transition to an enduring bilateral security partnership between the US and Iraq and is the natural next step to build on the collaboration of the past 10 years between Iraq and the Defeat ISIS coalition.

Doug Burgum on Energy & Oil : Jan 23, 2024
The oil industry is so safe, environmentally friendly

Ron DeSantis on Homeland Security : Jan 16, 2024
Veterans issues on front burner, but outside the VA

DeSANTIS: 9/11 happened. We were in conflict. And I felt that I should raise my hand and serve. I volunteered to go to Iraq. And I learned a lot about what veterans go through. And I'm going to put veteran issues on the front burner as commander-in-chief.

Q: What do you plan to do about the lackluster performance of the Veterans Administration?

DeSANTIS: What we're going to do is recognize that the V.A. is a massive bureaucracy. I'm going to fire people that aren't doing a good job. We're going to bring accountability. But we're also going to harness all the resources that are outside of government. And this is a model we've used in Florida. And we're going to use it for veterans. So we have something called the CarePortal. We recruit military groups, charities, churches, businesses, individuals. So you go to the V.A., you need something, maybe the V.A. helps you, but that immediately goes out to all these organizations.

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Jan 10, 2024
I beat ISIS in literally three months; knocked them out

A: They have chaos at the border. They have chaos in the military. People are going woke. We have the greatest military in the world except for the top where they want to turn this beautiful thing we built. We beat ISIS, knocked them out. It was supposed to take four years. I did it in literally three months. It was supposed to take four or five years.

[Did Trump's 2017-2018 actions in Iraq knock out ISIS?] Fact Check by American Enterprise Institute, 9/11/23: "ISIS remains resilient and has sustained a low-level insurgency in Iraq while conducting targeted attacks in Syria, especially against prisons to release key operatives. It has particularly strengthened in central Syria. Iraqi counterterrorism pressure has suppressed, but not eliminated, the ISIS threat."

Nikki Haley on War & Peace : Jan 10, 2024
There wouldn't be Hamas without Iran

HALEY: When it comes to Iran, what we have to understand, there would be no Hamas without Iran. There would not be Houthis without Iran. There wouldn't be Hezbollah without Iran. And when you look at the strikes that are happening in Iraq and Syria, that is because of Iran. They're pulling the puppet strings. We've had over 130 strikes on our men and women in Iraq and Syria is unconscionable. We're supposed to have their backs.

DESANTIS: After the attacks against Israel, anyone with half a brain knows Iran is behind this. They fund Hamas. They fund Hezbollah. We did a special session of the legislature down in Florida. We expanded sanctions against Iran.

Ron DeSantis on War & Peace : Jan 10, 2024
Florida expanded sanctions against Iran

DESANTIS: After the attacks against Israel, anyone with half a brain knows Iran is behind this. They fund Hamas. They fund Hezbollah. We did a special session of the legislature down in Florida. As the 14th largest economy in the world, we expanded sanctions against Iran. The root of this is Biden came into office and he relaxed the sanctions on Iran. They've had massive amounts of money flooding into their country. They take that money and they use it to fund jihad around the world. I would never put our troops in harm's way, like Biden is doing in the Middle East, without defending them with everything they got. If you harm a hair on the head of one of our servicemembers, you are going to have hell to pay.

Nikki Haley on War & Peace : Dec 6, 2023
Go hard after Iranian infrastructure in Syria & Iraq

Haley: No, I was not saying it's time to bomb Iran. But I dealt with Iran every day when I was at the United Nations and they only respond to strength. What they don't respond to is when you weaken the sanctions like they did on Iran that allowed China to send them billions to fill their proxies, what they don't respond to is when you give $6 billion for five hostages, that only makes them want more hostages. What they don't respond to is when they do 140 strikes on our men and women in Syria and Iraq and we do nothing but just some small shots back. You've got to punch them, you've got to punch them hard and let them know that, that's the only way they're going to respond. So the way you do that is you go after their infrastructure in Syria and Iraq where they're hitting our soldiers.

Chase Oliver on Principles & Values : Dec 1, 2023
Joined Libertarian Party after attending 2010 Pride rally

Chase Oliver began his political journey as a Democrat opposing the war in Iraq under President George W. Bush. While attending Atlanta Pride in 2010, Oliver met Georgia Libertarian John Monds, who convinced him that he was a libertarian. He joined the party soon thereafter and the rest, as they say, is history. His strong anti-war roots are still evident today.

Chase Oliver's platform is the best we've seen so far from any presidential candidate. Some of the big issues listed include: immigration, justice reform, ending the failed war on drugs, defending civil liberties, ending wars and supporting peace, respecting individual choice on tough issues, education reform, ranked choice voting and much more.

Ron DeSantis on Homeland Security : Nov 8, 2023
We have to be strong and defend the people who defend us

DeSantis: I actually served in Iraq back in the day and we had Al-Qaeda in Iraq, you had Shia militias that were funded by Iran that were killing 100s and 100s of US troops. And as commander-in-chief, I am not going to put our troops in harm's way unless you're willing to defend them with everything you have. Biden has [US naval ships and troops] out there, they're sitting ducks, he's doing glancing blows, that's just inviting more attacks from the Iranians. I would say you harm a hair on the head of an American service member and you are going to have hell to pay. We are not just going to sit there and let our service members be sitting ducks. And that's true whether it's Iran or whether it's any country on the world. We have to be strong and we have to defend the people who defend us.

Chase Oliver on War & Peace : Jul 23, 2023
Began political activism opposing the war in Iraq

"The duopoly is going to gift us with a Trump versus Biden 2.0 election, and that's going to allow millions of voters to feel dissatisfied and to look for something alternative," Oliver told a group of eight people gathered Sunday at RAYGUN in Cedar Rapids for a meet-and-greet event with Linn County Libertarians.

Nikki Haley on Foreign Policy : Mar 2, 2023
We will stop giving money to countries that hate America

Donald Trump on Free Trade : Feb 28, 2023
Listen to voters: fight outsourcing manufacturing to China

Some DC commentators have opined that Trump's nomination represented a hostile takeover of the Republican Party. But this analysis gets it exactly backward. Since Ronald Reagan [retired in] 1989, the GOP grass roots had been longing for someone who rejected the old-guard way of doing business and who could speak to their concerns and aspirations. Trump supported policies that appealed to the base in a way that GOP leaders in the DC swamp had been either incapable of doing or unwilling to do.

Ron DeSantis on Homeland Security : Feb 28, 2023
Military draft would make public oppose nation-building

The all-volunteer approach made lengthy deployments and years-long troop commitments more palpable to the public. Had there been a military draft, public opposition to a long-term nation-building exercise that resulted in American casualities would have been strong.

Ron DeSantis on Homeland Security : Feb 28, 2023
K-9s for Warriors: treat PTSD in post-9/11 veterans

A great nonprofit called "K-9s for Warriors" trained service dogs to be paired with veterans suffering from ailments like post-traumatic stress. K-9s for Warriors trained the dogs to recognize when the post-traumatic stress of the veteran was most acute and to respond in ways that reduced that stress. This simple approach, which didn't fund Big Pharma, helped many veterans. Not surprisingly, the suicide rate among those veterans paired with a service dog was infinitesimally small.

Ron DeSantis on War & Peace : Feb 28, 2023
We destroyed Al Qaeda in Iraq but can't establish democracy

Chase Oliver on Homeland Security : Nov 12, 2022
2008: Close Guantanamo; stop drone policies

A: I started out my political life as an anti-war activist in the wake of the war in Iraq. I was an ardent supporter of Barack Obama in 2008, because he promised to close Guantanamo. He said he was going to stop the drone policies of the Bush administration, and the wars. And he really didn't do any of those things--and yet he got a Nobel Peace Prize. That, to me, was very insulting. And what really bothered me was that the anti-war left that was marching with me in the streets while Bush was president, completely disappeared while Obama was president. That drove me out of the Democratic Party.

JD Vance on Principles & Values : May 3, 2022
Failure to thrive comes from lack of personal responsibility

Rather than sink into a familiar pattern of sporadic employment, drugs and violence, he joined the Marines for four years and served in Iraq before going to Ohio State University. There, he gained a degree in political science and philosophy. He gained admission to Yale Law School, where he began his memoir, published in 2016 just as Donald Trump was making his ultimately successful pitch for the US presidency.

While the book does not mention Trump, some commentators described it as a window into a conservative white working class often overlooked by Ivy League-educated coastal elites. Profoundly conservative, Vance put the blame of the hillbillies' failure to thrive on culture and a lack of personal responsibility, rather than systemic issues of economics and policy.

Joe Biden on Homeland Security : Mar 1, 2022
More benefits to veterans for toxic exposures

Mike Pence on Foreign Policy : Oct 7, 2020
Trump moved embassy to Jerusalem and destroyed ISIS

Kamala Harris on War & Peace : Oct 7, 2020
Trump does not care about troops' injuries or deaths

PENCE: My son is in captain in the United States Marine Corps. My son-in-law's deployed in the United States Navy. I can assure all of you with sons and daughters serving in our military, President Donald Trump, not only respects, but reveres all of those who serve in our armed forces and any suggestion, otherwise is ridiculous. Let me also say the American people deserve to know-

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Sep 15, 2020
I'm bringing troops back, when advisers wanted war

Look at North Korea, how that's worked out. We haven't--the sanctions are on. Everything's the same. We haven't spent anything. We're getting along with him. I get along with Kim Jong-un. That was supposed to be a war.

If President Obama were president, if Hillary Clinton ever got in, that would be a war, probably a nuclear war with North Korea. In the meantime, I'm getting calls all the time from friends of mine in South Korea. Thank you. We love you. Thank you. It's really been rather amazing.

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Sep 15, 2020
Soldiers don't want to be in Afghanistan

You know, there's no sadder thing than to sit with a widow or a mother, and these incredible Marines are walking off a casket and they were killed in the Middle East. Going there was the worst decision in the history of our country. We've spent $8 trillion and we've lost thousands of lives.

Iraq did not--Saddam Hussein did not knock down the World Trade Center. They said they had weapons of mass destruction. They made a mistake.

So we've been in there almost 20 years in Afghanistan. And we're bringing our soldiers back home. Nobody expected that from me. And people are so happy about it. And you know who's the happiest? The soldiers, I see them all the time. "What do you think, should we be here?" "No, sir, you shouldn't be here." "Why?" "They don't like us, sir."

Dean Phillips on Health Care : Apr 28, 2020
Provide VA resources for physical & mental health care

America built its middle class post-WWII in large part with a generous and effective GI Bill. Those education benefits have eroded in the ensuing years, presenting less opportunity to today's veterans. America owes opportunity to those who have served honorably and must provide sufficient education benefits that enable our returning veterans to reintegrate into civilian life and continue to make contributions to American society.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Feb 8, 2020
FactCheck: removed troops from Iraq, but they went back

It's true that in 2009 Biden chaired a committee that oversaw the troop withdrawal, while also keeping an eye on economic and political issues in Iraq. The Biden committee included representatives from the Defense Department, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Treasury Department and other agencies.

But what Biden fails to mention is that later--in Obama's second term, with Biden still vice president--the U.S. sent troops back into Iraq to combat the Islamic State fighters who had occupied much of the country. Near the end of the Obama administration, in late September 2016, the number of U.S. troops deployed exceeded 5,000.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Feb 7, 2020
I made a mistake; Bush said he wouldn't go into Iraq

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Feb 7, 2020
I made a mistake; Bush said he wouldn't go into Iraq

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Feb 7, 2020
I listened about Iraq; they were lying thru their teeth

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Jan 14, 2020
Endless war in Iraq cost us trillions and 4,500 troops

V.P. Joe BIDEN: We should not send anyone anywhere unless the overwhelming vital interests of the United States are at stake. They were not at stake in Iraq. It was a mistaken vote. It was a mistake to trust that they weren't going to go to war. They said they were not going to go to war. They said they were just going to get inspectors in. From that point on, I was in the position of making the case that it was a big, big mistake. And from that point on, I've voted to--I moved to bring those troops home.

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Jan 14, 2020
Passed bipartisan War Powers Act to stop Yemen war

V.P. Joe BIDEN: I said 13 years ago it was a mistake to give the president the authority to go to war if, in fact, he couldn't get inspectors into Iraq to stop what--thought to be the attempt to get a nuclear weapon. It was a mistake, and I acknowledged that. But the man who also argued against that war, Barack Obama, picked me to be his vice president. And once we were elected, he asked me to end that war.

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Jan 14, 2020
Great disasters of our time--Vietnam & Iraq--based on lies

V.P. Joe BIDEN: I said 13 years ago it was a mistake to trust that they weren't going to go to war, to stop what we thought to be Iraq's attempt to get a nuclear weapon.

SANDERS: We have to face as a nation is that the two great foreign policy disasters of our lifetimes were the war in Vietnam and the war in Iraq. Both of those wars were based on lies. And right now, what I fear is we have a president who is lying again and could drag us into a war that is even worse than the war in Iraq.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Jan 14, 2020
As veep, worked to end Iraq war

Sen. Bernie SANDERS: When Congress was debating whether or not we go into a war in Iraq, I said that would be a disaster. I helped pass a War Powers Act resolution, working with a conservative Republican, Mike Lee of Utah, which said that the war in Yemen, led by Saudi Arabia, was unconstitutional because Congress had not authorized it. We got a majority vote in the Senate. We got a majority vote in the House. Unfortunately, Bush vetoed that and that horrific war continues.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Jan 14, 2020
Iraq war vote mistake based on Bush/Cheney lies

Sen. Bernie SANDERS: The war in Iraq turned out to be the worst foreign policy blunder in the modern history of this country. We lost 4,500 brave troops. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis died. We have spent trillions of dollars on that endless war, money which should go into health care and education and infrastructure in this country. Joe and I listened to what Dick Cheney and George Bush & Rumsfeld had to say. I thought they were lying. I didn't believe them for a moment. Joe saw it differently.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Jan 14, 2020
Pull troops out of Mideast, except to patrol Gulf and ISIS

Sen. Bernie SANDERS: What we need to do is have an international coalition. The nuclear deal with Iran was worked on with a number of our allies.

BIDEN: I was part of that deal to get the nuclear agreement with Iran. And it was working. It was being held tightly. There was no movement on the part of the Iranian government to get closer to a nuclear weapon.

Q: So would you leave troops in the Middle East or would you pull them out?

BIDEN: I would leave troops in the Middle East in terms of patrolling the Gulf, where we have--where we are now, small numbers of troops, and I think it's a mistake to pull out the small number of troops that are there now to deal with ISIS. And with regard to this idea that we can walk away and not have any troops anywhere, including special forces, there's no way you negotiate with terrorists.

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Dec 19, 2019
I was wrong on my vote for Afghan War; remove all troops

Bernie Sanders: Well, only one person, my good friend Barbara Lee [U.S. Rep, D-CA-13] was right on that issue. She was the only person in the House to vote against the war in Afghanistan. She was right; I was wrong. So was everybody else in the House. But to answer your question, I don't think you do what Trump does and make foreign policy decisions based on a tweet at 3AM in the morning, or desert your long-time allies like the Kurds. I think you work with the international community, you remove all troops over a period of time, a short period of time, within one year.

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Dec 11, 2019
Bar Iranian diplomat from addressing UN over assassination

Joe Biden on Homeland Security : Oct 15, 2019
ISIS will come here if they take over Iraq and Syria

And with regard to regime change in Syria [Trump withdrew US forces from the Kurdish areas of Syria last week], that has not been the policy. It has been to make sure that the regime did not wipe out hundreds and thousands of innocent people between there and the Iraqi border.

And lastly, what is happening in Afghanistan all the way over to Syria, we have ISIS, it's going to come here. They are going to, in fact, damage the United States of America. That's why we got involved in the first place, and not ceded the whole area to Assad and to the Russians.

Mike Pence on War & Peace : Sep 14, 2019
2001: Saddam Hussein is a threat to our national security

Shortly before the House was set to vote on whether to authorize Bush to send troops to Iraq, Pence threw his support behind Bush. "I grieve at the thought of the United States at war and am not anxious to see it." Pence said. But Saddam Hussein is a threat to national security and to world security." Democrats and Republicans overwhelmingly banded together in the House and Senate to give Bush the power to declare war on Iraq. On March 20, 2003 the US invaded Iraq, just 18 months after the September 11 terrorist attacks, and shunted the effort in Afghanistan aside. And Mike Pence, like the rest of Washington, was 100 percent on board.

Joe Biden on Principles & Values : Sep 12, 2019
Deal with loss by finding purpose in what you do

BIDEN: I think the most critical setback that can occur to anyone is to lose family. [The philosopher Soren] Kierkegaard said "faith sees best in the dark." Right after I got elected, my wife and daughter were killed in an automobile accident. And I lost my faith for a while. I came back.

And then later, when my son Beau came home from Iraq with a terminal disease, and a year later, losing him was like losing part of my soul.

But the fact is that I learned that the way you deal with it is you deal with finding purpose, purpose in what you do. We've all been through that, in some form or another. And for me, the way I've dealt with it is finding purpose. And my purpose is to do what I've always tried to do and stay engaged in public policy.

But there's a lot of people been through a lot worse than I have who get up every single morning, put their feet one foot in front of another, without the help I had.

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Sep 12, 2019
I never made the huge mistake of voting for Iraq AUMF

BIDEN:

BIDEN: No, it wasn't wrong to pull out. I should have never voted to give Bush the authority to go in and do what he said he was going to do in the AUMF [Authorization for the Use of Military Force in Iraq]. The big mistake that was made, which we predicted, was that you would not have a circumstance where the Shia and the Kurds would work together to keep ISIS from moving in.

SANDERS: The truth is, the big mistake, the huge mistake, and one of the big differences between you and me, I never believed what Cheney and Bush said about Iraq...

BIDEN: You're right.

SANDERS: I voted against the war in Iraq, and helped lead the opposition. And it's sad to say--I kind of had the feeling that there would be massive destabilization in that area if we went into that war.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Sep 12, 2019
Can't put Afghanistan together: it's 3 different countries

BIDEN: I've been in and out of Afghanistan, not with a gun--and it's an open secret that I was opposed to the surge in Afghanistan. The whole purpose of going to Afghanistan was to not have a counterinsurgency, meaning that we're going to put that country together. It cannot be put together. Let me say it again. It will not be put together. It's three different countries. Pakistan owns the three provinces in the east. They're not run it. I will go on and on. But here's the point. The point is that it's a counterterrorism strategy. We can prevent the United States from being the victim of terror coming out of Afghanistan by providing for bases-insist the Pakistanis provide bases for us to air lift from and to move against what we know.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Sep 12, 2019
I shouldn't have voted for Bush's AUMF; he did it wrong way

BIDEN: No, it wasn't wrong to pull out. The fact of the matter is that, you know, I should have never voted to give Bush the authority to go in and do what he said he was going to do. The AUMF was designed, he said, to go in and get the Security Council to vote 15-0 to allow inspectors to go in to determine whether or not anything was being done with chemical weapons or nuclear weapons. And when that happened, he went ahead anyway without any of that proof. The big mistake that was made, which we predicted, was that you would not have a circumstance where the Shia and the Kurds would work together to keep ISIS from moving in.

Sen. Bernie SANDERS: The truth is, the big mistake, the huge mistake, and one of the big differences between you and me, I never believed what Cheney and Bush said about Iraq

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Sep 4, 2019
FactCheck:No, didn't oppose Iraq War right after war started

But a review of Biden's public statements about Iraq in the lead up to the invasion shows he was never entirely opposed to military action against Saddam Hussein:

• "Nine months ago, I voted to use force and I would vote that way again today," Biden said in a July 2003 speech at the Brookings Institution.
• In early January 2003, ahead of Secretary of State Colin Powell's presentation to the UN Security Council, Biden said war with Iraq appeared near inevitable.
• In a speech to the New Castle Chamber of Commerce in February 2003, Biden said. "I supported the resolution to go to war. I am not opposed to war to remove weapons of mass destruction from Iraq."

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Sep 2, 2019
U.S. forces out of Iraq, by whatever path led there fastest

Marianne Williamson on Foreign Policy : Jul 1, 2019
2007: Let Iranian president visit Ground Zero

Joe Biden on Health Care : Jun 27, 2019
Build on ObamaCare, with Medicare buy-in

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Jun 27, 2019
I got 150,000 troops out of Iraq; do same in Afghanistan

V.P. Joe BIDEN: I was responsible for getting 150,000 combat troops out of Iraq, and my son was one of them. I also think we should not have combat troops in Afghanistan. It's long overdue. It should end. We cannot go it alone in terms of dealing with terrorism. I would eliminate the act that allowed us to go into war. That's why we have to repair our alliances. We put together 65 countries to make sure we dealt with ISIS in Iraq and other places. That's what I would do. That's what I have done.

Sen. Bernie SANDERS: Joe voted for that war;I helped lead the oppositio

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Jun 27, 2019
Used War Powers Act to get US out of Saudi-Yemen war

V.P. Joe BIDEN: I was responsible for getting 150,000 combat troops out of Iraq. I also think we should not have combat troops in Afghanistan. It's long overdue. It should end.

Sen. Bernie SANDERS: One of the differences that Joe and I have in our record is Joe voted for that war, I helped lead the opposition to that war, which was a total disaster. I helped lead the effort for the first time to utilize the War Powers Act to get the United States out of the Saudi-led intervention in Yemen, which is the most horrific humanitarian disaster on Earth. Let me be very clear. I will do everything I can to prevent a war with Iran, which would be far worse than disastrous war with Iraq.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Mar 27, 2019
Supported wars in Iraq & Afghanistan, but not Iran

• Biden at first endorsed full-scale nation-building in Afghanistan but when he saw it wasn't working, he changed his mind, arguing that the U.S. military should destroy al-Qaeda and then leave. As vice president, he was a lonely voice in the Cabinet opposing Obama's escalation of the war in 2009.
• Regarding Iraq, however, he was a hawk. He repeated false intelligence claims that Saddam Hussein possessed chemical and biological weapons and was seeking nuclear weapons, and therefore was a threat that had to be "eliminated." He later called his vote for the 2003 invasion a "mistake."
• Biden is a self-described Zionist. He has stated that the Democrats' support for Israel "comes from our gut, moves through our heart, and ends up in our head. It's almost genetic."
• He would disagree with the present Israeli government on Iran. He wrote that "War with Iran is not just a bad option. It would be a disaster," and he supported Obama's entry into the Iran nuclear agreement.

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Feb 5, 2019
Afghani settlement: great nations do not fight endless wars

I have also accelerated our negotiations to reach a political settlement in Afghanistan. Our troops have fought with unmatched valor--and thanks to their bravery, we are now able to pursue a political solution to this long and bloody conflict.

In Afghanistan, my Administration is holding constructive talks with a number of Afghan groups, including the Taliban. As we make progress in these negotiations, we will be able to reduce our troop presence and focus on counter-terrorism. We do not know whether we will achieve an agreement--but we do know that after two decades of war, the hour has come to at least try for peace.

Marianne Williamson on Homeland Security : Jul 24, 2018
Remove pathological romanticization of the military

We need a miracle of God to remove from us what has become an almost pathological romanticization of the military. I have a great respect for the men and women of the U.S. Armed Forces, but their idealization as ultimate and exclusive saviors in times of national distress is a disservice to them and to us all. If America spent more time and resources waging peace, we would find ourselves waging far less war.

Marianne Williamson on War & Peace : Jul 24, 2018
U.S. imperialistically devastated both Vietnam and Iraq

To look in our national mirror is to see both glory and shame. We endured the horrors of a Civil War, heroically fought two world wars, brilliantly helped defeat Hitler--and then imperialistically devastated both Vietnam and Iraq. We are blessed with more money and more technological resources than any other nation in the world, yet we give only 1 percent of our budget away to nations less fortunate than us. America has always been a land of contradictions.

Donald Trump on Homeland Security : Jan 30, 2018
Keep Guantanamo open; stop releases & add new prisoners

In the past, we have foolishly released hundreds of dangerous terrorists, only to meet them again on the battlefield--including the ISIS leader, al-Baghdadi.

So today, I am keeping another promise. I just signed an order to reexamine our military detention policy and to keep open the detention facilities at Guantanamo Bay.

I am also asking the Congress to ensure that, in the fight against ISIS and al-Qa'ida, we continue to have all necessary power to detain terrorists--wherever we chase them down.

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Jan 29, 2018
2016: secret plan to defeat ISIS; 2018: caliphate gone

At the time, it seemed unlikely he would ever have to make good on the promise. However, Trump's surprise victory gave him the chance to back up his claim. Many were openly skeptical he could do it.

But one year into the Trump administration, the facts on the ground--in Syria and Iraq--have changed dramatically. The 'Caliphate' announced with such fanfare in the summer of 2014 was in tatters. "We have made, alongside our coalition partners, more progress against these evil terrorists in the past several months than in the past several years," Trump proclaimed last fall. So is ISIS now defeated?

President Trump deserves credit for hastening the downfall of their Caliphate. However, ISIS 2018 will launch an insurgency in its former territory. ISIS has access to electronic spaces where it can continue recruitment efforts.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Oct 24, 2017
Son Beau served in Iraq while Delaware Attorney General

Beau did things the hard way, the right way. At first, Delaware's governor offered to appoint Beau to be the attorney general, filling a vacancy. He turned it down so that, Obama said, he could run in an election and "win it fair and square."

Bernie Sanders on Foreign Policy : Sep 21, 2017
Foreign policy is directly related to military policy

Foreign policy is about U.S. government budget priorities. At a time when we already spend more on defense than the next 12 nations combined, foreign policy is about authorizing a defense budget of some $700 billion.

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Sep 21, 2017
1990s Iraq invasion laid groundwork for more wars in region

As a freshman congressman in 1991, I voted against the first Persian Gulf War, [saying], "I fear that one day we will regret that decision and that we are in fact laying the groundwork for more and more wars in that region for years to come.". Not a bad analysis for a freshman congressman.

In 2003, I did everything I could to prevent George W. Bush's invasion of Iraq--a war that Hillary Clinton supported. In one debate, when Hillary Clinton cited Henry Kissinger as a friend and mentor, I suggested that he was a terrible secretary of state, a war criminal, and would play no role in a Sanders administration.

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Sep 21, 2017
Iraq War discredited vision of benevolent global hegemony

The goal is not for the US to dominate the world. Nor, on the other hand, is our goal to withdraw from the international community and shirk our responsibilities under the banner of "America First." Our goal should be global engagement based on partnership, rather than dominance. This is better for our security, better for global stability, and better for facilitating international cooperation.

Far too often, American intervention and the use of American military power has produced unintended consequences which have caused incalculable harm.

JD Vance on War & Peace : May 25, 2017
Marines in Iraq trained on respecting Muslim culture

I thought about the never-ending training on how to respect Iraqi culture--never show anyone the bottom of your foot, never address a woman in traditional Muslim garb without first speaking to a male relative. I thought about the security we provided for Iraqi poll workers, and how we studiously explained the importance of their mission without ever pushing our own political views on them. And here was this [19-year-old] telling our class that we murdered people for sport. I felt an immediate drive to finish college as quickly as possible.

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Nov 15, 2016
1990: Tried to stop Bush's driving Saddam out of Kuwait

I feared not only the immediate impact of the war, in terms of the death and destruction it would bring, but what it portended for the future. Would war, and more and more wars, be the norm in solving international conflicts in the future? The entire world was united against a small country with a weak army. Surely, I reasoned, there must be a way other than war to achieve our goals and get Iraq out of Kuwait.

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Nov 15, 2016
Iraq War: worst foreign policy blunder in modern history

Needless to say, that wasn't my view. Clinton, as a former secretary of state, had more hands-on experience in foreign policy than I did, that did not necessarily make her better qualified in that area. In foreign policy, judgment mattered, and on the most important foreign policy issues of our time, my judgment had been better than Hillary Clinton's.

I not only voted against the war in Iraq, I helped lead the opposition to what turned out to be the worst foreign policy blunder in American modern history. Hillary Clinton, as a U.S. senator from New York, had voted for the war.

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Nov 15, 2016
Economic sanctions could have driven Saddam out of Kuwait

Against a great deal of political pressure, I had voted against the first Gulf War. I was worried about the precedent that it was setting in using military force and believed that economic sanctions could have driven Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait. I believed that war was unnecessary.

Yes, I was willing to concede that Hillary Clinton had more foreign policy experience than I did. No, I did not believe that her record made her better prepared than me to conduct U.S. foreign and military policy.

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Oct 19, 2016
Iran is taking over Iraq

Jill Stein on War & Peace : Oct 19, 2016
End policy of regime-change and military intervention

STEIN: U.S. foreign policy based on regime-change and military intervention has been an utter disaster. It is exhausting our budget; it takes up 54 percent of our discretionary budget for a defense department, which is truly an offense department, and it takes almost half of your income taxes. And what do we have to show for it?

Q: How are you going to pull the troops back in a way that, for instance, won't allow Iraq to collapse? Obama promised to pull the troops back, tried to do it, got sucked in again.

STEIN: Well, right. Shouldn't have been in there in the first place. We are bombing seven countries right now. Yesterday we fired missiles at Yemen. I mean, there is no end to U.S. incursions. We have this terrific power of militarism, and we're doing it all over the place. So here's the solution: We need a weapons embargo in the Middle East, and we need to freeze the bank accounts of those countries who insist on funding terrorist extremism.

Jill Stein on Foreign Policy : Oct 9, 2016
Support Iranian nuclear deal as part of nuclear-free Mideast

Clinton: Yes.

Trump: No.

Johnson: "Skeptic," but "wouldn't get rid of treaty."

Stein: Yes. Create nuclear-free zone in the entire Middle East.

Q: On Iraq: Did you support the Iraq war? Should the US commit significant additional ground troops to Iraq to combat ISIS?

Clinton: Voted to give Bush authority for war; then said "made a mistake." Supported Obama draw-down. Opposes adding more combat troops, but wants more support for Arab & Kurdish ground forces.

Trump: Says opposed war but made no public opposition statements at time, & some indicating support. Later supported troop withdrawal. Now supports 20,000-30,000 additional US troops.

Johnson: Opposed war. Boots on ground, bombs, & drones "make things worse." ISIS has been "largely contained geographically."

Stein: End Iraq and Afghan wars, withdraw troops & military contractors. Weapons embargo in Middle East.

Mike Pence on War & Peace : Oct 4, 2016
Back at war in Iraq because we didn't leave enough forces

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Sep 7, 2016
I opposed Iraq War in 2004; it destabilized entire Mideast

TRUMP: I was totally against the war in Iraq. You can look at Esquire magazine from '04. You can look at before that. I was against the war in Iraq because I said it's going to totally destabilize the Middle East, which it has.

USA TODAY Fact-Check: Trump expressed mild support for invading Iraq when asked about it on the Howard Stern radio show on Sept. 11, 2002--about six months before the war started. Stern asked Trump if he supported a war with Iraq, and Trump responded, "Yeah, I guess so." Trump cited an Esquire article that appeared in August 2004 to show his opposition to the war. But that article appeared 17 months after the war started. The facts don't support either candidate's strong assertions.

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Sep 7, 2016
When we defeated Iraq, we didn't know what to do after that

Part of the problem that we've had is we go in, we defeat somebody, and then we don't know what we're doing after that. We lose it, like as an example, you look at Iraq, what happened, how badly that was handled. When President Obama took over, it was a disaster. He took everybody out and ISIS was formed. If you look at the aftermath of Iraq, Iran is going to be taking over Iraq.

If we would have taken the oil, you wouldn't have ISIS, because ISIS formed with the power and wealth of that oil. They have among the largest oil reserves in the world. We go in, we spend $3 trillion, we lose thousands and thousands of lives, and then, we get nothing. It used to be to the victor belong the spoils. I always said: Take the oil.

Jill Stein on Homeland Security : Aug 25, 2016
$6 trillion to pay for wounded veterans from failed wars

Jill Stein on War & Peace : Aug 25, 2016
Invasions violate international law unless we're threatened

STEIN: Well, criminal? Does it violate international law? Yes. I think it does violate international law.

Q: What violates international law?

STEIN: For example, sending in the troops to Libya. Sending in the troops to Iraq for that matter. I think the criteria for invading other countries is that we need to be under imminent threat. And I think it would be hard to establish that we were under imminent threat, say, in Libya. Or in Iraq for that matter. I would argue that this is not consistent with international law or human rights, and that that should be the basis of our foreign policy going forward. We're proposing essentially a weapons embargo, a freeze on the bank accounts of countries who continue to fund terrorist enterprises and also we call on allies like Turkey to close their borders to the movement of jihadi groups.

Jill Stein on Homeland Security : Aug 17, 2016
Peace offensive: shut down bases, F-35, & Saudi funding

After recounting the toll in money and human life the US' counterterror efforts, Stein said: "What do we have to show for this? Failed states, mass refugee migrations and repeated terrorist threats."

Stein called for a full rethinking of the War on Terror: "We are calling for a new kind of offensive, a peace offensive in the Middle East," Stein said. The "peace offensive" would include an embargo on weapons sales and a freeze on funding to states that support "jihadi terrorist enterprises," she said, pointing to Saudi Arabia in particular. She called for a massive cut in military spending, including the closure of many bases, a shutdown of the F-35 program and not moving forward with the modernization of the US nuclear weapons program.

Mike Pence on War & Peace : Jul 15, 2016
Supported Iraq war and sending more US troops there in 2007

Jill Stein on War & Peace : May 9, 2016
War in Iraq created Frankenstein's monster of ISIS

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Feb 25, 2016
We would be better off if Gadhafi were in charge right now

TRUMP: I was in favor of Libya? I never discussed that subject. We would be so much better off if Gadhafi were in charge right now. If these politicians went to the beach and didn't do a thing, and we had Saddam Hussein and if we had Gadhafi in charge, instead of having terrorism all over the place, at least they killed terrorists, all right? And I'm not saying they were good--because they were bad, they were really bad--but we don't know what we're getting. You look at Libya right now, ISIS, as we speak, is taking over their oil. As we speak, it's a total mess. We would have been better off if the politicians took a day off instead of going into war.

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Feb 19, 2016
FactCheck: Supported Iraq invasion in 2002; opposed in 2003

Trump has repeatedly claimed that he was against the Iraq War before it began, despite no evidence of him publicly stating this position. Trump's comments on Stern's show are more in line with what he wrote in his 2000 book, The America We Deserve, where he advocated for a "principled and tough" policy toward "outlaw" states like Iraq.

Asked at the CNN town hall about the Stern interview, Trump said, "I could have said that. I wasn't a politician. It was probably the first time anyone has asked me that question. By the time the war started, I was against it, and shortly thereafter, I was really against."

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Feb 13, 2016
The war in Iraq was a big, fat mistake

Bernie Sanders on Foreign Policy : Feb 11, 2016
Need to look at consequences of removing dictators

SANDERS: Where Secretary Clinton and I disagree is the area of regime change. We can overthrow dictators all over the world. The point about foreign policy is not just to overthrow a dictator, it's to understand what happens the day after. In Libya, Secretary Clinton, as secretary of state, working with some other countries, did get rid of a terrible dictator named Gadhafi. But what happened is ISIS came in and now occupies significant territory in Libya. But this is nothing new. This has gone on 50 or 60 years where the United States has been involved in overthrowing governments.

Bernie Sanders on Foreign Policy : Feb 4, 2016
Key doctrine: We can't do it alone; must work in coalition

SANDERS: I did give a speech at Georgetown where I talked about democratic socialism and foreign policy. Maybe I shouldn't have combined the two in the same speech. While it is true that the secretary and I voted differently on the war in Iraq, what is important is that we learn the lesson of the war in Iraq. And that lesson is intrinsic to my foreign policy if elected president, is the United States cannot do it alone. We cannot be the policeman of the world. We are now spending more I believe than the next eight countries on defense. We have got to work in strong coalition with the major powers of the world and with those Muslim countries that are prepared to stand up and take on terrorism. So I would say that the key doctrine of the Sanders administration would be no, we cannot continue to do it alone; we need to work in coalition.

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Feb 4, 2016
Iraq war led to ISIS creation, as I predicted would happen

CLINTON: We have to support Arab & Kurdish fighters. It is important to keep the Iraqi army on a path where they can take back territory. They're doing the fighting. We're doing the support and enabling. I want to continue, and that's what the president is doing.

SANDERS: Let me agree with much of what the secretary said, but where we differ is on the war in Iraq, which created barbaric organizations like ISIS. Not only did I vote against that war, I helped lead the opposition. It gives me no pleasure to tell you that much of what I feared would happen the day after Saddam Hussein was overthrown, in fact, did happen. I think our task is to make certain that our young men and women in the military do not get sucked into never-ending, perpetual warfare within the quagmire of Syria and Iraq. It must be Muslim troops on the ground that destroy ISIS, with the support of a coalition of major powers.

Bernie Sanders on Foreign Policy : Dec 19, 2015
I do not believe in unilateral action against terrorism

Bernie Sanders on Foreign Policy : Dec 19, 2015
Think about what happens AFTER we get rid of dictators

SANDERS: I have a difference of opinion with Secretary Clinton on this. I worry that Secretary Clinton is too much into regime change without knowing what the unintended consequences might be. Yes, we could get rid of Saddam Hussein, but that destabilized the entire region. Yes, we could get rid of Gadhafi, a terrible dictator, but that created a vacuum for ISIS. Yes, we could get rid of Assad tomorrow, but that would create another political vacuum that would benefit ISIS. Getting rid of dictators is easy. But before you do that, you've got to think about what happens the day after. We need to put together broad coalitions to [avoid having a] political vacuum filled by terrorists. In Syria the primary focus now must be on destroying ISIS and [it's a] secondary issue to get rid of Assad.

Bernie Sanders on Foreign Policy : Dec 19, 2015
Easy to overthrow a dictator but hard to control aftermath

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Dec 19, 2015
I voted against 1st Gulf War, which led to 2nd Gulf War

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Nov 14, 2015
Invasion of Iraq led to ISIS; Hillary voted to invade

CLINTON: ISIS has developed [since 2014]. There are many other reasons why it has, but I don't think that the US has the bulk of the responsibility. I really put that on Assad and on the Iraqis and on the region itself.

SANDERS: She said the bulk of the responsibility is not ours. Well, in fact, I would argue that the disastrous invasion of Iraq, something that I strongly opposed, has unraveled the region completely and led to the rise of al-Qaeda and to ISIS.

Q: You're saying Secretary Clinton, who was then Senator Clinton, voted for the Iraq war. And are you making a direct link between her vote for that or and what's happening now for ISIS?

SANDERS: I don't think any sensible person would disagree that the invasion of Iraq led to the massive level of instability we are seeing right now. I think that was one of the worst foreign policy blunders in the more than history of the United States.

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Nov 10, 2015
Assad is a bad guy, but his replacement could be worse

TRUMP: Assad is a bad guy, but we have no idea who the so-called rebels--nobody even knows who they are.

Carly FIORINA: Governor Bush is correct. We must have a no fly zone in Syria.

TRUMP: So, I don't like Assad. Who's going to like Assad? But, we have no idea who these people, and what they're going to be, and what they're going to represent. They may be far worse than Assad. Look at Libya. Look at Iraq. Look at the mess we have after spending $2 trillion dollars, thousands of lives, wounded warriors all over the place--we have nothing. And, I said, keep the oil. And we should have kept the oil, believe me. We should have kept the oil. And, you know what? We should have given big chunks of the oil to the people that lost their arms, their legs, and their families, and their sons, and daughters, because right now, you know who has a lot of that oil? Iran, and ISIS.

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Nov 3, 2015
We should have demanded a deal with Kuwait to liberate them

Who did they turn to for help? Who else? Uncle Sucker. That's us. We spent billions of dollars sending our army to win back Kuwait. Our people were killed and wounded, but the Iraqis went back to their country.

About two months after the war, several Kuwaitis came up to my office. They told me, "We want to invest outside the United States." We had just handed them back their country! They were watching TV in the best hotel rooms in Paris while our kids were fighting for them. And they didn't want to invest in this country?

How stupid are we? Why didn't the United States make a deal with them that outlined how they would pay for us to get their country back for them? They would have paid anything if just asked.

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Nov 3, 2015
Blunder to announce withdrawal timetable from Afghanistan

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Oct 20, 2015
Afghanistan war made a mess, but troops need to stay

"We made a mistake going into Iraq. I've never said we made a mistake going into Afghanistan," Trump told CNN. Trump said on October 6 that he believed entering Afghanistan was a mistake and worried about U.S. forces getting stuck there.

"At some point, are they going to be there for the next 200 years? It's going to be a long time," Trump said, when asked about Afghanistan. "We made a terrible mistake getting involved there in the first place. We had real brilliant thinkers that didn't know what the hell they were doing. And it's a mess. And at this point, you probably have to stay because that thing will collapse about two seconds after they leave."

Trump first signaled his backtrack when he said Afghanistan is "where we should have gone," meaning the US should have focused its attention on Afghanistan over Iraq.

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Oct 18, 2015
Diplomacy and coalition-building before unilateral action

SANDERS: Well, I'm not going to get into hypotheticals, but I would say that Bush's decision to get us into a war in Iraq unilaterally was one of the worst foreign policy blunders in the history of the US. I think sensible foreign policy and military policies suggest that it cannot be the US alone which solves all of the world's [problems].

Q: In all circumstances?

SANDERS: I didn't say in all circumstances. But I think that there's a lesson to be learned from Iraq and Afghanistan, then what a great military power like the United States is about is trying to use diplomacy before war and working with other countries rather than doing it alone. At the end of the day, a military coalition is what will succeed, not the US doing it alone.

Bernie Sanders on Energy & Oil : Oct 13, 2015
Address climate change so we can leave planet to our kids

CHAFEE: It's certainly the chaos in the Middle East. And it all started with the Iraq invasion.

O'MALLEY: I believe that nuclear Iran remains the biggest threat, along with the threat of ISIL; climate change, of course, makes cascading threats.

CLINTON: I think it has to be continued threat from the spread of nuclear material that can fall into the wrong hands.

WEBB: Our greatest long-term strategic challenge is our relation with China.

Q: Senator Sanders, greatest national security threat?

SANDERS: The scientific community is telling us that if we do not address the global crisis of climate change, transform our energy system away from fossil fuel to sustainable energy, the planet that we're going to be leaving our kids and our grandchildren may well not be habitable. That is a major crisis.

Donald Trump on Foreign Policy : Oct 4, 2015
Better to have Mideast strongmen than Mideast chaos

TRUMP: It's not even a contest. Iraq is a disaster. And ISIS came out of Iraq.

Q: Well, let me button this up. If Saddam and Gaddafi were still in power, you think things would be more stable?

TRUMP: Of course it would be. You wouldn't have had your Benghazi situation, which is one thing, which was just a terrible situation.

Q: Would you pull out of what we're doing in Syria now?

TRUMP: no, I'd sit back.

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Sep 16, 2015
I'm pro-military but I opposed invading Iraq in 2003

Sen. Rand PAUL: I've made my career as being an opponent of the Iraq War. We have to learn sometimes the interventions backfire. The Iraq War backfired and did not help us. We're still paying the repercussions of a bad decision.

Dr. Ben CARSON: When the issue occurred in 2003, I suggested to President Bush that he not go to war. So I just want that on the record.

Bernie Sanders on Foreign Policy : Sep 13, 2015
Address humanitarian crisis in Syria with allies in region

SANDERS: I think it's impossible to give a proper number until we understand the dimensions of the problem. What I do believe is that Europe, the United States and, by the way, countries like Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, must address this humanitarian crisis. People are leaving Iraq, they're leaving Syria with just the clothes on their backs. The world has got to respond. The United States should be part of that response.

Q: When it comes to Syria, how much of the problem is the United States' fault, of policy, whether Bush in Iraq or Obama in Syria?

SANDERS: Look, I voted against the war in Iraq; much of what I feared would happen, in fact, did happen: Massive destabilization in that region. The issue now is not who is at fault. The issue is now what we do. And what we do is bring the region together.

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Sep 5, 2015
Iraq war destabilized Mideast; stay out of Mideast quagmire

A: No. In 2002, as a congressman, Bernie spoke extensively about the dangers of going to war in Iraq, and warned about the destabilizing impact that a war would cause and how it might lead to a counter-insurgency like we've seen, first with al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) and now ISIS: He voted against the resolution that gave President George W. Bush permission to invade Iraq.

Q: How has the Iraq war impacted Bernie's position on dealing with ISIS?

A: In February 2015, in response to a war powers resolution--a formal request by President Barack Obama to authorize a military campaign against ISIS--Bernie said, "I voted against the war in Iraq because I feared very much the destabilizing impact it would have on the region. Today, I very much fear U.S. involvement in an expanding and never-ending quagmire in that region of the world."

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Sep 5, 2015
Stop ISIS, but only with an international & Arab coalition

• A Global Threat That Must Be Stopped: ISIS is an incredibly dangerous, powerful, and barbaric organization. For the sake of people in the Middle East and all over the world, they must be stopped.
• We Must Learn From the War In Iraq: In terms of lives lost, injured soldiers, monetary costs, and lasting effects in the region, the Iraq War was a disaster. We need to learn from it so we don't make the same mistakes twice.
• A Coalition is Required: The United States cannot and should not lead the effort to defeat ISIS on its own. There are enough capable military powers in the region, and the coalition should be led by Middle Eastern allies.

Bernie Sanders on Social Security : Aug 30, 2015
Raise the Social Security cap on taxable income

I believe that we have got to raise the minimum wage over a period of several years to $15 an hour--not Hillary Clinton's position. I voted against the war in Iraq. Hillary Clinton voted for it.

Bernie Sanders on Foreign Policy : Aug 9, 2015
We have to negotiate with others, even Iran

SANDERS: We have got to go through every possible effort in order to make sure that we achieve that goal of Iran not having a nuclear weapon without going to war.

Q: So, do you support the agreement?

SANDERS: Yes, I do. Look, I'm not going to tell that you this is a perfect agreement. And every agreement can be better.

Q: What about hard-liners chanting death to America in Iraq making common cause with the opponents of this deal?

SANDERS: I wouldn't frame it that way. But this is the way I would frame it. It's so easy to be critical of an agreement which is not perfect. But the US has to negotiate with other countries. We have to negotiate with Iran. And the alternative, you know what it is? It's war. Do we really want another war, a war with Iran? I think we go as far as we possibly can in trying to give peace a chance, if you like, trying to see if this agreement will work. And I will support it.

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Aug 6, 2015
Opposed Iraq war in 2004 & predicted Mideast destabilization

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Jun 16, 2015
Boots on the ground to fight ISIS

In early 2015, Trump told CPAC that he felt the U.S. may need "boots on the ground" to fight the Islamic State. Soon after, he clarified to Fox News that he would send limited numbers of troops if all of his military advisers recommended it.

Bernie Sanders on Foreign Policy : Apr 30, 2015
Focus on domestic needs instead of international conflict

Sanders backs President Obama's negotiations with Iran and sharply criticized Republican senators who signed a letter warning Iran against a potential deal. In a statement, the Jewish senator pushed back against the idea of tougher sanctions and was critical of Netanyahu's speech to Congress. Sanders was the first senator to announce he would not attend the speech.

Jill Stein on War & Peace : Jan 20, 2015
ISIS grows out of chaos that we created in Iraq

The past decade of endless war on terror has been an unmitigated disaster which is now blowing back at us in the proliferation of extremist groups. ISIS itself grows directly out of the chaos; we see this in Iraq through ten years of vicious warfare and sectarian conflict that was promoted by our policies in Iraq.

Bernie Sanders on Technology : Jan 15, 2015
$1 trillion investment in infrastructure

Jill Stein on Homeland Security : Jul 31, 2014
Burden of fighting is borne by families of lesser means

Joe Biden on Foreign Policy : Mar 1, 2014
An internationalist as Foreign Relations Committee chair

Ron DeSantis on Homeland Security : Nov 6, 2012
Gave legal support to Gitmo terrorist detention center

He is currently an officer in the reserve component of the United States Navy. He is a member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars and the American Legion. He has lectured on the law of war at Florida Coastal School of Law.

Jill Stein on War & Peace : Nov 1, 2012
National conversation before we go to war

STEIN: I think the priority is that we do not bypass the American people who have been routinely bypassed in most of the interventions in recent decades including Iraq and Libya. This is being done without the explicit permission from Congress and is a critical check and balance that has gotten lost in the shuffle and is a violation of the US Constitution and the war powers act. It is very dangerous when politicians declare war and exhaust economic resources and spill the blood of Americans and civilians overseas. Most of the conflicts of the last decade would not have happened had there been a national conversation and discussion about what the true risks and benefits of our national security were.

Jill Stein on Energy & Oil : Oct 22, 2012
Fight against climate change instead of fighting for oil

STEIN: Instead of fighting wars for oil, America will be leading the fight to put an end to climate change. In Afghanistan and Iraq, we have spent about $5 trillion. We have seen thousands and thousands of American lives lost, hundreds of thousands of civilian lives lost, about a trillion dollars a year being spent on a massive, bloated military-industrial-security budget. Instead, we need to cut that military budget, rightsize it to year 2000 levels, and build true security here at home, bringing our war dollars home.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Oct 11, 2012
Out of Iraq as promised; out of Afghanistan soon

With regard to Afghanistan, he said he will end the war in 2014. Governor Romney said, #1, we should not set a date, and #2, with regard to 2014, it depends.

When it came to Osama bin Laden, the president, the first day in office, he called in the CIA and signed an order saying, 'my highest priority is to get bin Laden.' Prior to Pres. Obama being sworn in, Governor Romney was asked a question about how he would proceed. He said, 'I wouldn't move heaven and earth to get bin Laden.' He didn't understand it was more than about taking a murderer off the battlefield; it was about restoring America's heart.

And lastly, the president has led with a steady hand and clear vision. Governor Romney, the opposite. The last thing we need now is another war.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Jun 14, 2012
1990 Gulf War: reason enough to send generation to war?

"The president says he's angry and impatient, but God bless him, so are all of us. But is that a reason to send a whole generation to war?" asked Biden.

"The price is in body bags, in babies killed," said Barbara Boxer, then a member of the House of Representatives.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Jun 14, 2012
OpEd: Iraq war follows tradition of active US leadership

At the grass roots, the Democratic Party included millions of liberals who, since Vietnam, had been instinctively skeptical about the use of force or other assertions of American power abroad. By contrast, many of the party's foreign policy hands, particularly the alumni of the Clinton administration, had a different outlook. They viewed themselves as heirs to the foreign policy traditions of Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman and John Kennedy, all proponents of national strength and an active leadership role for the US.

Jill Stein on War & Peace : Feb 14, 2012
We're not safer internationally with drone wars

A. Small time, sure. There are minor improvements. But on the other hand, he took single-payer off the table. He absolutely took a public option off the table. As we found on issue after issue--the war, reappointing George Bush's secretary of defense, sticking to George Bush's timeline on Iraq, expanding the war, expanding the drone wars all over the place. And how about bringing Wall Street in, the guys who created the problem, among his first appointments. It was pretty clear right then that this was going to be business as usual on steroids. We're certainly not more secure, more equitable, more healthy or safer internationally, with what Obama has brought.

Jill Stein on War & Peace : Feb 3, 2012
End the Oil Wars

Redirect the trillions wasted on Wall Street, war & tax subsidies for the wealthy to...
• Stop climate change by creating millions of jobs in green energy, manufacturing, agriculture & public transportation.
• End the Oil Wars that are killing soldiers and civilians, and draining our national treasury. Obama is leaving thousands of private forces in Iraq and has twice as many troops in Afghanistan as George Bush.
• End unemployment by investing in green jobs.

Jill Stein on War & Peace : Jan 25, 2012
Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were illegal

Instead of austerity, we can end the Wall Street bailouts, cut the bloated military and tax the bloated rich.

Jill Stein on War & Peace : Dec 21, 2011
We should not be in Afghanistan; no military solution

A: As in Iraq, in Afghanistan likewise we should not be there. If we hadn't been training militaries in Afghanistan to start with 30 or 40 years ago, there never would have been an Osama bin Laden. Afghanistan is a symbol: military solutions are not solutions. They don't end.

Jill Stein on War & Peace : Dec 21, 2011
We never should have been in Iraq; we're still not out

A: We are not out of Iraq--we should be out of Iraq and we are not. We never should have been in Iraq. We have spent perhaps $1 trillion, lost nearly 5,000 American lives, and probably 100,000 or perhaps one million Iraqi lives. It's an unspeakable shame that this war occurred at all. A war caused by lies and military opportunism A war that has conveniently secured some oil supplies for the US and the West but what a horrible price that has been paid for that illegitimate bounty.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Dec 13, 2011
Proud of involvement in winding down Iraq war

BIDEN: I feel like I participated in something that I can be proud of the rest of my life. Had I stayed as chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, no matter how engaged I was, I don`t think I would have been in a position to be able to affect events on a day to day basis.

Q: In 2002, you voted for the authorization of use of force to go to Iraq. Is there a lesson learned about how we debate the use of force, how we debate whether or not to go to war?

BIDEN: I hope to God there is, because when that original debate took place, those of us like myself who voted to authorize to use force were based on the president`s commitment not to use force. He had no intention of using force. It was to demonstrate to the United Nations and to the world that we were united in wanting to stop Saddam Hussein.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Dec 13, 2011
We shared responsibility to bring democracy to Libya

I would give Libya as an example. It was clear that Moammar Gadhafi was really not a good guy at all. But what did the president do? We spent several billion dollars, but we didn`t lose one American life. We didn`t put one boot on the ground. And we had a shared responsibility with the rest of the world, including Arab nations as well as NATO to deal with that issue.

And now, there`s a shared responsibility to the world to help them establish a democracy. That`s very different than going it alone. I hope we`ve learned the lesson that, unless our immediate vital national interest is at stake, going it alone should be the last option.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Dec 13, 2011
Iran is isolated, and will be more so when Syria falls

BIDEN: Well, the argument was made early on that we removed two of Iran`s most greatest concerns, Saddam in Iraq, and the Taliban in Afghanistan. But the result now, in part because of some really outrageous moves that Iran has made, it actually has lost power in the entire region. The fact of the matter is its only ally left in the region is about to be toppled. That is in Syria with Bashar Assad. But the biggest thing that`s happened is the president has been able to unite the world, including Russia and China, in continuing to ostracize and to isolate Iran. So, the truth is, the capacity of Iran to project power in the Gulf is actually diminished. They are less feared. They have less influence than they have had any time, I would argue, in the last 20 years.

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Dec 5, 2011
Iraq should pick up the tab for their own liberation

How much is it worth to them to be rid of the bloodthirsty dictatorship of Saddam Hussein and to have gained a democracy? In reality, that's a priceless gift. When I say they should pay us back, I'm not even talking about cash out of their pockets. All I'm asking is that they give us, temporarily, a few flows of oil--enough to help pay us back and help take care of the tens of thousands of families and children whose brave loved ones died or were injured while securing Iraqi freedom.

But does Iraq do that? No. In fact, they've made it clear they have no intention of ever doing so. Ever. The ingratitude of Iraq's leadership is breathtaking.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Aug 30, 2011
1998: only way to remove Saddam is massive military effort

There was bipartisan support for the operation. Sen. Joe Biden, writing in The Washington Post two months before the strikes, noted the limitation of any policy that left Saddam in power. "Ultimately, as long as Saddam Hussein is at the helm, no inspectors can guarantee that they have rooted out the entirety of Saddam Hussein's weapons program," he wrote, and he observed that "the only way to remove Saddam is a massive military effort, led by the United States."

Bernie Sanders on Homeland Security : Dec 10, 2010
War in Iraq will cost us $3 trillion including veteran care

So when we talk about Iraq, it is not only the terrible loss of life that our soldiers and the Iraqi people have experienced, let's not forget what it has done to the deficit and the national debt. We did not pay for the war in Iraq. We just put it on the credit card.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Nov 9, 2010
OpEd: 2003 Iraq vote unmistakably authorized war

Joe Biden on Foreign Policy : Oct 5, 2010
New World Order should not mean US fights for the UN

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Oct 5, 2010
Not necessary to defeat Taliban; it's part of Afghan society

I wrote to the president, a long, 20-page handwritten memo focused on making the case:
1. that this is a 3-dimensional problem--al Qaeda, Pakistan and Afghanistan;
2. that there be a limit on the number of troops so that this wouldn't be a constant, creeping escalation whatever troop level was announced;
3. that there be a date at which we would begin the drawdown of American forces with the aim of drawing down all combat forces out, a la Iraq;
4. that it was not necessary to defeat the Taliban because the Taliban was and is part of the fabric of the Pashtun society--20% to 30% of it is incorrigible and must be defeated, and the remainder should be integrated into Afghan society;
5. that the return of the ability of the Taliban to overthrow the Afghan government was simply not within their power;
6. that the Taliban was not seeking to establish a new caliphate, they were not an existential threat to the USA,
7. that al-Qaeda's return to Afghanistan was highly unlikely.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Oct 5, 2010
No vital interest in Kuwait in 1990; like Vietnam in 1972

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Oct 5, 2010
2008: Afghanistan is forgotten war, & Pakistan is neglected

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Oct 5, 2010
Enemy is Al Qaeda, not Taliban; timetable for withdrawal ok

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Oct 5, 2010
2002: Iraq pivots from unfinished business in Afghanistan

Biden returned conveying a plea for urgent help, and Powell joined it, but while Bush "was agreeable and willing to listen, he was also noncommittal," Biden wrote later. Though Bush talked of a Marshall Plan for Afghanistan, he had other ideas, and was already giving Cheney and Rumsfeld "the force and resources they requested for a new target"--Iraq.

By now it was becoming increasingly clear to Biden that a critical pivot was under way from the unfinished business in Afghanistan to the neoconservatives' vision of spreading democracy throughout the Middle East, starting with deposing Saddam Hussein.

Biden and Republican Senator Chuck Hagel introduced a bill providing more money for Afghanistan, but the administration opposed it.

Jill Stein on War & Peace : Sep 29, 2010
End our military misadventures in Iraq and Afghanistan

The Iraq and Afghanistan wars are costing Massachusetts $3.4 billion per year. That money could go a long way toward creating jobs here in Massachusetts. Rather than serving as a Pentagon propagandist and obediently sending our National Guard off for yet another tour of duty, the Governor of Massachusetts should be telling President Obama that we need to end the wars, bring our National Guard home, and heal our economy.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : May 18, 2010
2009: Monthly visit to Baghdad to wind down Iraq War

Obama had changed his mind about Biden over the six months following the election. He went from not trusting him to keep his mouth shut about personal decisions to trusting him fully to handle one of the biggest portfolios of his presidency. Once in office Obama quickly saw that his V.P. was deeply knowledgeable about the nuances of foreign policy and surprisingly deft with foreign leaders, who, like American politicians, found him to be an irrepressible Labrador.

It was a sign of how busy the president was--and how surprisingly well Iraq went--that he never needed another meeting about Iraq for the rest of 2009.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Aug 4, 2009
2007: Supported funding Iraq War, against Obama

Obama said, "I opposed this war in 2002 precisely because I feared it would lead us to the open-ended occupation in which we find ourselves today. We should not give the president a blank check to continue down this same, disastrous path." Just fourteen senators opposed the measure.

Joe Biden on Homeland Security : Oct 2, 2008
We spend same in 3 weeks in Iraq as 7 years in Afghanistan

BIDEN: While Barack & I have been calling for more money & more troops in Afghanistan, McCain was saying two years ago, "The reason we don't read about Afghanistan anymore in the paper, it's succeeded." We spend in three weeks on combat missions in Iraq, more than we spent in the entire time we have been in Afghanistan. That will change in an Obama administration.

Joe Biden on Homeland Security : Oct 2, 2008
Greatest security threat is from al Qaeda in Pakistan

BIDEN: Pakistan already has nuclear weapons. Iran getting a nuclear weapon would be destabilizing, but they are not close to getting a nuclear weapon that's able to be deployed. John continues to tell us that the central war on terror is in Iraq. I promise you, if an attack comes in the homeland, it's going to come from al Qaeda in the hills of Pakistan. We need to support that democracy by helping them with their economic well-being.

PALIN: Both are extremely dangerous. And as for who coined that central war on terror being in Iraq, it was the Gen. Petraeus and al Qaeda, and it's probably the only thing that they're ever going to agree on. An armed, nuclear Iran is so extremely dangerous. Israel is in jeopardy when we're dealing with Iran. Others who are dangerous dictators are ones that Barack Obama has said he would be willing to meet with without preconditions. And that goes beyond naivete and poor judgment.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Oct 2, 2008
My push for Bosnian intervention saved 1000s of lives

BIDEN: I think the American public has the stomach for success. My recommendations on Bosnia. I admit I was the first one to recommend it. They saved tens of thousands of lives. And initially John McCain opposed it along with a lot of other people. But the end result was it worked. Look what we did in Bosnia. We took Serbs, Croats and Bosnians, being told by everyone, I was told by everyone that this would mean that they had been killing each other for a thousand years, it would never work. There's a relatively stable government there now as in Kosovo. With regard to Iraq, I gave the president the power, because he said he needed it not to go to war but to keep the UN in line, to keep sanctions on Iraq and not let them be lifted.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Oct 1, 2008
2002: Waiting to be sure of Saddam danger could be too late

"In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including al-Qaeda members."
--Sen. Hillary Clinton, Oct. 10, 2002

"Saddam Hussein certainly has chemical and biological weapons. There's no question about that."
--Rep. Nancy Pelosi, Nov. 17, 2002

"We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction."
--Sen. Edward Kennedy, Sept. 27, 2003

"If we wait for the danger to become clear, it could be too late."
--Sen. Joseph Biden, Sept. 4, 2002

Mike Pence on War & Peace : Mar 9, 2008
Afghanistan is and will continue to be a NATO and US success

PENCE: I really do. You know, Afghanistan is going to have its own challenges. And there's concern right now that there may be something of a counteroffensive by the Taliban this spring. And so some Marines are being transferred into the southwest provinces.

Q: Do you think the NATO and US forces are ready to deal with that?

PENCE: Our military personnel are not going to be surprised. The Taliban has already been operating with military violence in about 10% of the provinces. They see it coming, but look, Afghanistan is and will continue to be an extraordinary American and NATO success. Iraq right now is going in the right direction, but the fight is far from over.

Joe Biden on Foreign Policy : Feb 25, 2008
Foreign policy needs informed consent of American people

Joe Biden on Budget & Economy : Dec 13, 2007
Save Pentagon spending by getting the troops out of Iraq

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Nov 11, 2007
Strong US intervention in trouble spots around the world

On the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, he has been chair or ranking minority member since the late 1990s. In recent decades, he has consistently taken an interventionist stance, promoting the idea that the US, as the lone remaining superpower, ought to step in--with the UN, with NATO, or on its own--to prevent genocide, keep the peace, and promote democracy. Under Clinton, he pushed for intervention in Bosnia, and supported NATO's intervention in Kosovo. More recently, he has argued for an immediate intercession in Darfur, with US troops if need be.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Nov 11, 2007
Post-colonial countries like Iraq need federal system

A central government would sit atop of this regional setup, responsible for "common interests, like border security and the distribution of oil revenues." Shared oil resources would most likely restore Iraq to an earlier status: The country, after all, was once a colonial appendage of Britain before World War I, acquired solely for its oil.

Biden said in Feb. 2007, "Any country that comes into being as a consequence of the pen of a diplomat has never been able to be stable except by (a) an imperial power dominating it, (b) a dictator or strongman, or (c) a federal system." Biden clearly believes in the third of these options, but in practice his plan may well recreate the first.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Nov 11, 2007
Third way: federalize Iraq; troops home; no chaos behind

"President Bush does not have a strategy for victory in Iraq. His strategy is to prevent defeat and to hand the problem off to his successor. As a result, more and more Americans understandably want a rapid withdrawal, even at the risk of trading a dictator for chaos and a civil war that could become a regional war. Both are bad alternatives."

"There is a third way that can achieve the two objectives most Americans share: to bring our troops home, without leaving chaos behind. The idea is to maintain a unified Iraq by federalizing it and giving Kurds, Shiites, and Sunnis breathing room in their own region."

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Sep 9, 2007
Changed mind on Iraq pullout, not about political solution

NARRATOR: "In a world this dangerous, with a crisis as tough as Iraq, hard truths need to be told. Joe Biden says this war must end now."

A: Well, I have changed my mind, but I haven't changed my mind in any fundamental way. If you go back, I [always said] you need a political solution. And there's time, I thought back then, if the administration had been wiser, to generate a political solution allowing us to pull out. Now the situation we're in, if the president continues to insist on this strategically-flawed notion of being able to establish a central government that can control Iraq before we leave, I ain't buying into that.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Aug 19, 2007
Leaving Iraq will cause generation-long regional war

Joe Biden on Homeland Security : Aug 9, 2007
Don't Ask Don't Tell is antiquated & unworkable

A: Sen. Biden supports ending the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy. It is antiquated and unworkable. According to recent polls, 3/4 of veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan said that they had no problem serving with openly gay people. 24 of the nations serving alongside US forces in Iraq permit open service which has had no negative impact on these forces or the morale of our brave soldiers. Finally, the US does not have enough troops to fulfill our current missions--it is ridiculous to turn away brave and patriotic Americans who volunteer to serve solely because of their sexual orientation--especially in light of the Defense Department's recent decision to extend tours of duty in Iraq. Sen. Biden believes that we should treat everyone serving in the military by the same standards regardless of orientation.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Jul 31, 2007
Bush invaded Iraq as the weakest of the Axis of Evil

I thought this approach was flawed. The facts showed that terrorist groups didn't base their training camps in countries with strong governments or dictators; they found safe haven in failed states & grew stronger in the vacuum of power.

There was a lot of noise about overthrowing Saddam Hussein. Of the three Axis of Evil countries, Iraq was the country that could put up the least military resistance, and I believed Cheney & Rumsfeld were pushing the president toward an invasion

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Jul 31, 2007
End neocon fantasy of remaking Iraq in our image

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Jul 31, 2007
Voted for Iraq War resolution to avoid war in Iraq

But the president was giving personal assurances that he would try every avenue of diplomacy before he took the country to war. And it was clear that Colin Powell and members of the Joint Chiefs were not eager to go to war in Iraq. With that in mind, I decided to vote for the resolution.

I believed the resolution passed by Congress provided the firm & united support Powell needed to be able to get the United Nations Security Council to pass and enforce a new resolution that got the inspectors back into Iraq, kept Saddam in his box, and thus avoided a war. I wasn't alone in that.

I made a mistake. I underestimated the influence of Cheney, Rumsfeld, and the rest of the neocons; I vastly underestimated their disingenuousness and incompetence. So Bush went to war just the way the neocons wanted him to--without significant international backing.

Joe Biden on Principles & Values : Jul 15, 2007
His book "Promises to Keep" written before presidential race

A: Well, I wrote a book back when I thought I was going to be working with John Kerry in a Kerry administration. It had nothing to do with presidential politics. I was encouraged to write it by a guy named Richard Ben Cramer, who wrote the book "What it Takes," and asked how my personal values inform my public policy. And I talk about everything from the Supreme Court to the Balkans to Iraq, and how I think that the most significant thing about what we need in leadership is people who are willing to get back up. My dad used to have an expression. He used to say, "The measure of success is not whether you get knocked down; it's how rapidly you get back up." And the American people always get back up. And I think what they're doing is looking for somebody who is going to give them the opportunity to be able to take on the tough issues that are out there and just tell them the truth.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Jul 12, 2007
Never de-fund a single soldier in Iraq

But as long as there's a single soldier left in Iraq, I will not vote to de-fund protecting that soldier. That's why--and I know I say this straight up--that's why I voted, and the only one who voted the way I did, for a simple basic reason. I will not vote to delay one week, not one week, getting these new mine resistant vehicles in the field. That will protect and reduce by 80% the lives saved. This war must end, but must end in a way that we not only bring our children home but that we don't have to send our grandchildren back.

Joe Biden on Civil Rights : Jun 3, 2007
Nobody asks if you're gay in a foxhole

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Apr 29, 2007
Think about the decade after Iraq, not just the day after

A: Before we went to war, I wrote a report saying the decade after, and everyone was talking about the day after. And the point I was making was, if you went in and used force, which he should not have done when he did it, that we were committing and signing on to a decade. That was the minimum requirement. I also pointed out we needed more troops. I also pointed out at that time we would not be greeted with open arms. I also pointed out at that time oil would not pay for this. It was a warning to the president. The objective of us giving [Bush the Iraq war] authority was to get inspectors back in, bring the pressure of the world community. [And to decide] are we going to lift sanctions on Iraq or are we going to put more sanctions on Iraq? That was the context.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Apr 29, 2007
In 2002 Saddam posed a threat of purchasing a nuclear bomb

A: I was correct about that. I also said at the time that I did not think he had weaponized his material, but he did have these stockpiles everywhere.

A: It turned out they didn't, but everyone in the world thought he had them. The weapons inspectors said he had them. What he did with them, who knows?

Q: Gen. Zinni, when he heard the discussion about WMD that Saddam had, said, "I've never heard that" in any of the briefings he had as head of the Central Command. How could you as a US Senator be so wrong?

A: I wasn't wrong. When asked about aluminum tubes, I said they're for artillery. I don't believe they're for cascading.

Q: But you said Saddam was a threat.

A: He was a threat.

Q: In what way?

A: If Saddam was left unfettered, with sanctions lifted and billions in his coffers, then he had the ability to purchase a tactical nuclear weapon.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Apr 29, 2007
Partitioning Iraq is inevitable, as shown by history

A: Basically, Baker's in a minority. Henry Kissinger & Madeleine Albright have signed onto the plan. If you look at the Baker report, it goes on to say "We may get where Biden is talking about." Guess what? We're getting there. What is this administration implicitly acknowledging by building a wall? They're building a wall, and they're talking about a centralized government? There's never been a time in history where there's been a self-sustaining cycle of sectarian violence that has ended even remotely reasonably without a federated system. Never. What for the 1st time in history is different? There's an inevitability to what I'm talking about.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Apr 29, 2007
US worse off than before Saddam because US lost credibility

A: I believe we are less safe as a nation now because what has happened is the conduct of this war has so badly damaged our readiness. It has limited our credibility around the world and limited our flexibility in terms of the use of force. We could end the carnage in Darfur tomorrow, but why aren't we doing it? In part we're not doing it because we are so tied down. We could fundamentally change the dynamic in Afghanistan. Why aren't we doing it? Because we are tied down. Saddam was a butcher, the world's happy, may he burn in hell. He deserves it. But in terms of our global positioning, our geopolitical strategy, we are worse off than we were when we had Saddam sitting there because of the impact on our military and the impact on our credibility.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Apr 29, 2007
Regrets his war vote because Bush misused war authority

A: That's unfair. I said it was a mistake between, and you make it sound like I went to Iowa and all of a sudden [changed my position].

Q: Well, there was a change from being a just vote to a mistake.

A: Yeah, because I learned more. We were told at the time that all these Iraqi generals were ready to step up and take on Saddam. We had commitments at the time from the president that he would not move without the international community. There were a whole lot of things that changed.

Q: So what do you regret?

A: I regret having believed that this administration had any competence. If I'd known they were going to misuse the authority we gave them, I would have never ever given them the authority.

Joe Biden on Foreign Policy : Apr 26, 2007
Biggest threat to US is from North Korea, Iran, & Russia

A: The biggest threat to the US is, right now, North Korea. Iran not as big a threat, but a long-term threat. And quite frankly, the tendency of Putin to move in a totalitarian direction, which would unhinge all that's going on positively in Europe.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Apr 10, 2007
Decentralize Iraqi government; local control over daily life

A: Many of my colleagues have offered ideas, just capping troops or cutting troops, or removing troops, but none of them offered a political alternative. To be responsible, one has to be able to answer a two-word question: Then what? After we pull our troops out, then what? After we cap troops, then what? After we cut partial funding, then what? Well, I put forward a political solution that's been referred to as the Biden-Gelb plan. And it's totally consistent with the Iraqi constitution. The problem in Iraq today is a self-sustaining cycle of sectarian violence. To maintain a unified Iraq, you have to decentralize it. You have to give the courage to the Sunnis and Shias, control over the fabric of their daily lives, control over the local police forces, rules relating to marriage and divorce and education. all the things they're killing each other over.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Apr 10, 2007
Introduced legislation barring US Military bases in Iraq

A: I'm against building permanent US Military bases in Iraq, and I've led this fight to make sure we don't do that. Last year I introduced a law barring US Military bases in Iraq. In fact I introduced it three different times because although it passed the Senate each time, it got kicked out by the House. We finally got it put in the appropriations. I'm doing this same thing this year. Just 2 weeks ago, the same provision got through banning a permanent military bases in Iraq by the US. I also feel very strongly that we should be barred from exercising control of Iraqi natural resources, including oil. We have to knock down the belief that we're there for oil, and we have to knock down the ability of anyone in this administration misguided enough to believe that our mission actually has anything to do with oil or permanent military basing in Iraq. Absent that, we'll never be able to get it right.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Apr 10, 2007
Biden-Gelb plan: UN & Muslim powers to enforce Iraq unity

1. To maintain a unified Iraq, you have to decentralize it.
2. Have a limited central government that has concern for its borders, its army, the distribution of oil revenues, its foreign policy.
3. Secure access to oil revenues for the Sunnis who literally have nothing. Oil should be what binds the country together, not what splits it apart. There should be a guarantee in the constitution for proportional share of oil to get the Sunnis to get out of the business of supporting the insurgency.
4. Increase reconstruction assistance for Iraq but raise that money from the oil-rich Gulf states, and tie that reconstruction to the protection of the minority ranks.
5. And lastly, you have to make Iraq the world's problem. I would call for the permanent five of the Security Council, along with the four largest Muslim nations, to impose a political solution for a unified Iraq.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Feb 21, 2007
Vote for Iraq War was mistake; assumed Bush competence

A: First of all, I think that I vastly underestimated the incompetence of this administration. I really mean it. Remember, they did it pretty well in Afghanistan. They acted responsibly. Almost every major network, almost every major editorial board in America said that they were acting responsibly. And when [Bush] came forward with this plan for Iraq, his wanting this authority, we assumed he'd act equally as responsibly. But they have been absolutely irresponsible.

I wrote a report six months before we went to war, called "The Decade After Iraq." It stated we would not be greeted with open arms. There would not be enough oil to pay for the war. We'd be there for five to 10 years, and we better not go unless we're prepared to go with a lot more forces. And so I assumed they would understand that. And that was a giant mistake I made -- assuming their competence.

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Feb 21, 2007
Decentralize Iraq to give people control over daily lives

Joe Biden on War & Peace : Nov 23, 2006
Voted for Iraq war in 2002, but now a war critic

Tim Walz on War & Peace : Nov 7, 2006
Ensure an achievable mission in Iraq

Tim Walz on War & Peace : Nov 7, 2006
Change the currnet course of action; need Iraq exit plan

Tim Walz on War & Peace : Nov 7, 2006
Stabilize Iraq, if possible, before withdrawing

Howie Hawkins on War & Peace : Nov 1, 2006
Immediate and unconditional withdrawal from Iraq

A: Yes.

Q: Should the US withdraw its troops from Iraq?

A: Yes.

Q: Discuss your proposals for an exit strategy in Iraq.

A: Immediate and unconditional withdrawal. The real US military mission was to establish military bases and control the oil, not WMDs, terrorism, and democracy as the politicians spun it. The mission was imperialistic. It was wrong and it should stop.

Howie Hawkins on War & Peace : Aug 1, 2006
Replace Middle East occupation with peace

A: Supports Peace, not occupation in the Middle East. Cease fire.

Howie Hawkins on War & Peace : Jun 30, 2006
End the War in Iraq

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Aug 1, 2004
All of the reasons for Iraq war were blatantly wrong

Donald Trump on War & Peace : Aug 1, 2004
Iraq won't be a democracy when we leave; it'll be a mess

Bernie Sanders on Homeland Security : Jun 17, 1997
Pentagon lied about Iraq; expect same for future wars

Given their enormous success in selling the Persian Gulf debacle, there is no reason to expect that the government and the media will behave any differently when the next war comes. If they could win massive public support for defending "freedom" in Kuwait, they can use the same techniques to build support for ANY war.

Bernie Sanders on War & Peace : Jun 17, 1997
1990: Opposed authorizing all-out war in Kuwait with Iraq

From the very beginning of the Persian Gulf crisis, I was of the belief that the US could push Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait without having to resort to war. Diplomacy, economic boycott, isolation, financial leverage: we had many means for reversing the invasion. I was not only opposed to the war because of the potential destruction and loss of life, but also because I believe it IS possible for the major countries of this planet, and a virtually united world community, to resolve crises without carnage. If this matter could not be solved without massive bombing & killing thousands of people, then what crisis could ever be solved peacefully?