We have actually experienced in recent months a dramatic demonstration of an unprecedented intelligence failure, perhaps the most significant intelligence failure in the history of the United States.

The potential for regional conflict in the absence of an internationally active America is real.

The Chinese are really good at diplomacy - and even at making their interlocutors feel very uncomfortable.

I'm all in favour of grand important speeches, but the president then has to link his sermons to a strategy.

I give my grandfather, Dr Harold Young, a forestry Professor at the University of Maine, full credit for my career path. He pioneered the use of aerial photography in forestry in the 1950s, and we think he worked as a spy for the CIA during the Cold War, mapping Russian installations.

It is wrong to try to avoid the struggle against imperialism under the pretext that independence and revolution are important, but that peace is still more precious.

The hate and scorn showered on us Negro officers by our fellow Americans convinced me that there was no sense in my dying for a world ruled by them. I made up my mind that if I got through this war I would study law and use my time fighting for men who could not strike back.

I wish I wasn't the face of the victims - three lost near the finish line and hundreds injured - because then everyone would forget about me, and I could recover in peace, and at my own pace.