I saw the relation with Russia as necessary to the U.S., for the interests of the U.S. We worked very closely with them on the Sochi Olympics. We were working closely with them on the Iranian nuclear deal.
What do you do when you get out of the military, you stop serving? There are 26 presidents who served in the military. More than half of our presidents... that means that you stop being an American?
We have a centrist nationalist group of people in this country, lots of them, and we have a socialist group of people in this country, lots of them. And that's not, to me, the American idea.
Islam is an ideology and there's a religious component to it that's radicalized and in some cases it masks itself behind that religion, especially in America, because of freedom of religion.
We have zero strategic thinking out of our White House. And we have a national security structure that has lost its way when it comes to strategic thinking and strategic decision-making.
Donald Trump is a great listener, and he's a good challenger. He doesn't come across as a person who thinks he knows it all. In fact, he once told me he has had lot of things to learn.
Trump realized that you had to drive a stake through the heart of this establishment and that millions of Americans do not feel represented by this sort of clique in Washington.
We have a problem with radical Islamism and I actually think that we could work together with Russia against this enemy. They have a worse problem than America does.
I want to be able to speak freely about what I believe. There's a lot of people who would actually like to be able to do that but, for whatever reason, they can't.
There are Muslims, who are moderate Muslims. And there's more of them than there are radicalized Muslims and are using Islam in its misinterpreted ideology.
One of the things I learned was that Putin has no respect for the United States leadership. Not for the United States, but the leadership.
Why do we go through all the nonsense with security at our airport? It's not because the Catholic Church is falling apart.
Why do we take a dollar? Why do we give a dollar to countries that have no rights for women? We have to think about that.
I grew up as a kid with very little. I could enjoy a peanut butter and jelly sandwich or peanut butter crackers.
The threat of nuclear warfare is very, very low. Trump is no fool, and he sees the world as a globalized world.
NATO as a political alliance does need to be relooked at in terms of everything - resourcing, capabilities.
I'm standing up for the U.S. But it's hard when Russians don't have any respect for the current leadership.
![Why do three-quarters of NATO [countries] get away with not paying anything? They have to pay their bills.](https://quotes.thefamouspeople.com/images/quotes/michael-flynn-139746.jpg)
Why do three-quarters of NATO [countries] get away with not paying anything? They have to pay their bills.
I would have preferred to capture bin Laden and expose how he uses Islamic ideology for his own purposes.
Remember the box fight: You start as a southpaw, you go back to fighting as a right-handed fighter.
When you look back, history is not going to be kind to these last 16 years from 2000 to 2016.
One thing I agree with Donald Trump on is, there's something going on in the Muslim world.
Why is it that the U.S. has to take refugees? Why doesn't Saudi Arabia take more.
When you are given immunity that means that you've probably committed a crime.
I found Donald Trump to be very attuned to what was going on around the world.
There's one thing that I know about myself, I could wash dishes and be happy.
Russia ought to get Iran to back out of the proxy wars they are involved in.
We're not going to act in a soft way for what we believe needs to be done.
Egypt is going to be, potentially, a failed state if we don't help them.
The Islamic ideology is a political ideology based on a religion.
I think we have such a political cesspool in America right now.
I think all of Europe has been too soft on the refugee crisis.
I feel pretty passionate about what's happening to America.
If there's a way to serve America, I'd always consider it.
The Republican Party is no longer the Republican Party.
The Democratic Party is no longer the Democratic Party.
Nobody wanted Jeb Bush, nobody wants Hillary Clinton.
I do care about the direction of America.
I like serving America.
I think that [Obama] sees the military actually as something that is more dangerous to the world. I think that he looks at the United States military and sees it as a threatening application around the world than actually as a useful tool.
It's not Islam, it's extremism in general, that is such a crock and that does a disservice to the people of America to make us sound like we're a bunch of idiots that we can't see what's going on in front of us and we're too weak to tell the truth.
I believe there's a diseased component inside the Islamic world, the Muslim world, absolutely. It's like a cancer and it has metastasized and grabbed hold in a much bigger way, and it's because we, have tried to be, globally, tried to be so political correct.
The United States should not have to intervene in every single problem around the world. The voters of this country are reacting in a very big, broad way to Mr. Trump. They are frustrated by lousy decisions made by both George W. Bush and Barack Obama. Look at the mess we have.
This [U.S.] bombing in Libya. So what are we doing in Libya? We just dropped some bombs on someone who we found is a leader there, maybe we killed some group attending a leadership meeting. Does this mean the problem is going to go away? No. It means we're going to have worse guys.
Foreign policy is about US national security, it is definitely not non-intervention. It is definitely not isolationist. That's where people want to hear what they want to hear and not listen to what Donald Trump says. It is about national security for the United States, and that's fine.
I know Donald Trump as a very adaptive person. In my nearly three and a half decades of being in the military, I've had maybe one, maybe two guys that I've worked for that were that adaptive in combat. He adapts to the great challenges, with his own sort of street smarts and his instincts.
NATO was formed post-World War II. We're a little bit more than a half-century old. Do we want NATO to go on for another half-century? I think that the answer is, sitting here today: I don't know. If I had to bet on it, I would say, yeah, we have to have these alliances going forward and see who's going to pay for them.
Obama's decision to leave, to not sustain the victory that resulted after eight years of fighting, from 2003 to 2011 in Iraq, was another incredibly stupid decision. It was totally based on politics, not based on any notion of national security. It's a nightmare for our national security. And then you have the Libya intervention.
What I know is it is a disservice to those who continue to serve to think that there's going to be a civil-military breakdown because those who serve, they know who they serve. They know what their loyalties are, that's why you take an oath to the Constitution and your loyalty lies in the chain of command and your buddies. That's always been there. We are a professional military.
Donald Trump has no intention to step away without examining all relationships that we have. His intent is to relook at the way we are organized globally, where the US is sort of expected to be a global leader, but relook at these alliances and these charters that we are under to make sure that they are still viable for the 21st century. It doesn't mean that President Trump comes into office and NATO goes away.
The Chinese get over 40 percent of their oil from the Middle East through the Persian Gulf, but have you ever seen a Chinese aircraft carrier sitting inside the Persian Gulf? For at least 40 years, the United States of America has been guaranteeing Chinese energy supplies. Sitting here today, the US provides funds to, honest to God, 99 percent of the countries on the planet. We even give North Korea humanitarian aid. We give them food, and God knows what they do with it. They probably feed it to the crooks in the headquarters.
