National Interests Quotes:

The national interest is predetermined by geopolitics or the history of a country. Important political leaders never just followed their interests - they were concerned about the interests of their people.

- Joseph Nye

source: Source: www.spiegel.de

topic: Country, People, Leader, Political Leaders, Predetermined

when my office would require me to either violate my conscience or violate the national interest, then I would resign the office; and I hope any conscientious public servant would do the same.

- John F. Kennedy

source: Address to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association, delivered 12 September 1960 at the Rice Hotel in Houston, TX

topic: Office, Interest, Servant, National Interests

The predominant yardstick of your government is not human rights but national interests.

- Breyten Breytenbach

topic: Rights, Government, Yardsticks, National Interests

The reputation of those countries which cater to the foreign policy interests of other states at the expense of their own national interests will go down regardless of how they explain their actions.

- Vladimir Putin

source: Source: russialist.org

topic: Country, Action, Reputation, National Interests

In some cases, in order to protect global issues some sacrifice for national interest is worth it in the long run. Global warming, these things, they suffer everybody.

- Dalai Lama

topic: Global Issues, National Interests

I also talk about building a wall and oftentimes I'll say, and there's going to be a big beautiful door in that wall and people are going to come into our country because we want people to come in. We want people to come into our country, but we want them to come in legally.

- Donald Trump

source: Source: www.realclearpolitics.com

topic: Beautiful, Country, Wall, National Interests

For the United States, supporting international development is more than just an expression of our compassion. It is a vital investment in the free, prosperous, and peaceful international order that fundamentally serves our national interest.

- Condoleezza Rice

topic: Compassion, Expression, Order, Foreign Aid, National Interests

The capability of negotiating... is something that means you not only have to understand fully what you believe and what your national interests are but in order to be a really good negotiator, you have to try to figure out what the other person on the other side of the table has in mind.

- Madeleine Albright

topic: Believe, Mean, Order, Negotiating, National Interests

I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma: but perhaps there is a key. That key is Russian national interest.

- Winston Churchill

source: Radio broadcast, 1 Oct. 1939

topic: Keys, Russia, Action, National Interests

We are ready to engage in international co-operation against terrorism with a view to safeguarding national interests and regional security and stability.

- Li Peng

topic: Views, Engagement, Terrorism, Safeguarding, National Interests

People in Parliament occupy themselves with private animosities and petty quarrels, and think little of the national interest. It is impossible to credit the serene indifference with which they consider events outside their own country.

- William III of England

topic: Country, Thinking, People, National Interests

Russia is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.

- Winston Churchill

topic: Russia, Mystery, Enigma, National Interests

The corporation was originally conceived as a public institution whose purpose was to serve national interests and advance the public good.

- Joel Bakan

source: Joel Bakan (2005). “The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power”, p.153, Simon and Schuster

topic: Purpose, Corporations, Institutions, Public Good, National Interests

Self-interest and mutual interest are inextricably linked. National interests can best be advanced through collective action, ... Calculate not just the human misery of the poor themselves. Calculate our loss: The aid, the lost opportunity to trade, the short-term consequences of the multiple conflicts; the long-term consequences on the attitude to the wealthy world of injustice and abject deprivation amongst the poor.

- Tony Blair

topic: Attitude, Loss, Opportunity, Mutual Interest, Lost Opportunity

Do not compromise on national security for purely budgetary reasons. The world is dangerous, and we must always be prepared for anything that might threaten our national interests and security.

- Sanford Bishop

topic: Might, World, Compromise, National Interests

The statesman must think in terms of the national interest, conceived as power among other powers. The popular mind, unaware of the fine distinctions of the statesman's thinking, reasons more often than not in the simple moralistic and legalistic terms of absolute good and absolute evil.

- Hans Morgenthau

source: Hans Morgenthau (1955). “Politics Among Nations”

topic: Simple, Thinking, Evil, National Interests

We have made mistakes! We were too late. If we had presented our national interests more clearly from the beginning, the world would still be in balance today.

- Vladimir Putin

source: Source: www.businessinsider.com

topic: Mistake, Balance, World, National Interests

Party is a body of men united, for promoting by their joint endeavours the national interest, upon some particular principle in which they are all agreed.

- Edmund Burke

source: Edmund Burke (1792). “The works of ... Edmund Burke [ed. by W. King and F. Laurence].”, p.498

topic: Party, Men, Body, Man United, National Interests

I am proposing a new foreign policy focused on advancing America's core national interests - so important - promoting regional stability, and producing and easing the tensions within our very troubled world.

- Donald Trump

source: Source: www.rushlimbaugh.com

topic: America, Important, World, National Interests

There was a deliberate decision after the failure of the League of Nations to make the next attempt to establish a global political actor sensitive to geopolitical realities. The underlying idea was to provide major states, defined in 1945 by reference to the winners in the Second World War (now an anachronism), with assurance that they could take part in the UN without jeopardising their national interests. In this regard, the UN has succeeded, as none of the big countries has withdrawn, and the Organisation has managed to achieve virtually universal membership of all sovereign states.

- Richard A. Falk

source: Source: www.counterpunch.org

topic: Country, War, Reality, Anachronism, Geopolitical

Investing in women's lives is an investment in sustainable development, in human rights, in future generations - and consequently in our own long-term national interests.

- Liya Kebede

source: "Let’s Make Mother’s Day a Global Reality" by Liya Kebede, www.huffingtonpost.com. June 7, 2009.

topic: Rights, Long, Generations, National Interests

We really believe our national interests are identical with European interests.

- Gerhard Schroder

topic: Believe, Europe, Interest, National Interests

We must recognize that as the dominant power in the world we have a special responsibility. In addition to protecting our national interests, we must take the leadership in protecting the common interests of humanity.

- George Soros

source: George Soros (2007). “Age of Fallibility: Consequences of the War on Terror”, p.25, PublicAffairs

topic: Leadership, Responsibility, Humanity, Common Interests, National Interests

A wartime Minister of Information is compelled, in the national interest, to such continuous acts of duplicity that even his natural hair must grow to resemble a wig.

- Claud Cockburn

source: Claud Cockburn (1960). “Crossing the Line: Being the Second Volume of Autobiography”, Macgibbon & Kee

topic: Hair, Duplicity, Wigs, Wartime, National Interests

Everybody pursues their national interests. The only one who gets blamed for it is the United States.

- John Bolton

topic: United States, Interest, Pursue, National Interests

I would dodge, not lie, in the national interest.

- Larry Speakes

source: "Speakes Defines His Role In Shaping Events" by Leslie H. Gelb, www.nytimes.com. October 10, 1986.

topic: Lying, Dodge, Interest, National Interests

You have made a very good point: both the Prime Minister [Shindzo Abe] and I enjoy a fairly high level of trust among the citizens of our countries.

- Vladimir Putin

source: Source: www.rt.com

topic: Country, Citizens, Levels, Abe, National Interests

One of the things that we have to change in this country is the idea that people can't disagree without challenging each other's character and patriotism. I have never suggested that Sen. McCain picks his positions on national security based on politics or personal ambition. I have not suggested it because I believe that he genuinely wants to serve America's national interest. Now, it's time for him to acknowledge that I want to do the same. Let me be clear: I will let no one question my love of this country.

- Barack Obama

topic: Country, Believe, Ambition, National Interests

We must surely appear to the world as exactly what we are: a nation that organizes its economy around consuming twice as much oil as it produces, and around the profligate wastefulness of the wars and campaigns required to defend such consumption. In recent years we have defined our national interest largely in terms of the oil fields and pipelines we need to procure fuel.

- Barbara Kingsolver

source: Barbara Kingsolver (2011). “Small Wonder”, p.33, Faber & Faber

topic: War, Years, Oil, Oil Field, Wastefulness

Britain could make her own way in the world, outside the EU, if we chose to do so. So could any other Member State. But the question we will have to ask ourselves is this: is that the very best future for our country? We will have to weigh carefully where our true national interest lies.

- David Cameron

source: "The speech that was the start of the end of David Cameron". www.independent.co.uk. June 24, 2016.

topic: Country, Lying, World, National Interests

By statute, Congress has given the president the authority to suspend immigration - any class of immigration if he deems it in the national interest.

- Ted Cruz

source: Source: time.com

topic: Class, President, Immigration, National Interests

For some reason, our media are fascinated by stories that appear to harm American National interests.

- Bob Tyrrell

topic: Media, Stories, Reason, National Interests

Diplomacy has been exhausted .. Continued instability in the Balkans threatens important U.S. national interests,.

- Tom Daschle

topic: Important, Exhausted, Balkans, Instability, National Interests

Is it in our national interest to overheat the planet? That's the question Obama faces in deciding whether to approve Keystone XL, a 2,000-mile-long pipeline that will bring 500,000 barrels of tar-sand oil from Canada to oil refineries on the Gulf of Mexico.

- Jeff Goodell

topic: Oil, Long, Mexico, Refinery, Gulf Of Mexico

I do here in the most solemn and bitter manner curse the Prime Minister of England for having cumulated all his other betrayals of the national interest and honour, by his last terrible exhibition of dishonour, weakness and gullibility. The depths of infamy which our accurst "love of peace" can lower us are unfathomable.

- Enoch Powell

source: "Like the Roman. The Life of Enoch Powell" by Simon Heffer, (p. 47), 1999.

topic: Betrayal, Depth, Exhibitions, Dishonour, National Interests

Another longstanding foreign policy flaw is the degree to which special interests dictate the way in which the "national interest" as a whole is defined and pursued.... America's important historic relationship with Israel has often led foreign policy decision-makers to defer reflexively to Israeli security assessments, and to replicate Israeli tactics, which, as the war in Lebanon last summer demonstrated, can turn out to be counter-productive.

- Samantha Power

source: Interview with in Molly Lanzarotta, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government, March 14, 2007.

topic: Summer, War, Israel, Last Summer, Decision Makers

If I were a German today, I would be proud, proud but also worried. I would be proud of the magnificent achievement of rebuilding my country, entrenching democracy and assuming the undoubtedly preponderant position in Europe. But a united Germany can't and won't subordinate its national interests in economic or in foreign policy to those of the Community indefinitely. Germany's new pre-eminence is a fact - and its power is a problem - as much for Germans as for the rest of Europe.

- Margaret Thatcher

source: Margaret Thatcher, Iain Dale (1997). “As I said to Denis--: the Margaret Thatcher book of quotations”, Robson Book Ltd

topic: Country, Europe, Achievement, Eminence, National Interests

Our system provides for a winner to take office on January 20th, and he is expected to take command of the ship of state. Failure to do so, characterized by hesitation and indecision, will harm the national interest.

- Richard V. Allen

topic: Office, Ships, January, National Interests

I believe that the teachers unions are doing exactly what they're supposed to be doing. They were designed to be professional organizations that protect the rights and privileges and pay of their members. The problem is that we don't have an organized national interest group with the same heft as the teachers union that's advocating on behalf of children.

- Michelle Rhee

source: Source: www.sfgate.com

topic: Teacher, Children, Believe, Rights And Privileges, Teachers Unions

The notion that the UN is some sort of dispassionate body that, does right and just pursues everybody's best interests is a fantasy. Each individual nation will be pursuing their best interests. That's the normal behavior of nation-states. It shouldn't surprise us, but neither should we go to them for permission to do what's in our national interests.

- Mona Charen

topic: Body, Politics, Normal, National Interests

Talk about national interests: When we went in with Operation Iraqi Freedom, some of our allies, Turkey, for example, would not let us through. How much trouble did that cause us, because we were not able to go into Iraq through Turkey?

- Roger Wicker

topic: Turkeys, Iraq, Allies, National Interests

After everyone has had a chance to bluster, posture, and pontificate, we are left with one basic question: under any foreseeable circumstance, would it be in our national interest to default on our debt? The answer is unequivocally no.

- John Sununu

topic: Debt, Answers, Chance, Bluster, National Interests

Governments do not necessarily act in the national interest, especially when making detailed microeconomic interventions. Instead, they are influenced by interest group pressures. The kinds of interventions that new trade theory suggests can raise national income will typically raise the welfare of small, fortunate groups by large amounts, while imposing costs on larger, more diffuse groups.

- Paul Krugman

topic: Philosophy, Government, Political, Microeconomics, Interest Groups

The U.S. should never get involved where we have no clear national interest. We should not intervene militarily in a country like Syria, where we can’t separate friend from foe and might end up arming the very people who hate us the most.

- Rand Paul

source: FaceBook post by Rand Paul from Jul 19, 2013

topic: Country, Hate, People, National Interests

Look, I don't mind if the President sends a budget which he knows is not going to achieve anything. But when he prefaces his remarks as we just saw by saying we have to put politics aside, posing again as the one person in the country who rises above partisanship and party, speaks for the national interest, it's really grating.

- Charles Krauthammer

source: "Krauthammer: Obama budget 'not a real document'", www.foxnews.com. February 2, 2015.

topic: Country, Party, Mind, Partisanship, National Interests

In a situation where many national leaders do the same thing and look out for national interests, and with an issue like global warming, you're likely to get no solution, so I think you have to have some kind of ethical trump on some of those issues.

- Peter Singer

topic: Thinking, Issues, Leader, National Interests

The United States-Israeli relationship is based on the broadest conception of American national interest in which our two nations are bound forever together by common democratic values and traditions. This will never change.

- Colin Powell

source: McConnell Center Address on U.S. Role in Arab-Israeli Conflict, delivered 19 November 2001

topic: Two Nations, Israel, Forever, Democratic Values, National Interests

Patriotism, red hot, is compatible with the existence of a neglect of national interests, a dishonesty, a cold indifference to the suffering of millions. Patriotism is largely pride, and very largely combativeness. Patriotism generally has a chip on its shoulder.

- Charlotte Perkins Gilman

source: Charlotte Perkins Gilman (2015). “Collected Works of Charlotte Perkins Gilman: Short Stories, Novels, Poems and Essays: The Yellow Wallpaper, What Diantha Did, Women and Economics, The Crux, Moving the Mountain, Herland and other works from the prominent American feminist, sociologist and novelist”, p.454, e-artnow

topic: Pride, Suffering, Hot, Red Hot, National Interests

What remains constant for me, during the last 15 years, has been the conviction that the cold war was a calamity for the entire world, and that it can be justified by no consideration of theory, nor by any supposed national interest.

- Earl Browder

topic: War, Years, World, National Interests

You have, at the same time, placed your confidence in me, and in my ability to render a free, fair judgment - to uphold the Constitution and my oath of office - and to reject any kind of religious pressure or obligation that might directly or indirectly interfere with my conduct of the Presidency in the national interest.

- John F. Kennedy

source: "To the New Frontier". www.cnn.com. July 25, 1960.

topic: Religious, Oath Of Office, Religion, National Interests