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" The foremost threat to Iraq's long-term stability and the broader regional equilibrium is not the Islamic State, it is Shiite militias, many backed by - and some guided by - Iran. "

David Petraeus

Long-Term

Some

Threat

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" We will win again in Iraq; I do think that Iraq can definitely be handled. I think that it can be kept intact. "

" During the surge and in the years after the surge, Iraqi forces fought and died for their country at vastly higher numbers than did U.S. and coalition forces. We know that they can fight. "

" The truth is that a number of us have been saying for quite some time that it was only a matter of time until someone went to a gun show, bought a military-like semi-automatic assault weapon with a large capacity magazine, and did enormous damage. "

" The bottom line is, you really have to commit to something if you're going to be successful in it. "

" I'm living the dream. "

David Petraeus

Living

Dream

" Central to achieving progress in Afghanistan - and to setting the conditions necessary to transition security tasks from the international community to the Afghan government - is increasing the size and capability of ANSF. "

" There is no question that the Islamic State will be defeated in Mosul; the real question is what comes afterward. Can the post-Islamic State effort resolve the squabbling likely to arise over numerous issues and bring lasting stability to one of Iraq's most diverse and challenging provinces? Failure to do so could lead to ISIS 3.0. "

" We periodically note that there are no silver bullets, there are no magic formulas, there's no single action or component of the overall... comprehensive civil-military approach. "

" Folks really need to be very cautious about overanalyzing or overparsing what I've said to this reporter or that reporter. "

" In many... cases, of course, the Arab Spring has brought about instability rather than greater stability. And rather than bringing about government that is more representative and more responsive to the people, you're seeing, frankly, the opposite, or you're seeing all-out war. "

" I do talk to individuals still in the business of tracking individuals in the homeland and abroad. A lot of them have felt that they were hanging on by their fingernails a bit in terms of tracking all the potential threats out there. "

" This is actually true of the overall fight against al-Qaeda and trans-national extremists, that as you put pressure on them in one location, they'll seek safe haven sanctuaries in other areas. So you do have to continue to pursue them. But they have less capability. "

" You have to keep on disrupting. If you let up the pressure, then al-Qaeda senior leadership will come back. "

" Ungoverned spaces in the Islamic world will be exploited by people who wish us ill. They will not be contained. "

David Petraeus

People

Wish

" There were very few people who were both intercollegiate athletes and Star Men. "

" The formulation of sound national policy requires finding the right overarching concepts. "

" Being in combat is not unending high-five moments. "

" Committing to a particular goal publicly puts pressure on oneself. It becomes an enormous action-forcing mechanism and often helps you achieve more than you might have had you kept your goals to yourself. "

" We're all outriders out there, and what we have is all these large number of tasks - that's the herd; that's all the cattle - a whole bunch of individual, hundreds if not thousands of projects at any given time ongoing that we're trying to complete. So we're trying to keep the cattle herd, keep it all just going in the right direction. "

" I don't comment directly on actions or statements of candidates. "

" In the 101st Airborne Division headquarters in Mosul, we had a sign on the wall. It was a question that we would ask ourselves before every new operation or policy initiative. It asked: Will this policy or operation take more bad guys off the streets than it creates by its conduct? "

" Like a nuclear disaster, the fallout from the meltdown of Syria threatens to be with us for decades, and the longer it is permitted to continue, the more severe the damage will be. "

David Petraeus

" As you will recall, soon after the 9/11 attacks, an international coalition led by the United States conducted an impressive campaign to defeat the Taliban, al Qaeda, and other associated extremist groups in Afghanistan. "

" Proud parents document the arrival and growth of their future CIA officer in all forms of social media that the world can access for decades to come. "

" We cannot kill or capture our way out of an industrial-strength insurgency. "

" Leaders of the various Iraqi elements will likely have their own militias, and there will be endless rounds of brinkmanship on the road to post-Islamic State boundaries, governing structures, and distribution of power and resources. "

" Well, the oil, the oil spot, if you will, is a, is a term in counterinsurgency literature that connotes a peaceful area, secure area. So what you're trying to do is to always extend that, to push that out. "

" There is not a military commander alive today who is genetically predisposed to say that he has enough ISR and assets, and particularly not in the Central Command theater. "

" The fact is that Iran doesn't want to see the Taliban come back any more than do most Afghan citizens. "

" If you look at casualties, you find countries that had much higher loss rates per capita than the US. Denmark comes to mind, the United Kingdom, they have suffered heavy losses at various points, the Germans as well. "