88 Quotes by Robert M. Gates

What I know concerns me. What I don't know concerns me even more. What people aren't telling me worries me the most.

I'm a big advocate of drones.

There will be boots on the ground if there’s to be any hope of success in the strategy.

What I know concerns me. What I don’t know concerns me even more. What people aren’t telling me worries me the most.

Well, I’ve ruffled a few feathers at all the institutions I’ve led. But I think that’s part of leadership.

I have tried to maintain civil relationships with everyone I meet – and, even if I violently disagree with them, try to be respectful.

No president is well-served by groupthink or by everybody singing from the same sheet of music they think he’s on.

We should never lose sight of the ethos that has made the Marine Corps – where ‘every Marine is a rifleman’ – one of America’s cherished institutions and one of the world’s most feared and respected fighting forces.

Some people have said, in so many words, that I’m kind of wooly-headed in believing that the Iranians would see not having nuclear weapons as more in their security interest than not.