The French president and I cooperate well — that does not mean it cancels out the conflicts of interest that we have had over the last 50 or 60 years but what counts for me is the atmosphere in which we find solutions

No matter what the aggressor intends to do, when the world is truly united, it is then the world, not the aggressor, determines how events develop.

So the 20th century taught the world not to use nuclear weapons and not to proliferate. This is not a good strategy because recent history has shown that wars could erupt with equal devastation.

[Angela Merkel] showed what can be achieved when politicians take the right course of action and work to find solutions to the world’s challenges rather than simply shift responsibility to others.

On composure

To fear the world we have organized and led for three-quarters of a century, to abandon the ideals we have advanced around the globe, to refuse the obligations of international leadership and our duty to remain ‘the last best hope of Earth’ for the sake of some half-baked, spurious nationalism cooked up by people who would rather find scapegoats than solve problems is as unpatriotic as an attachment to any other tired dogma of the past that Americans consigned to the ash heap of history.

It is impossible to put up forever with this boorishness toward our country.

We must actively look for measures to secure our military’s own forces to deter and effectively deal with North Korea’s nuclear threats.

Whoever believes the problems of this world can be solved by isolationism and protectionism is making a tremendous error.