Rejecting the Politics of Fear

One can be excused for wondering what is happening when a
democracy has to rely on military leaders for cautious, professional,
unemotional judgment about foreign policy…I don’t think these remarks require
any interpretation.

General William Fallon, Centcom commander, referring to Iran:

• "I expect that there will be no war and that is what we ought to be working for….We ought to try and to do our utmost to create different conditions." source
• "We have to figure out a way to come to an arrangement with them…" source
• “There has got to be some combination of strength and willingness to engage. How to come up with the right combination of that is the real trick.”
• “Getting Iranian behaviour to change and finding ways to get them to come to their senses and do that is the real objective. Attacking them as a means to get to that spot strikes me as being not the first choice in my book.” source
  

General George Casey, Army Chief of Staff:

• "We are consumed with meeting the demands of the current fight and are unable to provide ready forces as rapidly as necessary for other potential contingencies." source

Defense Secretary Robert Gates:

• "The challenges we face in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere are fundamentally political, economic and cultural in nature, and are not going to be overcome by military means alone." source