If we had stayed a little more engaged, I think maybe it might have been prevented, i've always believed United States played the role of honest broker between all the groups and when we pulled ourselves out, we lost that role. Ray Odierno More Quotes by Ray Odierno More Quotes From Ray Odierno I believed at the time we could do that, but I said we were on the razor’s edge that we could actually do our mission at 450. Ray Odierno politics It's frustrating to watch it, i go back to the work we did in 2007, 2008, 2009, and 2010 and we got it to a place that was really good. Violence was low, the economy was growing, politics looked like it was heading in the right direction. Ray Odierno politics When we go to 450, we are going to have to stop doing something. Ray Odierno politics I think it would have been good for us to stay. Ray Odierno politics In my mind, we don't have the ability to deter. The reason we have a military is to deter conflict and prevent wars. And if people believe we are not big enough to respond, they miscalculate. Ray Odierno politics I think we have to be careful about over-arming ourselves, and I'm not talking about where you end up attacking each other. Ray Odierno politics First off, we have to figure out what happened, and then we will have to decide will [arming more soldiers] make a difference. Ray Odierno politics We don't want to overreact, but we have to do more quickly. Ray Odierno politics
