Leon Panetta

The longer you delay, the longer you avoid trying to assign some assistance there, the more dangerous these groups become and the greater the instability that develops here.

I urge you to do whatever you can to try to avoid this threat to our national defense.

If we have to reduce the budget, as we do, $487 billion, I can get that done pursuant to a strategy that protects the strongest military on Earth.

The U.S. military's alert posture is based on specific and credible intelligence.

We are working with the State Department and that's why we came up with this almost 1,000 more marines.

The U.S. Ambassador is the senior U.S. Government authority for the evacuation.

I think the problem was that it was very difficult to try to find out exactly--when you say the Iraqi position, what exactly the Iraqi position was at that point.

I have made that clear time and time again.

Europe is our security partner of choice for military operations and diplomacy around the world.

I think they are very nervous about having a democracy on their border.

Our nation was built on the premise of the citizen soldier. In our democracy, I believe it is the responsibility of every citizen to protect the nation.

the United States is ready to deal with it.

you can't have a huge infrastructure supporting a reduced force.

Leon Panetta, the defense secretary, said there were probably about seven to eight Americans, but I have to say, you know, throughout the day, the numbers on all of this, where they are, who might be injured or any other condition is not…

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta is calling it a terrorist attack.

Leon Panetta actually took my face in his hands like this and he says, trust me. I will tell you what happened.

As we determined the details of what took place there and how that attack took place, that it became clear that there were terrorists who had planned that attack.

I cannot, as secretary, send a signal to the SEALs who conduct those operations, oh, you can conduct these operations and then go out and write a book about it and -- or sell your story to 'The New York Times.' How can we run sensitive…

the forces in the future are going to have to be geographically distributed, operationally resilient, and politically sustainable

I would say if -- if you want to be able to protect yourself and your family, you'd better get the hell out now.

I'm sure that deep down Assad knows he's in trouble and it's just a matter of time before he has to go.

sequestration would be "catastrophic" to our military and result in the loss of 1.5 million jobs

Secretary Panetta has put great emphasis on dealing with the problem of sexual assault in the military.

I think they're very receptive of the strategy that we're proposing and are enthusiastic, certainly about our engagement in the region.

Sequestration would do this. It could have serious effects on our readiness and disrupt essential programs and contracts.