"I considered our British comrades to rank with the finest men and women of any armed service in the ..." — David Petraeus

The idea is to go to bed every night with fewer enemies than you had in the morning.

Leadership is an individual sport, one that has to be fine-tuned to each of the people that reports to you. Leaders also need to provide the direction, energy, encouragement and inspiration for each person who reports directly to the leader as well as for the overall organization.

You have to keep on disrupting. If you let up the pressure, then al-Qaeda senior leadership will come back.

In many... cases, of course, the Arab Spring has brought about instability rather than greater stability. And rather than bringing about government that is more representative and more responsive to the people, you're seeing, frankly, the opposite, or you're seeing all-out war.