Quotes By Madeleine Albright

I didn't want to set up a women's studies program. I thought women should learn to operate in a coeducational atmosphere, because, especially in national security and international affairs, it's male-dominated.

It took me quite a long time to develop a voice, and now that I have it, I am not going to be silent.

I was a little girl in World War II and I'm used to being freed by Americans.

Because of my parents' love of democracy, we came to America after being driven twice from our home in Czechoslovakia - first by Hitler and then by Stalin.

The best book, like the best speech, will do it all - make us laugh, think, cry and cheer - preferably in that order.

I can't imagine what it is like to be raised in a society where their only statues that exist are to you and your father.

I do believe that in order to be a successful negotiator that as a diplomat, you have to be able to put yourself into the other person's shoes. Unless you can understand what is motivating them, you are never going to be able to figure out how to solve a particular problem.

People are finding it harder and harder to relate to foreign policy.

I really think that there was a great advantage in many ways to being a woman. I think we are a lot better at personal relationships, and then have the capability obviously of telling it like it is when it's necessary.

Life is grim, and we don't have to be grim all the time.

The greatest thrill in my life was to represent the United States of America.

I have to tell you, my seven-year-old granddaughter said to my daughter, her mother, 'So what's the big deal about Grandma Maddy having been Secretary of State? Only girls are Secretaries of State.' Most of her lifetime, it's true. But at the time it really was a big deal.

Saddam's goal is to achieve the lifting of U.N. sanctions while retaining and enhancing Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs. We cannot, we must not and we will not let him succeed.

But I do not believe that the world would be entirely different if there were more women leaders. Maybe if everybody in leadership was a woman, you might not get into the conflicts in the first place. But if you watch the women who have made it to the top, they haven't exactly been non-aggressive - including me.

I enjoy wearing pins, and nobody tells me to do it.

Well I do think, when there are more women, that the tone of the conversation changes, and also the goals of the conversation change. But it doesn't mean that the whole world would be a lot better if it were totally run by women. If you think that, you've forgotten high school.

It's one thing to be religious, but it's another thing to make religion your policy.

I spent my life studying communism and Soviet systems.

I've never seen America as an imperialist or colonialist or meddling country.

My mind-set is Munich. Most of my generation's is Vietnam.

I saw what happened when a dictator was allowed to take over a piece of a country and the country went down the tubes. And I saw the opposite during the war when America joined the fight.

I am often asked if, when I was secretary, I had problems with foreign men. That is not who I had problems with, because I arrived in a very large plane that said United States of America. I had more problems with the men in our own government.

I hope I'm wrong, but I am afraid that Iraq is going to turn out to be the greatest disaster in American foreign policy - worse than Vietnam, not in the number who died, but in terms of its unintended consequences and its reverberation throughout the region.

The difference between humans and other mammals is that we know how to accessorize.

To understand Europe, you have to be a genius - or French.

I have always thought of myself as a Czechoslovak Catholic.

If you look at my life, generally, I've been put in situations which were difficult and which I conquered.

I did go to Wellesley, a women's college. And I am of a kind of strange generation which is transitional in terms of women who wanted to go out and get jobs.

I have had fun being who I became, so to speak.

It's important that we invest in America - literally. The terrorists wanted to destroy our economy, and we can't let our system fall apart. We also have to invest in one another.