Ben Rhodes

And I actually don't think and if I fault my administration, we tried to rein it in and bring some of the troops home and follow the law more to the letter.

I think it's time to just say we need to just stop doing this.

And guess what?

We would save, you know.

tens and tens of billions of dollars.

We could focus on other things.

And if people say, well, Ben, what about the terrorist threat?

You know what?

I think we can deal with it without fighting wars.

Like 9-11 happened.

You and I are New Yorkers.

It was horrible.

I witnessed 9-11.

I started this career because of it.

I think we can prevent a catastrophic attack like that without having this sprawling edifice that defines our foreign policy and keeps getting us into these wars.

Yeah.

And look, occasionally, I'm sure there might be some terrorist training camp that raises sufficient alarm bells that you might have to do something.

I'm not suggesting that we're in a world of pacifism.

I am suggesting, though, that the legal authorization...

The authorization to use military force for all these counterterrorism activities is still in place from 2002.