7 years ago

(CNN) – Rep. Ron Paul, who has long espoused a non-interventionist foreign policy, said Sunday that President Barack Obama’s apology for the burning of Qurans in Afghanistan was indicative of a larger problem with America’s foreign policy.

Speaking from Alaska, where the Texas congressman is campaigning for votes ahead of Super Tuesday, Paul said America shouldn’t be engaged in conflicts that require the president to apologize for troops’ missteps.



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“We should change our policy, so if we have a policy going on in the Middle East that is begging that we apologize now and then, and others condemning it because they don't think we should apologize, I think we should reassess our foreign policy,” Paul said to CNN Chief Political Correspondent on “State of the Union.”

Paul described Republicans who condemned Obama for apologizing for the burning as “a little over the top,” saying the very act of invading Afghanistan was deserving of an apology from the American president.

“I’m personally more apologetic for invading countries who never did anything to us and occupying it, disrupting it, causing thousands of deaths of our own people and causing hundreds of thousands of refugees,” Paul said. “This is the thing that I feel sad about, what about the pictures of torture? Weren't they every bit as bad? I mean this is what incites the hatred.”

As for Iran, Paul said the United States should follow the pattern of the Cold War.

“You know, it doesn't make any sense to bomb a country that is no threat to anybody just because they might get a weapon,” Paul said. “Containment worked pretty well with the Soviets, and they were rather ruthless people, killing millions and millions of their own people, and we stood them down in the Cold War. So I'd try to calm it down a little bit, but, quite frankly, I don't think we should tell Israel what they should do or shouldn't do.”

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