Romney: It's Hard to Name a Country That Has More Respect For Us Under Obama

Katie Pavlich | March 26, 2014 8:30 AM

Appearing Tuesday night on with Fox News' Sean Hannity, former presidential candidate and Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney analyzed the current stand-off with Russia and America's standing in the world under President Obama's leadership.

"It's hard to name a single country that holds America in more esteem and respect than when the President took office five years ago. It has not been a time of building America's respect and admiration and esteem and frankly our soft power or our hard power around the world and the President has to account for that. I think ultimately the historians will," Romney said. "We need a President that understands that not everybody around the world has the same interests. Some people around the world want to oppress other people and expand territory and take from the resources of other people, that's what's happening. The Jihadists want to do that, clearly Russia is intent on doing that and there are others as well."

Romney also said President Obama should have seen the problems with Ukraine coming before major moves by the Russians were made to secure sovereign territory.

"The real reason that we choose someone to be a leader is because we believe they have the capacity to see down the road further than we might, or they actually have the capacity to get something done that we might not be able to do, a doer if you will, and part of being the leader of the free world is the capacity to see what might happen in the future and to take action to shape the future," Romney said. "With regards to Ukraine, the President should have been able to see this coming. I'm sure many advisers told him that Russia might try and grab a piece of Ukraine."

During the 2012 presidential election, Romney warned Russian President Vladimir Putin was a problem and told Obama during a debate he would not look at the situation with Russia through "rose colored glasses" and said the country posed a major geopolitical threat to the United States and the world. He was right.