Quotes About Warfare

We humans are a frightening animal. Throughout our species existence, we have used each new technology we have developed to boost the destructive power of our ancient predisposition for killing members of our own species.

The evidence of history is that no advance which can be applied to the killing of other human beings goes unused.

Systematic rape is one of the most hideous, and most explicitly male, expressions of warfare, but it is hardly the only one. All wars are extraordinarily costly in material terms and grotesquely painful in human terms. Yet wars are so much a part of the human experience that we don't always pause to realize that one of the most astonishing aspects of war is the very fact that we so regularly go out and deliberately kill members of our own species.

Abandoned weapons and corpses may be washed away, removed by animals, dismembered by the victors as trophies, or buried, burned, or otherwise disposed of by the vanquished after defeat. It is reasonable to expect that direct archaeological evidence of warfare will be limited, and that it will actually tend to underestimate the frequency and bloody nature of past conflicts.

A top World War II ace once said that fighter pilots fall into two broad categories: those who go out to kill and those who, secretly, desperately, know they are going to get killed-the hunters and the hunted.

The aggressive spirit, the offensive, is the chief thing everywhere in war, and the air is no exception.

Despise the enemy strategically, but take him seriously tactically.

The muster roll for the 1300 campaign noted that Hugh fitz Heyr, a Shropshire landowner of little consequence, was obliged by the terms of his tenure to serve in the king's war 'with bow and arrow'. It also noted that 'as soon as he saw the enemy he shot his arrow, then went home'.

When Charlemagne began his long campaign against the Saxons in 772, he destroyed

Once he had recovered, Eadwine had retaliated by leading an army into Wessex and laying it to waste,

the building of bridges and the defence of fortresses against enemies when necessary'.

When it comes to Æthelbald's other priority – 'the defence of fortresses against enemies

The Danish conqueror had breathed his last on 3 February 1014,

In 844 they sailed up the River Garonne, one of the great arteries of Francia,

Alfred responded to the invasion by summoning an army

A crucial difference between Æthelred and Alfred, however, is that Alfred fought against his enemies in person.

The attackers rounded off their successful mission by destroying the viking fleet,

twenty years since the arrival of the great heathen army that had destroyed three of the four Anglo-Saxon kingdoms.

In 686 Cædwalla invaded the Isle of Wight,

With both Cynewulf and Cyneheard dead, and many of their men with them,

Alfred had returned with one purpose – to confront and destroy the Danes who were occupying his kingdom

The conquest of the Isle of Wight,

Alfred's luck could not last forever, and in 875 the viking attack on Wessex was resumed.

and a fierce battle ensued.