Quotes About Warfare

The Fore and Aft had enjoyed unbroken peace for five days, and were beginning, in spite of dysentery, to recover their nerve. But they were not happy, for they did not know the work in hand, and had they known, would not have known how to do it. Throughout those five days in which old soldiers might have taught them the craft of the game, they discussed together their misadventures in the past — how such an one was alive at dawn and dead ere the dusk

Fifty million Arabs in seven neighboring Arab states, five regular Arab armies, a million Arabs in Palestine—against 650,000 Jews.

He sat perfectly still, studying his hands in his lap. "I know it is a stupid idea to design a weapon that will refuse to kill," he said. "But maybe I could make the killing not so much fun.

How many victims, how much blood and suffering, are connected with this business of borders! There is no end to the cemeteries of those who have been killed the world over in the defense of borders. Equally boundless are the cemeteries of the audacious who attempted to expand their borders. It is safe to assume that half of those who have ever walked upon our planet and lost their lives in the field of glory gave up the ghost in battles begun over a question of borders.

Here we come upon a terrible facet of ethically asymmetric warfare: when your enemy has no scruples, your own scruples become another weapon in his hand.

WHICH way should the balance swing? Assuming that we want to maintain a coherent ethical position on these matters, this appears to be a circumstance of forced choice: if we are willing to drop bombs, or even risk that pistol rounds might go astray, we should be willing to torture a certain class of criminal suspects and military prisoners; if we are unwilling to torture, we should be unwilling to wage modern war.

Nothing is so contrary to military rules as to make the strength of your army known, either in the orders of the day, in proclamations, or in the newspapers.

In warfare, first lay plans which will ensure victory, and then lead your army to battle; if you will not begin with stratagem but rely on brute strength alone, victory will no longer be assured.

The atom bomb was no great decision. It was merely another powerful weapon in the arsenal of righteousness.

If their forces are substantial, prepare for them; if their forces are strong, avoid them.

Guerrilla wars, and even more so terrorist assaults, are conducted only by forces with insufficient strength to carry out a real war.

The British were indeed very far superior to the Americans in every respect necessary to military operations, except the revivified courage and resolution, the result of sudden success after despair.

Nothing except a battle lost can be half so melancholy as a battle won.

The conventional army loses if it does not win. The guerrilla wins if he does not lose.

Flying through an army, sire," said Athos, "in all countries in the world is called charging.

Treville understood admirably well the warfare of that period, when, if you did not live at the enemy's expense, you lived at the expense of your compatriots: his soldiers formed a legion of daredevils, undisciplined for anyone else but him.

Poi, gettando un ultimo sguardo su quel bel giovane di venticinque anni appena, che egli lasciava a giacere lì, privo di sentimenti, e forse morto, sospirò sullo strano destino che induce gli uomini a distruggersi gli uni con gli altri nell'interesse di persone estranee, le quali spesso ignorano, di quei loro paladini, perfino l'esistenza.

A government which should only be able to crush its enemies upon a field of battle would very soon be destroyed.

Weapons are kept from women, but such a naming suggests that perhaps men fear our talents in war as well as our desire for peace.

How peculiar it feels to speak about health care in America taking care of people's health while our government bombs the limbs off children in faraway lands. And starves and imprisons not a few of them at home. How odd that it seems not obviously known that true health care must mean, at minimum, deliberate non-harming of anyone?

Woman is the confusion of man, an insatiable beast, a continuous anxiety, an incessant warfare, a daily ruin, a house of tempest and a hindrance to devotion," fulminated the misogynistic Vincent de Beauvais in the thirteenth century.

GUNPOWDER, n. An agency employed by civilized nations for the settlement of disputes which might become troublesome if left unadjusted. By most writers the invention of gunpowder is ascribed to the Chinese, but not upon very convincing evidence. Milton says it was invented by the devil to dispel angels with, and this opinion seems to derive some support from the scarcity of angels.

PROJECTILE, n. The final arbiter in international disputes. Formerly these disputes were settled by physical contact of the disputants, with such simple arguments as the rudimentary logic of the times could supply—the sword, the spear, and so forth. With the growth of prudence in military affairs the projectile came more and more into favor, and is now held in high esteem by the most courageous. Its capital defect is that it requires personal attendance at the point of propulsion.

VALOR, n. A soldierly compound of vanity, duty and the gambler's hope.