Quotes About Warfare

when merchants and traders begin to run wars – hundreds of lives depend on bribes.

Glokta felt his hand bunching into a fist on the parapet. 'We must make the Gurkish pay for every stride of ground.' We must make them pay for my ruined leg. 'For every inch of dirt.' For my missing teeth. 'For every meagre shack, and crumbling hut, and worthless stretch of dust.' For my weeping eye, and my twisted back, and my repulsive shadow of a life. He licked at his empty gums. 'Make them pay.

Dogman and Dow, Tul and Grim, West and Pike. Six of them, stood in a circle and looking down at two piles of cold earth. Below in the valley, the Union were busy burying their own dead, Dogman had seen it. Hundreds of 'em, in pits for a dozen each. It was a bad day for men, all in all, and a good one for the ground. Always the way, after a battle. Only the ground wins. Shivers

A name to fill strong men with fear or courage, depending on which side they stand.

On the battlefield there are no rules.

Strange, to lock men up for thieving when the whole army lived on robbery. To dangle men for murder when they were all at the business of killing. What makes a crime in a time when men take what they please from who they please?

Few things indeed,' mused Pike, 'seem to have so much appeal before, and so little after, as a battle.

It was a bad day for men, all in all, and a good one for the ground. Always the way, after a battle. Only the ground wins.

I fought on horseback often enough. Charged small bodies of infantry, broke and pursued them. A noble business, cutting men down as they run, I earned all kinds of praise for it.

The ground must be a general's best friend, or it becomes his worst enemy.

Every war carries within it the seeds of the next.

Chief without soldiers is just a very lonely man in a big bloody field

Naturally, as soldiers, you all are prone to be sentimental about warfare. But fighting is only any use when it's cheaper than the alternatives.

Then, I would guess, they are largely, if not entirely, expended. So it always is with mercenaries. Easily hired, even more easily discharged and never missed once they are gone.

Last Argument of Kings." Inscribed on his cannons by Louis XIV

Hundreds of men, struggling and dying by the hellish glare of burning torches, of burning missiles, of burning houses. Friendly could hardly believe it was real. It all looked, false, fake, a model staged for a lurid painting. "The breach at Visserine." he whispered to himself, framing the scene with his hands and imagining it hanging on some rich man's wall.

No plan survives contact with the enemy." Helmuth von Moltke

There's only one kind of good news, and that's dead enemies.

The general with the smallest numbers should remain always on the offensive.

As with so many things in life, heroic last stands are a great deal more appealing in concept than in reality.

In bloody days, swords were worth more than gods. They certainly had 'em outnumbered.

He'd never been one for war cries. Why tell your enemy where you are? They'll learn soon enough. Surprise, that's the key. Whether you're fighting one man or a thousand or ten thousand. The more you're fighting, the more important it becomes, 'cause shock spreads faster'n plague, faster'n fire, and turns the bravest into cowards. So he rushed up silent as winter, silent as sickness.

Once you set your mind on killing, it is hard to choose the number of the dead.

Once the killing starts, it rarely sticks to those who deserve it