Military Quotes

500+ Sourced quotes

I wonder is it because men are cowards in heart that they admire bravery so much, and place military valor so far beyond every other quality for reward and worship.

William Makepeace Thackeray

American imperialism has suffered a stunning defeat in Indochina. But the same forces are engaged In another war against a much less resilient enemy, the American people. Here, the prospects for success are much greater. The battleground is ideological, not military. At stake are the lessons to be drawn from the American war in Indochina; the outcome will determine the course and character of new imperial ventures.

It's frustrating sometimes to see the mismatch in resources between the pointless and the urgent, isn't it. Like the gap between the vast resources poured into military technological research to make war more sophisticated, and the trickle that goes into developing techniques that might prevent war instead.

Our Republic is not a pastoral, not a military, not an agricultural, not a nomadic, not a clerical, but a business civilization. Nor is there anything random, casual or accidental about the United States as a business society. It is thoroughly well integrated - organized from top to bottom for the maximum efficiency of commerce and industry, for the maximum efficiency of making money.

Margaret Halsey

It is no coincidence that when the thugs tried to wrest control over Grenada, there were 30 Soviet advisors and hundreds of Cuban military and paramilitary forces on the island.

Peace is a condition in which no civilian pays any attention to military casualties which do not achieve a page one lead story unless that civilian is a close relative of one of the casualties. But, if there ever was a time in history when peace meant that there was no fighting going on, I have been unable to find out about it.

Robert A. Heinlein

You cannot prevent a major catastrophe, but you can build an organization that is battle-ready, where people trust one another. In military training, the first rule is to instill soldiers with trust in their officers - because without trust, they won't fight.

The world is becoming an immense military base, and that base is becoming a mental hospital the size of the world. Inside the nuthouse, which ones are crazy?

Eduardo Galeano

A free government with an uncontrolled power of military conscription is the most ridiculous and abominable contradiction and nonsense that ever entered into the heads of men.

Commercial conquest is far more thorough and final than military defeat.

".hitting the target", for centuries the principal military skill, is henceforth to be left to the law of averages.

All sciences are considered by their professors as equally significant; by the politicians, as equally incomprehensible; and by the military as equally expensive.

I have always considered Saipan the decisive battle of the Pacific offensive...(it was) the naval and military heart and brain of the Japanese defence strategy.

If you only would!" He added rather diffidently: "If you would not mind remembering that I am a military court of inquiry. It makes it easier for me to report to the general if you say things dully and in the order that they happened.

Ford Madox Ford

As far as military necessity will permit, religiously respect the constitutional rights of all.

George B. McClellan

Heroism, or military glory, is much admired by the generality of mankind. They consider it as the most sublime kind of merit. Menof cool reflection are not so sanguine in their praises of it.

In the military I could exercise the power of being automatically respected because of the medals on my chest, not because I had done anything right at the moment to earn that respect. This is pretty nice. It's also a psychological trap that can stop one's growth and allow one to get away with just plain bad behavior.

To engage in war is always to pick a wild card. And war must always be the last resort, not a first choice. I truly must question the judgment of any president who can say that a massive, unprovoked military attack on a nation which is over fifty percent children is 'in the highest moral traditions of our country.'

The thing about people who are truly and malignantly crazy: their real genius is for making the people around them think they themselves are crazy. In military science this is called Psy-Ops, for your info.

Athens' biggest worry was the sheer recklessness of its own democratic government. A simple majority of the citizenry, urged on and incensed by clever demagogues, might capriciously send out military forces in unnecessary and exhausting adventures.

Victor Davis Hanson

Of all the statist violations of individual rights in a mixed economy, the military draft is the worst. It is an abrogation of rights. It negates man's fundamental right-the right to life-and establishes the fundamental principle of statism: that a man's life belongs to the state, and the state may claim it by compelling him to sacrifice it in battle. Once that principle is accepted, the rest is only a matter of time.

The progress of manufactures and commerce insensibly collects a large multitude within the walls of a city: but these citizens are no longer soldiers; and the arts which adorn and improve the state of civil society, corrupt the habits of the military life.

One topic that has only recently begun to attract attention is the Nazi anti-tobacco movement. Germany had the world's strongest anti-smoking movement in the 1930s and early 1940s, supported by Nazi medical and military leaders worried that tobacco might prove a hazard to the race. Many Nazi leaders were vocal opponents of smoking. Anti-tobacco activists pointed out that whereas Churchill, Stalin, and Roosevelt were all fond of tobacco, the three major fascist leaders of Europe -- Hitler, Mussolini, and Franco -- were all non-smokers

Robert N. Proctor

You must all be aware that modern war is not a mere matter of military operations. It involves the whole strength and all the resources of the nation. Not only soldiers, but also all citizens without exception, take part.

Chiang Kai-shek

I am an opponent of war and of war preparations and an opponent of universal military training and conscription; but entirely apart from that issue, I hold that segregation in any part of the body politic is an act of slavery and an act of war.