Military Quotes

Leave the Artillerymen alone, they are an obstinate lot.

Reconnaissance memoranda should always be written in the simplest style and be purely descriptive. They should never stray from their objective by introducing extraneous ideas.

Great events ever depend but upon a single hair. The adroit man profits by everything, neglects nothing which can increase his chances; the less adroit, by sometimes disregarding a single chance, fails in everything.

Conscription is the vitality of a nation, the purification of its morality, and the real foundations of all its habits.

The best generals are those who have served in the artillery.

It is not enough to give orders they must be obeyed.

A military maxim, which ought never to be neglected, is to assemble your cantonments at the point which is most remote and best sheltered from the enemy, especially when he makes his appearance unexpectedly. You will then have time to unite the whole army before he can attack you.

Infantry, cavalry and artillery cannot dispense with each other. They ought to be quartered in such a manner as always to be able to support each other in case of surprise.

The effect of discussions, making a show of talent, and calling councils of war will be what the effect of these things has been in every age: they will end in the adoption of the most pusillanimous or (if the expression be preferred) the most prudent measures, which in war are almost uniformly the worst that can be adopted.True wisdom, so far as a general is concerned, consists in energetic determination.

Read over and over again the campaigns of Alexander, Hannibal, Caesar, Gustavus, Turenne, Eugene and Frederic. Make them your models. This is the only way to become a great general and to master the secrets of the art of war. With your own genius enlightened by this study, you will reject all maxims opposed to those of these great commanders.

A general-in-chief should never allow any rest either to the conquerors or to the conquered.

Timid and cowardly soldiers cause the loss of a nation's independence; but pusillanimous magistrates destroy the empire of the laws, the rights of the throne, and even social order itself.

Prussia was hatched from a cannon-ball.

We know that Germany and Japan are conducting their military and naval operations with a joint plan. Germany and Italy consider themselves at war with the United States without even bothering about a formal declaration.

If Great Britain goes down, the Axis powers will be in a position to bring enormous military and naval resources against this hemisphere.

I started to make a study of the art of war and revolution and, whilst abroad, underwent a course in military training. If there was to be guerrilla warfare, I wanted to be able to stand and fight with my people and to share the hazards of war with them.

A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.

There are many people in England, and perhaps elsewhere, who seem to be unable to contemplate military operations for clear political objects, unless they can cajole themselves into the belief that their enemy are utterly and hopelessly vile.

The Navy can lose us the war, but only the Air Force can win it. Therefore our supreme effort must be to gain overwhelming mastery in the Air. In no other way at present visible can we hope to overcome the immense military power of Germany.

It seems to me that the moment has come when the question of bombing of German cities simply for the sake of increasing the terror, though under other pretexts, should be reviewed...I feel the need for more precise concentration upon military objectives, such as oil and communications behind the immediate battle-zone, rather than on mere acts of terror and wanton destruction, however impressive.