War Quotes

You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than live as slaves.

You were given the choice between war and dishonor. You chose dishonor and you will have war.

When you feel you cannot continue in your position for another minute, and all that is in human power has been done, that is the moment when the enemy is most exhausted, and when one step forward will give you the fruits of the struggle you have borne.

Building slow destroyers ! One might as well breed slow race horses.

I do not hold that we should rearm in order to fight. I hold that we should rearm in order to parley.

In wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies.

This truth may be unfashionable, unpalatable, no doubt unpopular, but, if it is the truth, the story of mankind shows that war was universal and unceasing for millions of years before armaments were invented or armies organized. Indeed, the lucid intervals of peace and order only occurred in human history after armaments in the hands of strong governments have come into being, and civilization in every age has been nursed only in cradles guarded by superior weapons and superior discipline.

Sure I am of this, that you have only to endure to conquer. You have only to persevere to save yourselves, and to save all those who rely upon you. You have only to go right on, and at the end of the road, be it short or long, victory and honor will be found.

Wars are not won by evacuations.

Never, never, never believe any war will be smooth and easy, or that anyone who embarks on the strange voyage can measure the tides and hurricanes he will encounter. The statesman who yields to war fever must realize that once the signal is given, he is no longer the master of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and uncontrollable events.

The Pashtun tribes are always engaged in private or public war. Every man is a warrior, a politician and a theologian. Every large house is a real feudal fortress....Every family cultivates its vendetta; every clan, its feud....Nothing is ever forgotten and very few debts are left unpaid.

A medal glitters, but it also casts a shadow.

If, however, there is to be a war of nerves let us make sure our nerves are strong and are fortified by the deepest convictions of our hearts.

Politics is almost as exciting as war, and quite as dangerous. In war you can only be killed once, but in politics many times.

One day President Roosevelt told me that he was asking publicly for suggestions about what the war should be called. I said at once 'The Unnecessary War'.

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.

At the beginning of this War megalomania was the only form of sanity.

In war as in life, it is often necessary when some cherished scheme has failed, to take up the best alternative open, and if so, it is folly not to work for it with all your might.

War is mainly a catalogue of blunders.

The great defence against aerial menace is to attack the enemy's aircraft as near as possible to their point of departure.