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  2. A war for a great principle ennobles a nation. A war for commercial supremacy, upon some shallow pretext, is despicable, and more than aught else demonstrates to what immeasurable depths of baseness men and nations can descend.

  3. All the talk of history is of nothing almost but fighting and killing, and the honor and renown which are bestowed on conquerors, who, for the most part, are mere butchers of mankind, mislead growing youth, who, by these means, come to think slaughter the most laudable business of mankind, and the most heroic of virtues.

  4. All warfare is based on deception. Therefore, when capable, feign incapacity; when active, inactivity. When near, make it appear that you are far away; when far way, that you are near. Offer the enemy a bait to lure him; feign disorder and strike him. When he concentrates, prepare against him; where he is strong, avoid him. Anger his general and confuse him. Pretend inferiority and encourage his arrogance. Keep him under a strain and wear him down. When he is united, divide him. Attack where he is unprepared; sally out when he does not expect you. These are the strategist's keys to victory. It is not possible to discuss them beforehand.

  5. An ancient strategist has said: I dare not take the offensive but I take the defensive; I dare not advance an inch but I retreat a foot. This means: To march without formation, To stretch one's arm without showing it, To confront enemies without seeming to meet them, To hold weapons without seeming to have them.

  6. An infallible method of conciliating a tiger is to allow oneself to be devoured.

  7. And by prudent flight and cunning save A life, which valour could not, from the grave. A better shield I can soon regain; But who can get another life again?

  8. Armament is an important factor in war, but not the decisive factor...Man, not material, forms the decisive factor.

  9. As long as war is regarded as wicked it will always have its fascinations. When it is looked upon as vulgar, then it will cease to be popular.

 10. At the outset, a righteous cause, as well as a proper method for conducting the war, is essential for military success.

 11. Before all else, be armed.

 12. Beware lest in your anxiety to avoid war you obtain a master.

 13. Blood is a cleansing and sanctifying thing, and the nation that regards it as the final horror has lost its manhood... There are many things more horrible than bloodshed, and slavery is one of them!

 14. But Thy most dreaded instrument In working out a pure intent, Is man, - arrayed for mutual slaughter, - Yes Carnage is Thy daughter.

 15. By the rude bridge that arched the flood, Their flag to April's breeze unfurl'd; Here once the embattl'd farmers stood, And fired the shot heard round the world.

 16. Defense is the stronger form with the negative object, and attack the weaker form with the positive object.

 17. Endless money forms the sinews of war.

 18. Even war is better than a wretched peace.

 19. Every government has as much of a duty to avoid war as a ship's captain has to avoid a shipwreck.

 20. Everything can collapse. Houses, bodies, and enemies collapse when their rhythm becomes deranged. In large- scale battles, when the enemy starts to collapse you must pursue him without letting the chance go. If you fail to take advantage of your enemies' collapse, they may recover.

 21. For a war to be just three conditions are necessary - public authority, just cause, right motive.

 22. For what this whirlwind all a flame? This thunderstroke of hellish ire, Setting the universe afire? While millions upon millions came Into a very storm of war? For a scrap of paper.

 23. Force and fraud are in war the two cardinal virtues.

 24. Force is never more operative than when it is known to exist but is not brandished.

 25. Force, that is to say, physical force (for no moral force exists apart from the conception of a state and law), is the means; to impose our will upon the enemy is the object. To achieve this object with certainty we must disarm the enemy, and this disarming is by definition the proper aim of military action.

 26. From fear in every guise, From sloth, from love of self, By war's great sacrifice The world redeems itself.

 27. Gentleness succeeds better than violence.

 28. Give the enemy not only a road for flight, but also a means of defending it.

 29. He that fights and runs away, May turn and fight another day; But he that is in battle slain, Will never rise to fight again.

 30. I hear the hoarse-voiced cannon roar, the red-mouthed orators of war.

 31. I know war as few other men now living know it, and nothing to me is more revolting. I have long advocated its complete abolition, as its very destructiveness on both friend and foe has rendered it useless as a method of settling international disputes.

 32. Ideas are the great warriors of the world, and a war that has no idea behind it, is simply a brutality.

 33. If a sufficient number of people who wanted to stop war really did gather together, they would first of all begin by making war upon those who disagreed with them. And it is still more certain that they would make war on people who also want to stop wars but in another way.

 34. If war has its chivalry and its pageantry, it has also its hideousness and its demoniac woe. Bullets respect not beauty. They tear out the eye, and shatter the jaw, and rend the cheek.

 35. In every heart Are sown the sparks that kindle fiery war.

 36. In peace the sons bury their fathers and in war the fathers bury their sons.

 37. In war events of importance are the result of trivial causes.

 38. In war, when a commander becomes so bereft of reason and perspective that he fails to understand the dependence of arms on Divine guidance, he no longer deserves victory.

 39. It is always easy to begin a war, but very difficult to stop one, since its beginning and end are not under the control of the same man. Anyone, even a coward, can commence a war, but it can be brought to an end only with the consent of the victors.

 40. It is an irrepressible conflict between opposing and enduring forces.

 41. It is not the object of war to annihilate those who have given provocation for it, but to cause them to mend their ways; not to ruin the innocent and guilty alike, but to save both.

 42. It is only necessary to make war with five things: with the maladies of the body, with the ignorances of the mind, with the passions of the body, with the seditions of the city, with the discords of families.

 43. It is well that war is so terrible- we would grow too fond of it.

 44. It simply is not true that war never settles anything.

 45. Like the leaves of the forest when summer is green, That host with their banners at sunset were seen; Like the leaves of the forest when autumn hath blown, That host on the morrow lay wither'd and strown!

 46. March to the battle-field, The foe is now before us; Each heart is Freedom's shield, And heaven is shining o'er us.

 47. Men grow tired of sleep, love, singing and dancing sooner than of war.

 48. Military tactics are like unto water; for water in its natural course runs away from high places and hastens downwards. So in war, the way is to avoid what is strong and to strike what is weak. Like water, taking the line of least resistance.

 49. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord: He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored: He hath loosed the fateful lightning of his terrible swiftsword: His truth is marching on.

 50. Most sorts of diversion, in men, children and other animals, are an imitation of fighting.

 51. Naval supremacy is the best security for the peace of the world...If...you are ready for instant war, with every unit of your strength in the first line and waiting to be first in, and hit your enemy in the belly and kick him when he is down, and boil your prisoners in oil (if you take any) and torture his women and children, then people will keep clear of you.

 52. No protracted war can fail to endanger the freedom of a democratic country.

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

 54. Nothing good ever comes of violence.

 55. Once we have a war there is only one thing to do. It must be won. For defeat brings worse things than any that can ever happen in war.

 56. Our business in the field of fight Is not to question, but to prove our might.

 57. Preparation for war is a constant stimulus to suspicion and ill will.

 58. So far war has been the only force that can discipline a whole community, and until an equivalent discipline isorganized, I believe that war must have its way.

 59. Sound trumpets! let our bloody colours wave! And either victory, or else a grave.

 60. Speed is the essence of war.

 61. Study strategy over the years and achieve the spirit of the warrior. Today is victory over yourself of yesterday; tomorrow is your victory over lesser men.

 62. The arms are fair, When the intent of bearing them is just.

 63. The art of war is of vital importance to the State. It is a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin. Hence it is a subject of inquiry which can on no account be neglected.

 64. The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold, And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold.

 65. The ballot is stronger than the bullet.

 66. The carnage and suffering which war entails are terrible to contemplate, and constitute an irresistible argument in favor of arbitration.

 67. The essence of war is fire, famine, and pestilence. They contribute to its outbreak; they are among its weapons; they become its consequences.

 68. The essence of war is violence.

 69. The essence of war is violence. Moderation in war is imbecility.

 70. The fortunes of war are always doubtful.

 71. The general who advances without coveting fame and retreats without fearing disgrace, whose only thought is to protect his country and do good service for his sovereign, is the jewel of the kingdom.

 72. The God of War hates those who hesitate.

 73. The increase of armaments that is intended in each nation to produce consciousness of strength, and a sense of security, does not produce these effects. On the contrary, it produces a consciousness of the strength of other nations and a sense of fear. Fear begets suspicion and distrust and evil imaginings of all sorts.

 74. The life of states is like that of men. The latter have the right of killing in self-defense; the former to make wars for their own preservation.

 75. The might of the community. Yet, it too, is nothing else than violence...it is the communal, not individual, violence that has its way.

 76. The sinews of war are five - men, money, materials, maintenance (food) and morale.

 77. The thing constantly overlooked by those hopefuls who talk about abolishing war is that it is by no means an evidence of the decay but rather a proof of health and vigor.

 78. The Way of strategy is the Way of nature. When you appreciate the power of nature, knowing the rhythm of any situation, you will be able to hit the enemy naturally and strike naturally.

 79. Theirs not to make reply, Theirs not to reason why, Theirs but to do and die.

 80. There are only two forces in the world, the sword and the spirit. In the long run the sword will always be conquered by the spirit.

 81. There are strings in the human heart that had better not be vibrated.

 82. There is many a boy here today who looks on war as all glory, but boys, it is all hell.

 83. There is no greater misfortune than underestimating the enemy. If I underestimate the enemy I am in danger of losing my treasure. Where two armies confront each other in battle the conqueror will be he who wins with a heavy heart.

 84. There is no such thing as an inevitable war. If war comes it will be from a failure of human wisdom.

 85. There was only one virtue, pugnacity; only one vice, pacifism. That is an essential condition of war.

 86. There will one day spring from the brain of science a machine or force so fearful in its potentialities, so absolutely terrifying, that even man, the fighter, who will dare torture and death, will be appalled, and so abandon war forever. What man's mind can create, man's character can control.

 87. There's but a twinkling of a star Between a man of peace and war.

 88. These are the time that try men's souls. The Summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country, but he that stands now deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like Hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us - the harder the conflict the more glorious the triumph.

 89. To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace.

 90. To destroy is still the strongest instinct in our nature.

 91. To fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting.

 92. To those to whom war is necessary it is just; and a resort to arms is righteous in those to whom no means of assistance remain except by arms.

 93. Violence is essentially wordless, and it can begin only where thought and rational communication have broken down.

 94. War - An act of violence whose object is to constrain the enemy, to accomplish our will.

 95. War - the trade of barbarians, and the art of bringing the greatest physical force to bear on a single point.

 96. War has been prescribed for you and that displeases you, it may be you dislike something whilst it is good for you; and it may be that you love something that is bad for you, because God knows it, and you know it not.

 97. War I abhor, and yet how sweet The sound along the marching street Of drum and fife, and I forget Wet eyes of widows, and forget Broken old mothers, and the whole Dark butchery without a soul.

 98. War is a series of catastrophes which result in victory.

 99. War is an instrument entirely inefficient toward redressing wrong; and multiplies, instead of indemnifying losses.

100. War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it.

101. War is much too important a matter to be left to the generals.

102. War is nothing less than a temporary repeal of the principles of virtue. It is a system out of which almost all the virtues are excluded, and in which nearly all the vices are included.

103. War is only a cowardly escape from the problems of peace.

104. War is the greatest of all crimes; and yet there is no aggressor who does not color his crime with the pretext of justice.

105. War is the science of destruction.

106. War its thousands slays, Peace its ten thousands.

107. War kills men, and men deplore the loss; but war also crushes bad principles and tyrants, and so saves societies.

108. War leads to peace.

109. War! that mad game the world so loves to play.

110. War, he sung, is toil and trouble; Honour but an empty bubble.

111. Wars are caused by undefended wealth.

112. Wars are to be undertaken in order that it may be possible to live in peace without molestation.

113. Wars occur because people prepare for conflict, rather than for peace.

114. Wars, like thunder-storms, are often necessary to purify the stagnant atmosphere. War is not a demon, without remorse or reward. It restores the brotherhood in letters of fire... It is the hurricane that brings the elemental equilibrium, the concord of Power and Wisdom.

115. We fight to great disadvantage when we fight with those who have nothing to lose.

116. What difference does it make to the dead...whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy?

117. When discord dreadful bursts her brazen bars, And shatters locks to thunder forth her wars.

118. When the army engages in protracted campaigns the resources of the state will not suffice...For there has never been aprotracted war from which a country has benefited.

119. When wars do come, they fall upon the many, the producing class, who are the sufferers.

120. Wherever armies are stationed, briars and thorns grow. Great wars are always followed by famines.

121. Yes; quaint and curious war is! You shoot a fellow down You'd treat if met where any bar is, Or help to half-a-crown.

122. You need only a show of war to have peace.