quotations about war
War is a beastly business, it is true, but one proof we are human is our ability to learn, even from it, how better to exist.
M. F. K. FISHER
introduction to revised edition, How to Cook a Wolf
War among men defiles this world.
T. S. ELIOT
Murder in the Cathedral
The line, broken into moving fragments by the ground, went calmly on through fields and woods. The youth looked at the men nearest him, and saw, for the most part, expressions of deep interest, as if they were investigating something that had fascinated them. One or two stepped with overvaliant airs as if they were already plunged into war. Others walked as upon thin ice. The greater part of the untested men appeared quiet and absorbed. They were going to look at war, the red animal--war, the blood-swollen god. And they were deeply engrossed in this march.
STEPHEN CRANE
The Red Badge of Courage
We are now in the midst of our first television war ... the television environment [is] total and therefore invisible. Along with the computer, it has altered every phase of the American vision and identity. The television war has meant the end of the dichotomy between civilian and military. The public is now a participant in every phase of the war, and the main actions of the war are now being fought in the American home itself.
MARSHALL MCLUHAN
War and Peace in the Global Village
NIXON: The only place where you and I disagree ... is with regard to the bombing. You're so goddamned concerned about civilians and I don't give a damn. I don't care. KISSINGER: I'm concerned about the civilians because I don't want the world to be mobilized against you as a butcher.
RICHARD NIXON & HENRY KISSINGER
attributed, Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers
Fifteen millions of soldiers with popguns and horses
All bent upon killing, because their "of courses"
Are not quite the same.
AMY LOWELL
"A Ballad of Footmen"
Eventually, you hope. Obviously, we're not in a position at the moment for the eradication of war to seem like anything but a far-off dream. But at one time, the eradication of slave markets in the United States seemed very far off. I mean, people have to begin somewhere. We can change. We can evolve as a species. It's not simple, and it's a very long and drawn-out process, but you can hope.
SUZANNE COLLINS
interview, Hogwarts Professor, August 15, 2010
Weakness and ambivalence lead to war.
GEORGE H. W. BUSH
RNC acceptance speech, August 18, 1988
When a war breaks out, people say: "It's too stupid; it can't last long." But though the war may well be "too stupid," that doesn't prevent its lasting. Stupidity has a knack of getting its way; as we should see if we were not always so much wrapped up in ourselves.
ALBERT CAMUS
The Plague
Military arrangement, and movements in consequence, like the mechanism of a clock, will be imperfect and disordered by the want of a part.
GEORGE WASHINGTON
letter to the President of Congress, December 23, 1777
What lackeys men are, who might be such fine fellows!
To be killing each other, unmercifully,
At an order, as though one said, "Bring up the tea."
AMY LOWELL
"A Ballad of Footmen"
The chain reaction of evil--hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars--must be broken, or we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.
MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.
Christmas sermon delivered at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, 1957
History shows that wars are divided into two kinds, just and unjust. All wars that are progressive are just, and all wars that impede progress are unjust. We Communists oppose all unjust wars that impede progress, but we do not oppose progressive, just wars. Not only do we Communists not oppose just wars; we actively participate in them.
MAO ZEDONG
"On Protracted War", May 1938
War is not pretty from any angle, and the most vulnerable organ in the body is the brain.
FRANK LAWLIS
PTSD Breakthrough: The Revolutionary, Science-Based Compass RESET Program
While Congress cuts programs for basic human needs, our costs of post-9/11 wars -- including future veteran care -- stand at $4.4 trillion. We've spent $7.6 trillion on defense and homeland security. Yet spending those same dollars on peaceful industry -- education, health care, infrastructure, and renewable energy -- could produce many more and better paying jobs.
DOUG WINGEIER
letter to the Editor, Smoky Mountain News, February 3, 2016
The modern State is by its very nature a military State; and every military State must of necessity become a conquering, invasive State; to survive it must conquer or be conquered, for the simple reason that accumulated military power will suffocate if it does not find an outlet.
MIKHAIL BAKUNIN
Statism and Anarchy
War is hell and all that, but it has a good deal to recommend it. It wipes out all the small nuisances of peace-time.
IAN HAY
The First Hundred Thousand
The nation having the strongest war footing can easily find an excuse for going to war.
LEWIS F. KORNS
Thoughts
War has been the most convenient pseudo-solution for the problems of twentieth-century capitalism. It provides the incentives to modernisation and technological revolution which the market and the pursuit of profit do only fitfully and by accident, it makes the unthinkable (such as votes for women and the abolition of unemployment) not merely thinkable but practicable.... What is equally important, it can re-create communities of men and give a temporary sense to their lives by uniting them against foreigners and outsiders. This is an achievement beyond the power of the private enterprise economy ... when left to itself.
ERIC J. HOBSBAWM
London Observer, May 26, 1968
No one should be surprised at the prominence given to war. We are dealing with early ages: nation-making is the occupation of man in these ages, and it is war that makes nations.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Physics and Politics