Military Uniformity Quotes

Never do an enemy a small injury. ~ Niccolo Machiavelli

They are most welcome. We will butcher them. ~ Mohammed Saeed Al-Sahaf

Demoralize the enemy from within by surprise, terror, sabotage, assassination. This is the war of the future. ~ Adolf Hitler

The Cloud Ark Constitution is now in effect." Dinah drew breath, knowing what this meant. Markus spelled it out anyway. "This means that all nation-states of Earth, and their governments and constitutions, no longer exist. Their military and civilian chains of command are no more. Oaths you may have taken to them, allegiances you may have held, loyalties you may have felt, citizenships you may have had are now and forever dissolved. The rights granted you by the Cloud Ark Constitution, no more and no less, are your rights. The laws and responsibilities of the Cloud Ark Constitution now bind you. You are citizens of a new nation now, the only nation. Long may it endure. ~ Neal Stephenson

Before the military coup in Chile, we had the idea that military coups happen in Banana Republics, somewhere in Central America. It would never happen in Chile. Chile was such a solid democracy. And when it happened, it had brutal characteristics. ~ Isabel Allende

From their maneuvers and their terrific speed I am certain their flight performance was greater than any aircraft known today. ~ Frank Herman Schofield

When adults tell you they are concerned about you,what they usually mean is that they think you are up to no good and are about to have you tested,or increase your medication.Or transfer you to military school. ~ John David Anderson

The U.S. couldn't play a military role in different areas like Iraq and Afghanistan without huge quantities of oil. So a shortage or disruption in oil would not only damage the U.S. economy; it would undercut American military supremacy. ~ Michael Klare

In Japan, no one could dictate effectively to either army or navy. To an extraordinary degree, the two services - each with its own air force - pursued independent war policies, though the soldiers wielded much greater clout. The foremost characteristic of the army general staff, and especially of its dominant operations department, the First Bureau, was absolute indifference to the diplomatic or economic consequences of any military action. Mamoru ~ Max Hastings

In front, the sun climbs slow, how slowly, but westward, look, the land is bright. ~ Arthur Hugh Clough

What's brilliant about the United States system of government is separation of power. Not only the executive, legislative, judicial branches, but also the independence of the military from civilians, an independent media and press, an independent central bank. ~ Feisal Abdul Rauf

The worst of these comments came in mid-April from the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, who said in a press conference, "This war is lost" and "The surge is not accomplishing anything." I was furious and shared privately with some of my staff a quote from Abraham Lincoln I had written down long before: "Congressmen who willfully take actions during wartime that damage morale and undermine the military are saboteurs and should be arrested, exiled, or hanged. ~ Robert M. Gates

I fully understand those who say you can't win this thing militarily. That's exactly what the United States military says, that you can't win this military. ~ George W. Bush

After investigating the UFO phenomenon all over the world, after studying thousands of pages of released government documents, and interviewing eyewitnesses and insiders, including generals, intelligence officers, cosmonauts and astronauts, military and commercial pilots, I do not have the shadow of a doubt anymore that we are indeed visited by extraterrestrial intelligences. The evidence just does not allow another conclusion. ~ Michael Hesemann

I had come looking for a parade, for a military review of champions marching in ranks. Instead I was left with a brawl of ancestors, a herd of dissenters, sometimes marching together but just as often marching away from each other. ~ Ta-Nehisi Coates

A people living under the perpetual menace of war and invasion is very easy to govern. It demands no social reform. It does not haggle over expenditures for armaments and military equipment. It pays without discussion, it ruins itself, and that is an excellent thing for the syndicates of financiers and manufacturers for whom patriotic terrors are an abundant source of gain. ~ Anatole France

Looking back at the recent history of the world, I find it amazing how far civilization has retrogressed so quickly. As recently as World War I - granted the rules were violated at times - we had a set of rules of warfare in which armies didn't make war against civilians: Soldiers fought soldiers. Then came World War II and Hitler's philosophy of total war, which meant the bombing not only of soldiers but of factories that produced their rifles, and, if surrounding communities were also hit, that was to be accepted; then, as the war progressed, it became common for the combatants simply to attack civilians as part of military strategy. By the time the 1980s rolled around, we were placing our entire faith in a weapon whose fundamental target was the civilian population. ~ Ronald Reagan

Praise be to Allah, who revealed the Book, controls the clouds, defeats factionalism, and says in His Book: 'But when the forbidden months are past, then fight and slay the pagans wherever ye find them, seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem (of war)'; and peace be upon our Prophet, Muhammad Bin-'Abdallah, who said: I have been sent with the sword between my hands to ensure that no one but Allah is worshipped, Allah who put my livelihood under the shadow of my spear and who inflicts humiliation and scorn on those who disobey my orders.

...All these crimes and sins committed by the Americans are a clear declaration of war on Allah, his messenger, and Muslims. And ulema have throughout Islamic history unanimously agreed that the jihad is an individual duty if the enemy destroys the Muslim countries. This was revealed by Imam Bin-Qadamah in 'Al- Mughni,' Imam al-Kisa'i in 'Al-Bada'i,' al-Qurtubi in his interpretation, and the shaykh of al-Islam in his books, where he said: 'As for the fighting to repulse [an enemy], it is aimed at defending sanctity and religion, and it is a duty as agreed [by the ulema]. Nothing is more sacred than belief except repulsing an enemy who is attacking religion and life.'

On that basis, and in compliance with Allah's order, we issue the following fatwa to all Muslims:

The ruling to kill the Americans and their allies -- civilians and military -- is an individual duty for every Muslim ~ Osama Bin Laden

Turning the military-industrial complex is a little bit like turning a battleship, in an age in which smaller, faster ships with smaller crews launching unmanned aircraft is probably a better way to go. ~ David Rothkopf

The shooting and killing weren't as black-and-white as most people think. The actions live in that hazy area of blown-apart stone walls and hesitations. Sometimes I shot when I shouldn't have; other times I didn't shoot when I should have. There was no way to explain why I did either. Everything happened so fast. Decisions had to be made. After I got home I began to see things in slow motion, see the actions that might've been mistakes. ~ Clint Van Winkle

During my military service, I performed a sketch in which I played a flea called Max. So when critics kept misspelling my name, I decided to change it and thought, 'Ah! Max!' ~ Max Von Sydow

The academic mind can eat away the very basis of its own assurance ... produce contortions when it tries to bend over backward ... allow itself to be dismayed by the picture it has created of relentless historical process. ~ Herbert Butterfield

The new naval treaty permits the United States to spend a billion dollars on warships - a sum greater than has been accumulated by all our endowed institutions of learning in their entire history. Unintelligence could go no further! ... [In Great Britain, the situation is similar.] ... Until the figures are reversed, ... nations deceive themselves as to what they care about most. ~ Abraham Flexner

If you want to serve the country, you recognize it's rough and tumble. And it's nothing like serving your country in the military. ~ Mitt Romney

As long as a population can be induced to believe in a supernatural hereafter, it can be oppressed and controlled. People will put up with all sorts of tyranny, poverty, and painful treatment if they're convinced that they'll eventually escape to some resort in the sky where lifeguards are superfluous and the pool never closes. Moreover, the faithful are usually willing to risk their skins in whatever military adventure their government may currently be promoting. ~ Tom Robbins

Thunder on! Stride on! Democracy. Strike with vengeful stroke! ~ Walt Whitman

The Israeli military believes it has destroyed all of Hamas's tunnels, or at least all the ones it knew about. ~ Richard Engel

Suppose everyone on our side felt that way? ~ Joseph Heller

Their military training will ensure success in war, but they must maintain unity by not allowing the state to grow to large, and by ensuring that the measures for promotion and demotion from one class to another are carried out. Above all they must maintain the educational system unchanged; for on education everything else depends, and it is an illusion to imagine that mere legislation without it can effect anything of consequence. ~ Plato

To those who charge that liberalism has been tried and found wanting, I answer that the failure is not in the idea, but in the course of recent history. The New Deal was ended by World War II. The New Frontier was closed by Berlin and Cuba almost before it was opened. And the Great Society lost its greatness in the jungles of Indochina. ~ George McGovern

A desperate man does what he has to to."
She lifted a brow. "I make you that desperate?"
"I guess it will take another date – or two – for you to find that out. ~ Paige Tyler

It's the founding ideals that the flag draped over my father's coffin stand for.
Truth: His father was buried in Kenya, never served in the U.S. military. Which flag draped his father's coffin? And what ideals does the flag that draped his father's coffin in Kenya stand for? ~ Barack Obama

there are no morals. We do not have to differentiate between military or civilian. As far as we are concerned, they are all targets. If inciting people to do that is terrorism, and if killing those who kill our ~ Erec Stebbins

The 'eathen in 'is blindness must end where 'e began. But the backbone of the Army is the non-commissioned man! ~ Rudyard Kipling

Somebody accused us of hiring him and putting him there. He was a classic. ~ George W. Bush

political environment. But there is always a thin line between a peaceful election and armed conflict. We acknowledge this close relationship in the way we use martial jargon to discuss our politics. Candidates battle for states, campaigns are run from war rooms, commercials are part of a media blitz, and campaign volunteers are foot soldiers. "Politics," the Prussian military theorist Carl Von Clausewitz said, "is the womb in which war develops." Violent conflict is born out in other nations where the martial language of politics is not metaphorical. In the same year that McCain and Obama ~ Scott Farris

It's not just a matter of whether you support Obama or Romney. It's who they have coming with them. I always keep my powder dry, as they say in the military. ~ Colin Powell

My experience is that if the military didn't want to use force and was confronted with a president that did, the military would come back with what I would call the 'bomb Moscow' scenario. They would say it had to be done with conditions that were so extreme, you obviously wouldn't do it. ~ George P. Shultz

Some 3,500 Muslims now serve in the U.S. military. The overwhelming majority of them are loyal Americans who see no conflict between their personal religious duty and service to their country. But there can no place in our military for those persons of any faith who do. America has now seen the horrors of what 'diversity at any cost' can lead to. ~ Linda Chavez

No profession or occupation is more pleasing than the military; a profession or exercise both noble in execution (for the strongest, most generous and proudest of all virtues is true valor) and noble in its cause. No utility either more just or universal than the protection of the repose or defense of the greatness of one's country. The company and daily conversation of so many noble, young and active men cannot but be well-pleasing to you. ~ Michel De Montaigne

In State of the Union addresses, I always look at the foreign policy and military parts first, which are generally pretty minimal. ~ Phil Klay

If our soldiers are not overburdened with money, it is not because they have a distaste for riches; if their lives are not unduly long, it is not because they are disinclined to longevity. ~ Sun Tzu

Coalition forces have encountered serious violence in some areas of Iraq. Our military commanders report that this violence is being insticated by three groups. ~ George W. Bush

See, ma'am, frankly speaking this problem can't be solved by us police or military. The problem with these tribals is they don't understand greed. Unless they become greedy there's no hope for us. I have told my boss, remove the force and instead put a TV in every home. Everything will be automatically sorted out. ~ Arundhati Roy

It was easy to make fun of the marines when they weren't listening. In Holden's navy days, making fun of jarheads was as natural as cussing. But four marines had died getting him off the Donnager, and three of them had made a conscious decision to do so. Holden promised himself that he'd never make fun of them again. ~ James S.A. Corey

I know "professional" historians like to talk about how Yonkers represented a "catastrophic failure of the modern military apparatus," how it proved the old adage that armies perfect the art of fighting the last war just in time for the next one. Personally, I think that's a big 'ole sack of it. Sure, we were unprepared, our tools, our training, everything I just talked about, all one class-A, gold-standard clusterfuck, but the weapon that really failed wasn't something that rolled off an assembly line. It's as old as…I don't know, I guess as old as war. It's fear, dude, just fear and you don't have to be Sun freakin Tzu to know that real fighting isn't about killing or even hurting the other guy, it's about scaring him enough to call it a day. Break their spirit, that's what every successful army goes for, from tribal face paint to the "blitzkrieg" to…what did we call the first round of Gulf War Two, "Shock and Awe"? Perfect name, "Shock and Awe"! But what if the enemy can't be shocked and awed? Not just won't, but biologically can't! That's what happened that day outside New York City, that's the failure that almost lost us the whole damn war. The fact that we couldn't shock and awe Zack boomeranged right back in our faces and actually allowed Zack to shock and awe us! They're not afraid! No matter what we do, no matter how many we kill, they will never, ever be afraid! ~ Max Brooks

One of the primary reasons I first ran for Congress was to be a voice for our troops, veterans and military families. ~ Kirsten Gillibrand