Maxwell Davenport Taylor citations (41 citations)

“A recruit arriving in a new unit feels lonely, homesick, and insecure. Someone has to welcome him when he arrives and make him understand that he is truly wanted. That responsibility is shared by every officer in the channel of command, beginning with the division commander.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Source: Swords and Plowshares (1972), p. 105
Contexte: A recruit arriving in a new unit feels lonely, homesick, and insecure. Someone has to welcome him when he arrives and make him understand that he is truly wanted. That responsibility is shared by every officer in the channel of command, beginning with the division commander. I made it a point to try to meet every new soldier joining the Division, usually assembling them in small groups for a handshake and an informal talk. A standard question for a new man was why he had volunteered for parachuting and whether he enjoyed it. On one occasion, a bright-eyed recruit startled me by replying to the latter question with a resounding "No, sir." "Why, then, if you don't like jumping did you volunteer to be a parachutist?" I asked. "Sir, I like to be with people who do like to jump," was the reply. I shook his hand vigorously and assured him that there were at least two of us of the same mind in the Division.

“Standing bareheaded at the foot of the reviewing stand, I received the last salute of these gallant soldiers, their ribbons and streamers recalling our battles together. They had put stars on my shoulders and medals on my chest. I owed my future to them, and I was grateful.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Source: Swords and Plowshares (1972), p. 110-111
Contexte: My days in Europe with the 101st were nearly at an end. I suddenly received orders relieving me from the Division and assigning me as Superintendent of West Point. On August 22 I took an emotion-laden leave of my troops in a division review at Auxerre. For all their hard-boiled reputation, generals can be terribly sentimental about their units and their men. Standing bareheaded at the foot of the reviewing stand, I received the last salute of these gallant soldiers, their ribbons and streamers recalling our battles together. They had put stars on my shoulders and medals on my chest. I owed my future to them, and I was grateful.

“A standard question for a new man was why he had volunteered for parachuting and whether he enjoyed it. On one occasion, a bright-eyed recruit startled me by replying to the latter question with a resounding "No, sir." "Why, then, if you don't like jumping did you volunteer to be a parachutist?" I asked. "Sir, I like to be with people who do like to jump," was the reply. I shook his hand vigorously and assured him that there were at least two of us of the same mind in the Division.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Source: Swords and Plowshares (1972), p. 105
Contexte: A recruit arriving in a new unit feels lonely, homesick, and insecure. Someone has to welcome him when he arrives and make him understand that he is truly wanted. That responsibility is shared by every officer in the channel of command, beginning with the division commander. I made it a point to try to meet every new soldier joining the Division, usually assembling them in small groups for a handshake and an informal talk. A standard question for a new man was why he had volunteered for parachuting and whether he enjoyed it. On one occasion, a bright-eyed recruit startled me by replying to the latter question with a resounding "No, sir." "Why, then, if you don't like jumping did you volunteer to be a parachutist?" I asked. "Sir, I like to be with people who do like to jump," was the reply. I shook his hand vigorously and assured him that there were at least two of us of the same mind in the Division.

“First, we didn't know ourselves. We thought we were going into another Korean war, but this was a different country. Secondly, we didn't know our South Vietnamese allies. We never understood them, and that was another surprise. And we knew even less about North Vietnam. Who was Ho Chi Minh? Nobody really knew. So, until we know the enemy and know our allies and know ourselves, we'd better keep out of this dirty kind of business. It's very dangerous.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

As quoted in The Certain Trumpet: Maxwell Taylor and the American Experience in Vietnam (1991) by Douglas Kinnard, p. 198

“The ultimate guide to decision should be our estimate at the time of the nature and extent of the American interest. There may be good reasons to use our resources to resist a troublemaking power which commits aggression against a weak and friendly state if the subversion of that state would be a significant gain to the troublemaker or a significant loss to us. Even then, we should have a reasonably accurate and encouraging estimate of the chances of success before we act. We cannot afford to stake our world standing on a lost cause or on one with unduly high risks of failure.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Source: Responsibility and Response (1967), p. 49

“It was one thing to decide to go to West Point, another to get there.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Source: Swords and Plowshares (1972), p. 23

“So the future depends not only on what we do but on what other powers do. Will they join in the nuclear arms race or save their resources for later, more renumerative uses? Will they increase their productivity while we succumb to inflation and its social and economic consequences? Will they live in harmony at home while we remain riven by factionalism and terrorized by crime? Most important of all, will they choose their goals wisely and pursue them relentlessly while we flounder in aimlessness or exhaust ourselves in internecine struggles? These matters are quite as important as the decline of absolute American power in determining the equilibrium of international relations in the 1970s. One thing is sure: the international challenge tends to merge more and more with the domestic challenge until the two become virtually indistinguishable. The threats from both sources are directed at the same sources of national power which provide strength both for our national security and for our domestic welfare. It is clear, I believe, that we cannot overcome abroad and fail at home, or succeed at home and succumb abroad. To progress toward the goals of our security and welfare we must advance concurrently on both foreign and domestic fronts by means of integrated national power responsive to a unified national will.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Closing words, p. 421-422
Swords and Plowshares (1972)

“We all have a share in it, and none of it is good. There are no heroes, just bums. I include myself in that.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Taylor commenting on the fall of Saigon and with it the collapse of the Republic of Vietnam, speaking in a UPI interview in May 1975. Quoted from General Maxwell Taylor: The Sword and the Pen (1989), p. 366

“During my cadet years, West Point was still a military cloister, linked tenuously to the outside world by the West Shore Railway, the excursion boats on the Hudson, and a winding road leading westward into New Jersey. A cadet normally entered the Academy in July and never left it on vacation until his second Christmas. In the meantime, he led a completely regimented life, arising at six, going to bed at ten and rarely having a moment without a duty to occupy it.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Source: Swords and Plowshares (1972), p. 25

“Standing in the door ready to jump behind Cassidy, I saw the plane on our wing hit by ground fire and flames start licking back from the engine under the fuselage. Cassidy was so fascinated by the sight that I had to nudge him to remind him that the jump signal was on. Later I learned that the Air Force pilots of the burning plane never wavered in their steady course to the drop zone where the parachutists jumped to safety while the pilots crashed to their deaths.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Source: Swords and Plowshares (1972), p. 88

“But the problem of a Chief of Staff in Washington is not that simple. In the military service, an officer is not hailed before an outside authority and therefore required to indicate the advice which he had originally given his commanding general and to explain his reasons therefore. This is the position of the Chief of Staff before a Congressional committee. No sooner has he read his prepared statement supporting the position of the Defense Department than he must face a battery of interrogators bent on bringing forth his original views and contrasting them with the ultimate position of the Secretary of Defense and of the President. Very shortly a Chief of Staff will find himself in the position either of appearing to oppose his civilian superiors or of withholding facts from the Congress. Personally, I have found no way of coping with the situation other than by replying frankly to questions and letting the chips fall where they may.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Source: The Uncertain Trumpet (1960), p. 112-113

“The acceptance of the legitimacy of the overt use of power comes hard in some segments of our citizenship. In some of the expressions of concern over our behavior in Vietnam, we are seeing curious aspects of our national character in this regard. They often contain a note of reluctance or of regret over the use of the vast power represented by the resources of the United States at home and abroad. In some quarters there seems to even be what amounts to a certain feeling of guilt arising from our possession of this power and an uneasiness about the morality of our conduct. One consequence of this attitude in the Vietnam situation is that our government must constantly defend its actions to critics and, in so doing, is often obliged to disclose its plans and purposes to a degree which must be vastly helpful to our opponents. Inevitably in a situation such as Vietnam, where we are using limited means to gain limited ends, it is essential to keep the adversary in doubt with regard to the full scope of our intentions.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Source: Responsibility and Response (1967), p. 79

“It is hard to suggest a remedy for this situation, which is one no military man enjoys. One alternative would be to refuse to permit military officers to appear before Congress and leave the defense of military matters to the civilian secretaries. This is the solution followed in Great Britain and many European countries. I doubt that it will ever be accepted in the United States, where the COngress wants to hear the facts from military men who presumably are without political motivation. A second alternative would be to take the position that the advice of the Chiefs of Staff to their civilian superiors is privileged and not to be revealed under Congressional interrogation. Thus far the Executive authority has not seen fit to raise the storm such a stand would create.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Source: The Uncertain Trumpet (1960), p. 113

“Our adversaries have a determination which has existed since at least 1954 to absorb South Vietnam into a Communist state against the will of the vast majority of the people in the South and to rule that state from Hanoi. It is a simple, straightforward objective, no ifs or ands about it. They also have collateral objectives which in the long run may be equally as important to us, such as their desire to demonstrate the invincibility of the "War of Liberation" and in the end to evict the United States from Southeast Asia.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Source: Responsibility and Response (1967), p. 18-19

“With the opportunity to observe the problems of the President at closer range, I have come to understand the importance of an intimate, easy relationship, born of friendship and mutual regard, between the President and the Chiefs. It is particularly important in the case of the Chairman, who works more closely with the President and Secretary of Defense than do the service chiefs. The Chairman should be a true believer in the foreign policy and military strategy of the administration he serves, or, at least, feel that he and his colleagues are assured an attentive hearing those matters for which the Joint Chiefs have a responsibility. These considerations have led me to conclude that an incoming President is well advised to change the Chiefs, not with one sweep of the new broom, but progressively as he gets a chance to know the senior officers qualified for consideration and to evaluate their compatibility with his ways of thinking and acting.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Source: Swords and Plowshares (1972), p. 252

“Both of these alternatives would have the disadvantage of depriving Congress of responsible military advice needed to discharge its constitutional responsibilities toward the armed forces. Each year the matters of national security are becoming increasingly complicated and technical, yet the members of Congress must legislate wisely with respect to them. To whom can they turn other than to the Chiefs of Staff, who are responsible for our national defense? To deprive them of access to the views of the Chiefs of Staff would inevitably force them to seek irresponsible sources of advice, to the probable detriment of their legislative actions.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Source: The Uncertain Trumpet (1960), p. 113-114

“Give me three days and three nights of hard fighting, and you will be relieved.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Statement made by Taylor to the men of Easy Company, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, as he circulated among the men on June 4, 1944, two days before commencement of the amphibious invasion of France, Operation Overlord. Easy Company and the entire 101st Airborne Division fought for 7 days, more than twice the promised number, before its last major fight in Normandy at the Battle of Bloody Gulch on June 13. Two days later on June 15, 9 days after the start of Mission Albany, the 101st Airborne's specific part of Overlord, was considered over. As quoted in Band of Brothers (1992) by Stephen E. Ambrose, p. 65

“Our military behavior must be visibly consistent with our conduct in the political, economic, and international fields. Our strategic readjustments should not be mistaken for a new spurt in an armament race with the USSR. Any serious imbalance in military power between East and West is an encouragement to war- if it favors the Communist dictatorship. Actions to correct an imbalance of power and to replace the concept of Massive Retaliation by one of Flexible Response are measures conducive not to war but to world peace. Such are the notes to be sounded by confident leaders who know what they are doing and why. Then we can prepare ourselves calmly to the battle, knowing that if it is properly prepared, the odds are high for peace.”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

Source: The Uncertain Trumpet (1960), p. 179-180

“Nuclear weapons began to exert an important influence on military policy immediately following World War II, although their capabilities, limitations, and political implications were only vaguely understood. But it seemed clear they they represented destructiveness at a cheap price. This point was important because of the need to replace the armed forces demobilized so thoroughly and wastefully at the end of World War II in the furor to "bring the boys home." To have rebuilt similar forces in the succeeding years would have been costly both in dollars and in political "face." Neither the Truman administration nor the American people were prepared to foot such a bill, particularly that part of the program which would have been a tacit admission of lack of foresight. Under such circumstances, it is not surprising that the idea of relying on nuclear weapons and strategic bombing for national defense had great appeal. Such a military program appeared to offer us a way out of fighting dirty, costly wars with Communist masses on the ground. It was a way to meet manpower with mechanical power. Its apparent cheapness gave rise to the slogan, "More bang for a buck."”

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Maxwell D. Taylor

But this reliance on Massive Retaliation overlooked the fact that atomic bangs could eventually be bought for rubles as well as dollars.
Source: The Uncertain Trumpet (1960), p. 12-13