Quotes about war
page 38

Ulysses S. Grant photo

“Mister Crawford, nobody is more sick of this war than I am. That's why we're moving south, to end it as quickly as possible. Lincoln said at Gettysburg we must preserve this nation so a government of the people won't perish, but you newspaper boys never pay much attention to that, did you?”

Ulysses S. Grant (1822–1885) 18th President of the United States

North and South, Book II https://listenonrepeat.com/watch/?v=vopVVBiC80g#General_Grant_s_Strategies (1986).
In fiction, <span class="plainlinks"> North and South, Book II http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090490/fullcredits?ref_=tt_cl_sm#cast (1986)</span>

George Galloway photo

“Your Excellency, Mr President: I greet you, in the name of the many thousands of people in Britain who stood against the tide and opposed the war and aggression against Iraq and continue to oppose the war by economic means, which is aimed to strangle the life out of the great people of Iraq. I greet you, too, in the name of the Palestinian people, amongst whom I've just spent two weeks in the occupied Palestinian territories. I can honestly tell you that there was not a single person to whom I told I was coming to Iraq and hoping to meet with yourself who did not wish me to convey their heartfelt, fraternal greetings and support. And this was true, especially at the base in the refugee camps of Jabaliyah and Beach Camp in Gaza, in the Balatah refugee camp in Nablus and on the streets of the towns and villages in the occupied lands.I thought the president would appreciate knowing that even today, three years after the war, I still met families who were calling their newborn sons Saddam; and that two weeks ago, when I was trapped inside the Orient House, which is the Palestinian headquarters in al-Quds [Jerusalem], with 5,000 armed mustwatinin [settlers] outside demonstrating, pledging to tear down the Palestinian flag from the flagpole, the hundreds of shabab [youths] inside the compound were chanting that they wish to be with a DSh K [machine gun] in Baghdad to avenge the eyes of Abu Jihad. And the Youth Club in Silwan, which is the one of the most resistant of all the villages around Jerusalem, asked me to ask the president's permission if they could enrol him as an honourary member of their club and to present him with this flag from holy Jerusalem.I wish to say, sir, that I believe that we are turning the tide in Europe, that the scale of the humanitarian disaster which has been imposed upon the Iraqi people is now becoming more and more widely known and accepted. Fifty-five British members of parliament opposed the war, but 125 are demanding the lifting of the embargo; and this does not include the invisible section of the Conservative Party who must also be moving in that direction, and Sir Edward Heath is being a very persuasive advocate inside the Conservative Party.It is my belief that we must convey the very clear picture that 1994 has to be the year of the ending of the embargo against Iraq. Otherwise, famine and all the awful consequences, including acts of despair by Iraqis, will be the result; and this is the message we must convey to civilized opinion in Europe.Sir, I salute your courage, your strength, your indefatigability, and I want you to know that we are with you, hatta al-nasr, hatta al-nasr, hatta al-Quds”

George Galloway (1954) British politician, broadcaster, and writer

until victory, until victory, until Jerusalem
"'I greet you in the name of thousands of Britons'", The Times, January 20, 1994, citing BBC monitoring service at 9 PM on January 19 as its source.
Speech to Saddam Hussein, January 19, 1994.
Source: See also David Morley Gorgeous George: The Life and Adventures of George Galloway, London: Politicos, 2007, p. 210-11. Galloway disputes the reporting of this quote and has repeatedly stated that the conclusion was a salute to "the Iraqi people" rather than Saddam Hussein personally.

Calvin Coolidge photo
Mike Rosen photo
Ayn Rand photo

“It took centuries of intellectual, philosophical development to achieve political freedom. It was a long struggle, stretching from Aristotle to John Locke to the Founding Fathers. The system they established was not based on unlimited majority but on its opposite: on individual rights, which were not to be alienated by majority vote or minority plotting. The individual was not left at the mercy of his neighbors or his leaders: the Constitutional system of checks and balances was scientifically devised to protect him from both. This was the great American achievement—and if concern for the actual welfare of other nations were our present leaders' motive, this is what we should have been teaching the world. Instead, we are deluding the ignorant and the semi-savage by telling them that no political knowledge is necessary—that our system is only a matter of subjective preference—that any prehistorical form of tribal tyranny, gang rule, and slaughter will do just as well, with our sanction and support. It is thus that we encourage the spectacle of Algerian workers marching through the streets [in the 1962 Civil War] and shouting the demand: "Work, not blood!"—without knowing what great knowledge and virtue are required to achieve it. In the same way, in 1917, the Russian peasants were demanding: "Land and Freedom!" But Lenin and Stalin is what they got. In 1933, the Germans were demanding: "Room to live!" But what they got was Hitler. In 1793, the French were shouting: "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity!"”

Ayn Rand (1905–1982) Russian-American novelist and philosopher

What they got was Napoleon. In 1776, the Americans were proclaiming "The Rights of Man"—and, led by political philosophers, they achieved it. No revolution, no matter how justified, and no movement, no matter how popular, has ever succeeded without a political philosophy to guide it, to set its direction and goal.
The Ayn Rand Column

Charles Sumner photo
Emanuel Moravec photo
Mitsumasa Yonai photo
Amir Taheri photo
John F. Kennedy photo
Yeshayahu Leibowitz photo
Franklin D. Roosevelt photo
Robert Menzies photo

“Few people of the Commonwealth fully realised that the European crisis might involve hostilities in Australian waters – that war might be something that would come to Australia, and not merely something that was happening 12,000 miles away.”

Robert Menzies (1894–1978) Australian politician, 12th Prime Minister of Australia

In speech to the Constitutional Club of Sydney, October 1938
Early career (1934-1939)
Source: https://www.jewishnews.net.au/menzies-an-enemy-of-tyranny-and-friend-of-freedom/29309

John C. Wright photo

“Everyone loses in war, even the winners.”

Source: Orphans of Chaos (2005), Chapter 7, “Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea” Section 2 (p. 109)

John Pilger photo
Steve Allen photo
Chris Eubank photo

“Blair, don't send our young prince to your catastrophic illegal war to make it look plausible.”

Chris Eubank (1966) British former professional boxer

A message condemning Tony Blair for sending Prince Harry to Iraq February 22, 2007 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/6387231.stm

Vladimir Lenin photo
Calvin Coolidge photo
Jefferson Davis photo
Chris Hedges photo

“Most of these who are thrust into combat soon find it impossible to maintain the mythic perception of war.”

Chris Hedges (1956) American journalist

Source: War Is a Force that Gives Us Meaning

Douglas MacArthur photo
Calvin Coolidge photo

“Undoubtedly one of the most important provisions in the preparation for national defense is a proper and sound selective service act. Such a law ought to give authority for a very broad mobilization of all the resources of the country, both persons and materials. I can see some difficulties in the application of the principle, for it is the payment of a higher price that stimulates an increased production, but whenever it can be done without economic dislocation such limits ought to be established in time of war as would prevent so far as possible all kinds of profiteering. There is little defense which can be made of a system which puts some men in the ranks on very small pay and leaves others undisturbed to reap very large profits. Even the income tax, which recaptured for the benefit of the National Treasury alone about 75 per cent of such profits, while local governments took part of the remainder, is not a complete answer. The laying of taxes is, of course, in itself a conscription of whatever is necessary of the wealth of the country for national defense, but taxation does not meet the full requirements of the situation. In the advent of war, power should be lodged somewhere for the stabilization of prices as far as that might be possible in justice to the country and its defenders.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, Toleration and Liberalism (1925)

Pope John Paul II photo
Miguel de Unamuno photo
Anastas Mikoyan photo
Zainab Salbi photo
Ursula K. Le Guin photo
Neville Chamberlain photo

“In war, whichever side may call itself the victor, there are no winners, but all are losers.”

Neville Chamberlain (1869–1940) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Speech at Kettering, (3 July 1938), The Times (4 July 1938)
Prime Minister

Norman Thomas photo
Ernst Kaltenbrunner photo
Robert E. Lee photo

“The questions which for years were in dispute between the State and General Government, and which unhappily were not decided by the dictates of reason, but referred to the decision of war, having been decided against us, it is the part of wisdom to acquiesce in the result, and of candor to recognize the fact.”

Robert E. Lee (1807–1870) Confederate general in the Civil War

Letter to former Virginia governor John Letcher (28 August 1865), as quoted in Personal Reminiscences, Anecdotes, and Letters of Gen. Robert E. Lee (1875) by John William Jones, p. 203
1860s

Ken Wilber photo

“These two enormous forces — truth and meaning — are at war in today's world. …And something sooner or later has to give.”

Ken Wilber (1949) American writer and public speaker

The Marriage of Sense and Soul (1998)

John Pilger photo

“There is no War on Terrorism; it is The Great Game speeded up. The difference is the rampant nature of the superpower, ensuring infinite dangers for us all.”

John Pilger (1939) Australian journalist

John Pilger, 'War on Terror' a smokescreen created by the ultimate terrorist, America itself http://johnpilger.com/articles/-war-on-terror-a-smokescreen-created-by-the-ultimate-terrorist-america-itself

Mao Zedong photo

“In seeking victory, those who direct a war cannot overstep the limitations imposed by the objective conditions. Within these limitations, however, they can and must play a dynamic role in striving for victory. The stage of action for commanders in a war must be built upon objective possibilities, but on that stage they can direct the performance of many a drama, full of sound and color, power and grandeur.”

Mao Zedong (1893–1976) Chairman of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China

On Protracted Warfare (1938)
Original: (zh-CN) 指导战争的人们不能超越客观条件许可的限度期求战争的胜利,然而可以而且必须在客观条件的限度之内,能动地争取战争的胜利。战争指挥员活动的舞台,必须建筑在客观条件的许可之上,然而他们凭借这个舞台,却可以导演出很多有声有色、威武雄壮的戏剧来。

Ann Coulter photo
Henry Campbell-Bannerman photo

“What is that policy? That now that we had got the men we had been fighting against down, we should punish them as severely as possible, devastate their country, burn their homes, break up their very instruments of agriculture.. It is that we should sweep – as the Spaniards did in Cuba; and how we denounced the Spaniards! – the women and children into camps…in some of which the death-rate has risen so high as 430 in the thousand. I do not say for a moment, because I do not think for a moment, that this is the deliberate and intentional policy of His Majesty's Government…at all events, it is the thing which is being done at this moment in the name and by the authority of this most humane and Christian nation. Yesterday I asked the leader of the House of Commons when the information would be afforded, of which we are so sadly in want. My request was refused. Mr. Balfour treated us with a short disquisition on the nature of war. A phrase often used is that "war is war", but when one comes to ask about it one is told that no war is going on, that it is not war. When is a war not a war? When it is carried on by methods of barbarism in South Africa.”

Henry Campbell-Bannerman (1836–1908) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Speech at the Holborn Restaurant (14 June 1901), quoted in John Wilson, C.B.: A Life of Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman (London: Constable, 1973), p. 349
Leader of the Opposition

John F. Kennedy photo

“The 1930's taught us a clear lesson: aggressive conduct, if allowed to go unchecked and unchallenged ultimately leads to war.”

John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) 35th president of the United States of America

1962, Cuban Missile Crisis speech

Albert Marquet photo

“Over the course of the war I came to understand a lot. The Communists are right... It's terrible that many people haven't understood anything and want to return everything back..”

Albert Marquet (1875–1947) French artist

from the memoirs of Ilya Ehrenburg; as quoted by Mikhail Guerman, in Albert Marquet – The Paradox of Time, Parkstone Aurora Publishers, Bournemouth England, 1995, p. 82
Ilya Ehrenburg wrote that Marquet said him this shortly after the War, in 1946.

Jonathan Swift photo

“Hobbes clearly proves that every creature
Lives in a state of war by nature.”

Jonathan Swift (1667–1745) Anglo-Irish satirist, essayist, and poet

On Poetry: Poetry, a Rhapsody (1733)

Pope John Paul II photo

“Never again war! Never again hatred and intolerance!”

Pope John Paul II (1920–2005) 264th Pope of the Catholic Church, saint

Address on arrival at the Sarajevo Airport on 12 April 1997, during the pope's apostolic journey to Bosnia-Herzegovina
Source: Libreria Editrice Vaticana http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/travels/documents/hf_jp-ii_spe_12041997_sarajevo-arrival_en.html

Albert Speer photo
Christopher Hitchens photo
Carl von Clausewitz photo
Timothy McVeigh photo
John Dryden photo

“Thus in a pageant-show a plot is made;
And peace itself is war in masquerade.”

Pt. I, lines 750–751.
Absalom and Achitophel (1681)

Philip Pullman photo
Julius Streicher photo

“One day, thought Stone, there will be a war and when you get to the front you will last five minutes before someone puts a bullet in your back.”

Christopher Wood (writer) (1935–2015) English writer

Wood, Christopher. "Terrible Hard", Says Alice. London: Constable. 1970. (chapter 1)

Muammar Gaddafi photo
Newton Lee photo

“Humankind too often cooks up an excuse to start war instead of making peace. Rather than developing better strategies to win wars, we should focus on better recipes to attain peace.”

Newton Lee American computer scientist

Counterterrorism and Cybersecurity: Total Information Awareness (2nd Edition), 2015

Walter Lippmann photo
Eerik-Niiles Kross photo
Gustav Stresemann photo

“The question poses itself whether we should look on with folded arms while those Germans of the Baltic countries who, despite all the persecution, all the misery and all the difficulties have stuck to the German language and German culture, are being slaughtered…It would be incomprehensible if we, who have exerted ourselves for the freedom of ethnically foreign nations, failed to let our hearts beat first of all for the Balts, who are our own flesh and blood…If to-day you go to Riga or Mitau, you will be confronted by such a pure, unadulterated Germanism that sometimes you would wish it could be united with Germany…When, in addition to Courland, we have also occupied Latvia and Estonia, then I hope that the day will also come when this old German soil will lie under the protection of the great Reich…This does not mean annexation of these territories. But it does mean a free Baltic in close dependence on Germany, under our military, moral, political, and cultural protection. I think it would be one of the finest aims of this world war if we could merge this piece of loyal Germanism with ourselves as intimately as it desires to be merged…The Baltic Germans have completely preserved their German culture: a shining example for the Americanized grandchildren of German grandfathers.”

Gustav Stresemann (1878–1929) German politician, statesman, and Nobel Peace Prize laureate

Speech in the Reichstag (19 February 1918), quoted in W. M. Knight-Patterson, Germany. From Defeat to Conquest 1913-1933 (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1945), pp. 149-150.
1910s

Glenn Beck photo

“They want a race war. We must be peaceful people. They are gonna poke and poke and poke, and our government is going to stand by and let them do it. We must be — we must take the role of Martin Luther King, because I do not believe that Martin Luther King believed in, "Kill all white babies."”

Glenn Beck (1964) U.S. talk radio and television host

The Glenn Beck Program
Premiere Radio Networks
2010-07-12
Beck: "They want a race war … and our government is going to stand by and let them do it"
2010-07-12
Media Matters for America
http://mediamatters.org/mmtv/201007120021
on The New Black Panther Party
2010s, 2010

A. James Gregor photo

“Every element of Fascist doctrine can be traced to the belief system of revolutionary national syndicalism as that syndicalism emerged from the First World War.”

A. James Gregor (1929–2019) American political scientist

Source: Italian Fascism and Developmental Dictatorship, (1979), p. 119

Ursula K. Le Guin photo
André Maurois photo
Clement Attlee photo
Muhammad of Ghor photo

“The editor introduces Muhammad Ghuri in the Taj-ul-Maasir of Hasan Nizami as follows: 'After dwelling on the advantage and necessity of holy wars, without which the fold of Muhammad's flock could never be filled, he says that such a hero as these obligations of religion require has been found, 'during the reign of the lord of the world Mu'izzu-d dunya wau-d din, the Sultan of Sultans, Abu-l Muzaffar Muhammad bin Sam bin Husain' the destroyer of infidels and plural-worshippers etc.,' and that Almighty Allah had selected him from amongst the kings and emperors of the time, 'for he had employed himself in extirpating the enemies of religion and the state, and had deluged the land of Hind with the blood of their hearts, so that to the very day of resurrection travellers would have to pass over pools of gore in boats, - had taken every fort and stronghold which he attacked, and ground its foundations and pillars to powder under the feet of fierce and gigantic elephants, - had sent the whole world of idolatry to the fire of hell, by the well-watered blade of his Hindi sword, - had founded mosques and colleges in the places of images and idols'.'The narrative proceeds: 'Having equipped and set in order the army of Islam, and unfurled the standards of victory and the flags of power, trusting in the aid of the Almighty, he proceeded towards Hindustan…”

Muhammad of Ghor (1160–1206) Ghurid Sultan

Elliot and Dowson, Vol. II : Elliot and Dowson, History of India as told by its own Historians, 8 Volumes, Allahabad Reprint, 1964. pp. 209-212. Quoted in Sita Ram Goel : The Calcutta Quran Petition, ch. 6.

Andrea Dworkin photo
George S. Patton photo

“I want you to remember that no bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor, dumb bastard die for his country.”

George S. Patton (1885–1945) United States Army general

Spoken by George C. Scott in the film Patton.
Variants:
No man ever won a war by dying for his country. Wars were won by making the other poor bastard die for his.
You don't win a war by dying for your country. You win a war by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his.
War is not meant to be you dying for your country-it is by making the other bastard die for his.
Misattributed

Jack Vance photo

“If ambush I must, then ambush I will,” Aillas muttered to himself. “A fig for chivalry, at least until the war is won.”

Source: Lyonesse Trilogy (1983-1989), The Green Pearl (1985), Chapter 10, section 3 (p. 518)

Wendell Berry photo
Angela Davis photo
Amanda Lear photo

“In Italy I'm big because they're all so sex-obsessed. In Germany I succeeded because they've been waiting for someone like Marlene Dietrich to come along ever since the war. I played on their need for a drunken, nightclubbing vamp. And I've won the gays, who are crucial because they have all the best discos, entirely because of the extraordinary legends about me.”

Amanda Lear (1939) singer, lyricist, composer, painter, television presenter, actress, model

https://www.theguardian.com/theobserver/2000/dec/24/focus.news, The bizarre career of Amanda Lear (At the court of Queen Lear), Andrew Anthony, 24 December 2000, The Observer, www.guardian.co.uk, 6 June 2010

Ilana Mercer photo
Max Beckmann photo

“Oh I wish that I could paint again. Paint is an instrument without which I cannot survive for any length of time. Whenever I even think of gray, green and white, I am overcome with quivers of lust. Then I wish that this war would end and that I might paint again.”

Max Beckmann (1884–1950) German painter, draftsman, printmaker, sculptor and writer

Quote from Beckmann's letter to his first wife Minna, from the front, first World war, 1915; as quoted in Max Beckmann, Stephan Lackner, Bonfini Press Corporation, Naefels, Switzerland, 1983, p. 14
Quote of Max Beckmann, one from a series of letters he wrote to his wife Minna Beckmann-Tube, being medic soldier at the front of World War 1.
1900s - 1920s

Richard L. Daft photo

“The management science approach to organizational decision making is the analog to the rational approach by individual managers. Management science came into being during World War II. At that time, mathematical and statistical techniques were applied to urgent, large-scale military problems that were beyond the ability of individual decision makers. Mathematicians, physicists, and operations researchers used systems analysis to develop artillery trajectories, antisubmarine strategies, and bombing strategies such as salvoing (discharging multiple shells simultaneously). Consider the problem of a battleship trying to sink an enemy ship several miles away. The calculation for aiming the battleship's guns should consider distance, wind speed, shell size, speed and direction of both ships, pitch and roll of the firing ship, and curvature of the earth. Methods for performing such calculations using trial and error and intuition are not accurate, take far too long, and may never achieve success.
This is where management science came in. Analysts were able to identify the relevant variables involved in aiming a ship's guns and could model them with the use of mathematical equations. Distance, speed, pitch, roll, shell size, and so on could be calculated and entered into the equations. The answer was immediate, and the guns could begin firing. Factors such as pitch and roll were soon measured mechanically and fed directly into the targeting mechanism. Today, the human element is completely removed from the targeting process. Radar picks up the target, and the entire sequence is computed automatically.”

Richard L. Daft (1964) American sociologist

Source: Organization Theory and Design, 2007-2010, p. 500

Seishirō Itagaki photo

“It is a place rich in natural resources, having everything we need for national defense, a crucial place for the empire's self-reliance. The place is crucial too for our wars with China, Russia, and the U. S.”

Seishirō Itagaki (1885–1948) Japanese general

About sending troops to China's northeast. March 1931, from speech entitled "Manchuria and Mongolia from the Military Point of View". Quoted in "China in the World Anti-Fascist War" by Peng Xunhou - Page 23 - 2005.

Simone de Beauvoir photo

“After wars peace, after peace, another war. Every day men are born and others die.”

Simone de Beauvoir (1908–1986) French writer, intellectual, existentialist philosopher, political activist, feminist, and social theorist

All Men are Mortal (1946)

Calvin Coolidge photo
David Lloyd George photo

“Any intervention now would be a triumph for Germany! A military triumph! A war triumph! Intervention would have been for us a military disaster. Has the Secretary of State for War no right to express an opinion upon a thing which would be a military disaster? That is what I did, and I do not withdraw a single syllable. It was essential. I could tell the hon. Member how timely it was. I can tell the hon. Member it was not merely the expression of my own opinion, but the expression of the opinion of the Cabinet, of the War Committee, and of our military advisers. It was the opinion of every ally. I can understand men who conscientiously object to all wars. I can understand men who say you will never redeem humanity except by passive endurance of every evil. I can understand men, even—although I do not appreciate the strength of their arguments—who say they do not approve of this particular war. That is not my view, but I can understand it, and it requires courage to say so. But what I cannot understand, what I cannot appreciate, what I cannot respect, is when men preface their speeches by saying they believe in the war, they believe in its origin, they believe in its objects and its cause, and during the time the enemy were in the ascendant never said a word about peace; but the moment our gallant troops are climbing through endurance and suffering up the path of ascendancy begin to howl with the enemy.”

David Lloyd George (1863–1945) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1916/oct/11/statement-by-prime-minister in the House of Commons (11 October 1916)
Secretary of State for War

Osama bin Laden photo

“In today's wars, there are no morals. We believe the worst thieves in the world today and the worst terrorists are the Americans. We do not have to differentiate between military or civilian. As far as we are concerned, they are all targets.”

Osama bin Laden (1957–2011) founder of al-Qaeda

As quoted in "The Most Wanted Man in the World" http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101010924/wosama.html (16 September 2001), Time magazine profile.
2000s, 2001

Camille Paglia photo
Georges Clemenceau photo

“It is easier to make war than make peace.”

Georges Clemenceau (1841–1929) French politician

Il est plus facile de faire la guerre que la paix.
"Discours de Paix" [Speech on Peace] Verdun (20 July 1919)
Prime Minister

Isaac Asimov photo

“Why, Stephen, if I am right, it means that the Machine is conducting our future for us not only simply in direct answer to our direct questions, but in general answer to the world situation and to human psychology as a whole. And to know that may make us unhappy and may hurt our pride. The Machine cannot, must not, make us unhappy.
"Stephen, how do we know what the ultimate good of Humanity will entail? We haven't at our disposal the infinite factors that the Machine has at its! Perhaps, to give you a not unfamiliar example, our entire technical civilization has created more unhappiness and misery than it has removed. Perhaps an agrarian or pastoral civilization, with less culture and less people would be better. If so, the Machines must move in that direction, preferably without telling us, since in our ignorant prejudices we only know that what we are used to, is good—and we would then fight change. Or perhaps a complete urbanization, or a completely caste-ridden society, or complete anarchy, is the answer. We don't know. Only the Machines know, and they are going there and taking us with them."
"But you are telling me, Susan, that the 'Society for Humanity' is right; and that Mankind has lost its own say in its future."
"It never had any, really. It was always at the mercy of economic and sociological forces it did not understand—at the whims of climate, and the fortunes of war. Now the Machines understand them; and no one can stop them, since the Machines will deal with them as they are dealing with the Society,—having, as they do, the greatest of weapons at their disposal, the absolute control of our economy."
"How horrible!”

"Perhaps how wonderful! Think, that for all time, all conflicts are finally evitable. Only the Machines, from now on, are inevitable!"
“The Evitable Conflict”, p. 192
I, Robot (1950)

Primo Levi photo
Curtis LeMay photo
F. Scott Fitzgerald photo
Robert Hall photo

“Settle it therefore in your minds, as a maxim never to be effaced or forgotten, that atheism is an inhuman, bloody, ferocious system, equally hostile to every useful restraint and to every virtuous affection; that, leaving nothing above us to excite awe, nor round us to awaken tenderness, it wages war with heaven and with earth: its first object is to dethrone God, its next to destroy man.”

Robert Hall (1764–1831) British Baptist pastor

Rev. Robert Hall, sermon to Baptist meeting, Cambridge, quoted in [1843, The Baptist Library: a republication of standard Baptist works, 2, Charles George Sommers, William R. Williams, Levi L. Hill, 108, http://books.google.com/books?id=CgxMAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA108]

Artur Balder photo

“I am the unknown Will,
The Anger that threatens glory and ruin:
Lord of Storms am I,
in heaven high and caverns deep.
I am the Father of the War,
Odin for you, Wotan for him,
Wayfarer, Wanderer, beggar, king,
numen, genius, strength and ring.”

Artur Balder (1974) Spanish film director

Invocation of the Nordic god Odin, from "Invocations and Oracles", Germanic Appendices, Volume V of the Teutoburg Saga, as quoted in advance posting (30 September 2014) https://m.facebook.com/ArturBalderWeb/photos/a.328905527173875.77327.224962374234858/757576457640111/?type=1

Thomas Babington Macaulay, 1st Baron Macaulay photo

“Press where ye see my white plume shine, amidst the ranks of war,
And be your oriflamme today the helmet of Navarre.”

Thomas Babington Macaulay, 1st Baron Macaulay (1800–1859) British historian and Whig politician

Ivry: A Song of the Huguenots http://www.bartleby.com/246/76.html, l. 29 (1824)

Muhammad bin Qasim photo

“A mine was dug, and in two or three days the walls fell down, and the fort of Multan was taken. Six thousand warriors were put to death, and all their relations and dependents were taken as slaves. Protection was given to the merchants, artisans and the agriculturists. Muhammad Kasim said the booty ought to be sent to the treasury of the Khalifa; but as the soldiers have taken so much pains, have suffered so many hardships, have hazarded their lives, and have been so long a time employed in digging the mine and carrying on the war, and as the fort is now taken, it is proper that the booty should be divided, and their dues given to the soldiers. Then all the great and principal inhabitants of the city assembled together, and silver to the weight of sixty thousand dirams was distributed and every horseman got a share of four hundred dirams weight. After this, Muhammad Kasim said that some plan should be devised for realizing the money to be sent to the Khalifa. He was pondering over this, when suddenly a Brahman came and said, 'Heathenism is now at an end, the temples are thrown down, the world has received the light of Islam, and mosques are built instead of idol temples. I have heard from the elders of Multan that in ancient times there was a chief in this city whose name was Jibawin, and who was a descendent of the Rai of Kashmir. He was a Brahman and a monk, he strictly followed his religion, and always occupied his time in worshipping idols. When his treasures exceeded all limits and computation, he made a reservoir on the eastern side of Multan, which was hundred yards square. In the middle of it he built a temple fifty yards square, and he made a chamber in which he concealed forty copper jars each of which was filled with African gold dust. A treasure of three hundred and thirty mans of gold was buried there. Over it there is an idol made of red gold, and trees are planted round the reservoir.'… It is related by historians, on the authority of… Ali bin Muhammad who had heard it from Abu Muhammad Hindui that Muhammad Kasim arose and with his counsellors, guards and attendants, went to the temple. He saw there an idol made of gold, and its two eye were bright red rubies… Muhammad Kasim ordered the idol to be taken up. Two hundred and thirty mans of gold were obtained, and forty jars filled with gold dust… This gold and the image were brought to treasury together with the gems and pearls and treasures which were obtained from the plunder of Multan.”

Muhammad bin Qasim (695–715) Umayyad general

Multan (Punjab) . The Chach Nama, in: Elliot and Dowson, Vol. I : Elliot and Dowson, History of India as told by its own Historians, 8 Volumes, Allahabad Reprint, 1964. pp. 205-06.
Quotes from The Chach Nama

John McCain photo

“War is wretched beyond description, and only a fool or a fraud could sentimentalize its cruel reality.”

John McCain (1936–2018) politician from the United States

Speech to the American Red Cross "Promise of Humanity" conference http://mccain.senate.gov/index.cfm?fuseaction=Newscenter.ViewPressRelease&Content_id=820 (6 May 1999).
1990s

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Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury photo
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