“No battle plan survives first contact with the enemy. Not when the enemy is me.”

“No plan survives contact with the enemy”

“No plan survives the first encounter with your enemy, so why bother to make one?”

“No business plan survives its first contact with customers.”

“The enemy of a good plan is the dream of a perfect plan.”

“It was a good plan, and like all plans since the dawn of time, this would fail to survive contact with real life.”

“.., by universal custom, your enemy is never more polite than when he is planning or has planned your destruction.”

“He's probably their battle poet, too."
"You mean he makes up heroic songs about famous battles?"
"No, no. He recites poems that frighten the enemy…. When a well-trained gonnagle starts to recite, the enemy's ears explode.”

“The Chinese, in their infinite wisdom, have taught me that one must know when to choose between the primary and secondary enemy. For China, the primary enemy is the Soviet Union, and the secondary one is America. Therefore, they deal with the Soviet Union first, and America later. For me, the primary enemy is American imperialism and Lon Nol's fascism. My secondary enemies are the communists. Thus, I choose to ally myself with the secondary enemy to defeat the primary.”

“She saw that in all wars, the first stage was to dehumanize the enemy, reduce the enemy to a lower level so that he might be killed without compunction. When the enemy was not human to begin with, the task was easier.”