“I divide my officers into four groups. There are clever, diligent, stupid, and lazy officers. Usually two characteristics are combined. Some are clever and diligent -- their place is the General Staff. The next lot are stupid and lazy -- they make up 90 percent of every army and are suited to routine duties. Anyone who is both clever and lazy is qualified for the highest leadership duties, because he possesses the intellectual clarity and the composure necessary for difficult decisions. One must beware of anyone who is stupid and diligent -- he must not be entrusted with any responsibility because he will always cause only mischief.”
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Kurt von Hammerstein-Equord 3
German general 1878–1943Related quotes

“To be clever enough to get all that money, one must be stupid enough to want it.”
The Innocence of Father Brown (1911) The Paradise of Thieves
The Father Brown Mystery Series (1910 - 1927)

“There are so many different kinds of stupidity, and cleverness is one of the worst.”
Source: The Magic Mountain

“No clever person can help here; I see that clearly. Here, only stupidity can help the stupid one!”
Original: (de) "Hier hilft kein Kluger, das seh’ ich klar: hier hilft dem Dummen die Dummheit allein!"
Source: Quotes from his operas, Siegfried, Mime, the dwarf (and master metal-smith), Act 1, Scene 3

Remarks quoted in Red Horizons: Chronicles of a Communist Spy Chief (1987) by Ion Mihai Pacepa, p. 110

“Dissimulation is innate in woman, and almost as much a quality of the stupid as of the clever.”
"Of Women"
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Studies in Pessimism