“The engineers made hard forms. Evil. With angles. They are easily broken. The world is round and soft..”

— Vladimir Tatlin

quote, c. 1930; cited by Christina Lodder https://utopiadystopiawwi.wordpress.com/constructivism/vladimir-tatlin/letalin/, in Russian Constructivism; Yale University Press, Connecticut, 1983, p. 214
The 'Letatlin' Tatlin constructed in organic round and oval forms
Quotes, 1926 - 1954

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

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Vladimir Tatlin 7

Russian artist 1885–1953

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“But there comes a time when soft power or talking with evil will not work where, unfortunately, hard power is the only thing that works.”

Colin Powell (1937) Former U.S. Secretary of State and retired four-star general

Response to a question by George Carey (a former Archbishop of Canterbury), after the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland (26 January 2003), as to whether the US had given due consideration to the use of "soft power" vs "hard power" against the regime of Saddam Hussein; this has sometimes been portrayed as an accusation by an Archbishop of Canterbury that the United States was engaged in "empire building", in which Powell's response has been paraphrased:
2000s
Context: There is nothing in American experience or in American political life or in our culture that suggests we want to use hard power. But what we have found over the decades is that unless you do have hard power — and here I think you're referring to military power — then sometimes you are faced with situations that you can't deal with.
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So our record of living our values and letting our values be an inspiration to others I think is clear. And I don't think I have anything to be ashamed of or apologize for with respect to what America has done for the world.
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