In our view, all-out war promises the least success in achieving the objectives we have outlined.
War Quotes
Two of the best-known lines about war are flagged as misattributed, and both stories are worth knowing.
“In war, truth is the first casualty” is credited to Aeschylus, and sometimes to the US senator Hiram Johnson. It is not in his speeches. The first recorded use Wikiquote found is by Philip Snowden in July 1916, introducing a book by E. D. Morel, and he wrote “it has been said”, so it was probably already going around. Samuel Johnson made the same point in The Idler in 1758, about “the falsehoods which interest dictates and credulity encourages”.
“Men grow tired of sleep, love, singing and dancing, sooner than of war” is credited to Homer, and it is a misquotation of the Iliad (Book 13). In the original, most men prefer those things to war. It is the Trojans who can never get enough of fighting.
War's very object is victory, not prolonged indecision. In war there is no substitute for victory.
Victories win wars. Give people victory and they won't care who won it.
My friends, there is no Palestinian-Israeli conflict. There is only the global war on terrorism.
Right now, the choice isn't between war and peace. It is between war and endless war.
War's a fearsome thing. They'll be cunning that catches me at this wark again.
Are there quantitative aspects to the phenomena of war that can be counted? Evidently!