This morning, I heard that a Turkish politician said, arguing that Turkey should support the US military action: "At the victory feast, do we want to be a guest of honor, or an item on the menu?"
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Great Quotes from the War
- Thread starter Spray92109
- Start date
"Wars throughout history have been waged for conquest and plunder.... the working class who fight all the battles, the working class who make the supreme sacrifices, the working class who freely shed their blood and furnish their corpses, have never yet had a voice in either declaring war or making peace. It is the ruling class that invariably does both. They alone declare war and they alone make peace....They are continually talking about their patriotic duty. It is not their but your patriotic duty that they are concerned about. There is a decided difference. Their patriotic duty never takes them to the firing line or chucks them into the trenches."
-Eugene Debs
-Eugene Debs
"From within the dispute between India and Pakistan, issues of national sovereignty and religious identity seem worth the risk even of nuclear war, but from outside there is no conceivable justification of that risk... But that contradiction adheres in every situation of war. From within a dispute, drastic action is always justified. From outside it, compromise, negotiation, and restraint are always seen as preferable to violence. The India-Pakistan war, in other words, is a revelation of the futility of war as such..... The only way to live humanly - still - is in resistance to war. The prevention of war, in the nuclear age, must be a central purpose of every person's life. Scientists, physicians, lawyers, bishops, mothers, students, writers - where are you? We must remember what we learned already, but forgot; what the leaders of India and Pakistan are showing us again: If we human beings leave this problem to governments, we are doomed."
-James Carroll
-James Carroll
"Follow me if I advance! Kill me if I retreat! Revenge me I die!
Ngo Dinh Diem, Vietnam
"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."
Franklin D Roosevelt, US
"I don't know what effect these men will have upon the enemy, but, by God, they terrify me."
Duke of Wellington, GB
"The nation which forgets its defenders will be itself forgotten."
Calvin Coolidge, US
"Victory belongs to the most persevering."
Napoleon Bonaparte, FR
"I came, I saw, I conquered."
Julius Ceasar, Rome
"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance."
Thomas Jefferson, US
"The most persistent sound which reverberates through man's history is the beating of war drums."
Arthur Koestler, UK
"When we assumed the soldier, we did not lay aside the citizen".
George Washington, US
"Soldiers usually win the battles and generals get the credit for them".
Napoleon Bonaparte, FR
"The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his."
George Patton, US
"A young man who does not have what it takes to perform military service is not likely to have what it takes to make a living".
John F Kennedy, US
"Let him who desires peace prepare for war".
Vegetius, Roman (4th Century)
"I have nothing to offer but book, toil, tears and sweat."
Winston Churchill, UK
"The number of medals on an officer's breat varies in inverse proportion to the square of the distance of his duties from the front line."
Oscar Wilde
"Always forgive your enemies. Nothing annoys them so much."
Oscar Wilde
"God is not on the side of the battalions, but on the side of those who shoot best".
Voltaire, FR
"Discipline is simply the art of making the soldiers fear their officers more than the enemy".
Helvetius
"In war there is no substitute for victory"
General Douglas MacArthur, US
"There is no avoiding war, it can only be postponed to the advantage of others."
Niccolo Machiavelli, IT
"Keep your fears to yourself, but share your courage with others."
Robert Lewis Stevenson
"Get action. Seize the moment. Man was never intended to become a oyster."
Theodore Roosevelt, US
"We make war that we may live in peace."
Aristotle
"If you want to know the taste of a pear, you must change the pear by eating it yourself. If you want to know the theory and methods of revolution, you must take part in the revolution. All genuine knowledge originates in direct experience."
Mao Zedong, China
"Above all, we must realize that no arsenal, or no weapon in the arsenals of the worked are so formidable as the will and moral and courage of free men and women. It is a weapon adversaries in today's world do not have".
Ronald Reagan, US
Ngo Dinh Diem, Vietnam
"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."
Franklin D Roosevelt, US
"I don't know what effect these men will have upon the enemy, but, by God, they terrify me."
Duke of Wellington, GB
"The nation which forgets its defenders will be itself forgotten."
Calvin Coolidge, US
"Victory belongs to the most persevering."
Napoleon Bonaparte, FR
"I came, I saw, I conquered."
Julius Ceasar, Rome
"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance."
Thomas Jefferson, US
"The most persistent sound which reverberates through man's history is the beating of war drums."
Arthur Koestler, UK
"When we assumed the soldier, we did not lay aside the citizen".
George Washington, US
"Soldiers usually win the battles and generals get the credit for them".
Napoleon Bonaparte, FR
"The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his."
George Patton, US
"A young man who does not have what it takes to perform military service is not likely to have what it takes to make a living".
John F Kennedy, US
"Let him who desires peace prepare for war".
Vegetius, Roman (4th Century)
"I have nothing to offer but book, toil, tears and sweat."
Winston Churchill, UK
"The number of medals on an officer's breat varies in inverse proportion to the square of the distance of his duties from the front line."
Oscar Wilde
"Always forgive your enemies. Nothing annoys them so much."
Oscar Wilde
"God is not on the side of the battalions, but on the side of those who shoot best".
Voltaire, FR
"Discipline is simply the art of making the soldiers fear their officers more than the enemy".
Helvetius
"In war there is no substitute for victory"
General Douglas MacArthur, US
"There is no avoiding war, it can only be postponed to the advantage of others."
Niccolo Machiavelli, IT
"Keep your fears to yourself, but share your courage with others."
Robert Lewis Stevenson
"Get action. Seize the moment. Man was never intended to become a oyster."
Theodore Roosevelt, US
"We make war that we may live in peace."
Aristotle
"If you want to know the taste of a pear, you must change the pear by eating it yourself. If you want to know the theory and methods of revolution, you must take part in the revolution. All genuine knowledge originates in direct experience."
Mao Zedong, China
"Above all, we must realize that no arsenal, or no weapon in the arsenals of the worked are so formidable as the will and moral and courage of free men and women. It is a weapon adversaries in today's world do not have".
Ronald Reagan, US
tyrez-
Those are great quotes. But how does one apply them?
I guess Hussein did challenge Bush to a duel. Perhaps that should have been what settled the dispute.
The American Civil War was probably the prime example of "rich man's war, poor man's fight" in this nation's history. But would a few more generations of slavery been better or worse? (I know it wasn't fought over slavery, but, as with many wars, the end of slavery was a result, at least until they figured out sharecropping...)
India and Pakistan are like a B-list USSR and USA during the Cold War. I don't know exactly how their border dispute compares with anything the US is currently doing.
How does one connect the philosophy with the reality?
Those are great quotes. But how does one apply them?
I guess Hussein did challenge Bush to a duel. Perhaps that should have been what settled the dispute.
The American Civil War was probably the prime example of "rich man's war, poor man's fight" in this nation's history. But would a few more generations of slavery been better or worse? (I know it wasn't fought over slavery, but, as with many wars, the end of slavery was a result, at least until they figured out sharecropping...)
India and Pakistan are like a B-list USSR and USA during the Cold War. I don't know exactly how their border dispute compares with anything the US is currently doing.
How does one connect the philosophy with the reality?
Oh boy, Tyrez ... quoting Eugene Debs! That's gonna nick you up another notch on the Disco Tex "Daily-Worker-reading Leftist Pansy" scale! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" />
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Originally posted by Spray92109:
<strong>tyrez-
Those are great quotes. But how does one apply them?
...How does one connect the philosophy with the reality?</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">#1: I thought it would be useful to bring in a point that we haven’t seemed to cover in all of our soap-boxing on the BB. Wars are never fought by the folks who start them (Senators, Presidents, Tyrants, etc.), instead the actual fighting and dying is left up to the poor, for the most part. I know the US has an all-volunteer military, but save a few college boys, the vast majority of the people who are fighting are people who joined the service as a last-ditch option. On the “other” side it’s even worse as once you remove the Republican Guard from the equation, we’re pretty much going to be killing the people we’re supposed to be saving from Saddam.
#2: It’s interesting to look at a pre-9/11 quote about a conflict that most have either forgotten about or never even heard of. India and Pakistan not too long ago were on the verge of nuclear war when they were going back and forth with nuclear tests on their borders. For them, it was the end all, the logical conclusion to a long-standing feud. But to all of us outsiders, no matter how much they talked about “national security,” “sovereignty issues” or “self-defense,” we realized that war was not the answer there and we stepped in and helped to defuse the situation. Removed from the heat of the dispute, the rest of the world saw that the best way to solve the problem was not with mushroom clouds but with diplomacy. I think that it’s usefull for the US to try and remove itself from the “heat of the dispute” and look at it from the outside, where I think the view would be very much different.
How’s that?
<strong>tyrez-
Those are great quotes. But how does one apply them?
...How does one connect the philosophy with the reality?</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">#1: I thought it would be useful to bring in a point that we haven’t seemed to cover in all of our soap-boxing on the BB. Wars are never fought by the folks who start them (Senators, Presidents, Tyrants, etc.), instead the actual fighting and dying is left up to the poor, for the most part. I know the US has an all-volunteer military, but save a few college boys, the vast majority of the people who are fighting are people who joined the service as a last-ditch option. On the “other” side it’s even worse as once you remove the Republican Guard from the equation, we’re pretty much going to be killing the people we’re supposed to be saving from Saddam.
#2: It’s interesting to look at a pre-9/11 quote about a conflict that most have either forgotten about or never even heard of. India and Pakistan not too long ago were on the verge of nuclear war when they were going back and forth with nuclear tests on their borders. For them, it was the end all, the logical conclusion to a long-standing feud. But to all of us outsiders, no matter how much they talked about “national security,” “sovereignty issues” or “self-defense,” we realized that war was not the answer there and we stepped in and helped to defuse the situation. Removed from the heat of the dispute, the rest of the world saw that the best way to solve the problem was not with mushroom clouds but with diplomacy. I think that it’s usefull for the US to try and remove itself from the “heat of the dispute” and look at it from the outside, where I think the view would be very much different.
How’s that?
CNN is one of the participants in the war. I have a fantasy where Ted Turner is elected president but refuses because he doesn't want to give up power.
- Arthur C. Clarke
- Arthur C. Clarke
"The French are a smallish, monkey-looking bunch and not dressed any better, on average, than the citizens of Baltimore. True, you can sit outside in Paris and drink little cups of coffee, but why this is more stylish than sitting inside and drinking large glasses of whiskey I don't know."
--- P.J O'Rourke (1989)
--- P.J O'Rourke (1989)
Tyrez- That says it all- a quote from the famous socialist and wannabe wealth redistributor Mr Eugene Debs himself.
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Originally posted by barnacle:
<strong>Tyrez- That says it all- a quote from the famous socialist and wannabe wealth redistributor Mr Eugene Debs himself.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">So you agree with him, yes?
<strong>Tyrez- That says it all- a quote from the famous socialist and wannabe wealth redistributor Mr Eugene Debs himself.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">So you agree with him, yes?
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Originally posted by tyrez:
<strong>On the “other” side it’s even worse as once you remove the Republican Guard from the equation, we’re pretty much going to be killing the people we’re supposed to be saving from Saddam.</strong>
</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">But what is the alternative? People whom fate has cruelly put in that position have few choices. Remember, all my male ancestors were in the same place. So what do you do about it? Do those who fight for Hussein deserve to live, while innocent people who do NOT fight for him die at the hands of his troops?
I've thought about this a lot, and I can't come up with one.
Moreover, wars are not always fought for conquest, and there is such thing as defense. I am not sure which it is this time. But it's also not true that no one but the "working class" ever fights, either. There are no "classes", per se, in the modern US. There is a continuum of wealth and power levels, that can be roughly separated into "classes", but the fact of the matter is that people with any money and power (or even influence) will use it to ensure their own safety if they can. Sometimes they have enough, sometimes not. Obviously, people with the most money and power can call upon the most resources to ensure their own safety. But I personally don't agree with Debs' oversimplification of the world.
Now I DO agree with what you wrote about who is in the military and how they get there. Of course, I don't have anything against the notion of risk and reward; many people have used the military to rise up the socio-economic ladder (to a higher "class"). This has always been true. The risk they take is the ultimate risk.
Yes, some people here forget about the soldier on the ground in Iraq. But certainly some people don't. I can't; most of my immediate neighborhood is owned by the US Navy, and I see real faces of real Sailors, real Marines, real kids, real spouses, every day of my life, all around me.
But then I think of the people who are just as real, living under Hussein. I think of the Palestinians in Israel. I think of the people who have died at the hands of other everywhere. And I think that the US military has a place in the world that is not about conquest and money.
[ March 18, 2003, 11:52 AM: Message edited by: Spray92109 ]
<strong>On the “other” side it’s even worse as once you remove the Republican Guard from the equation, we’re pretty much going to be killing the people we’re supposed to be saving from Saddam.</strong>
</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">But what is the alternative? People whom fate has cruelly put in that position have few choices. Remember, all my male ancestors were in the same place. So what do you do about it? Do those who fight for Hussein deserve to live, while innocent people who do NOT fight for him die at the hands of his troops?
I've thought about this a lot, and I can't come up with one.
Moreover, wars are not always fought for conquest, and there is such thing as defense. I am not sure which it is this time. But it's also not true that no one but the "working class" ever fights, either. There are no "classes", per se, in the modern US. There is a continuum of wealth and power levels, that can be roughly separated into "classes", but the fact of the matter is that people with any money and power (or even influence) will use it to ensure their own safety if they can. Sometimes they have enough, sometimes not. Obviously, people with the most money and power can call upon the most resources to ensure their own safety. But I personally don't agree with Debs' oversimplification of the world.
Now I DO agree with what you wrote about who is in the military and how they get there. Of course, I don't have anything against the notion of risk and reward; many people have used the military to rise up the socio-economic ladder (to a higher "class"). This has always been true. The risk they take is the ultimate risk.
Yes, some people here forget about the soldier on the ground in Iraq. But certainly some people don't. I can't; most of my immediate neighborhood is owned by the US Navy, and I see real faces of real Sailors, real Marines, real kids, real spouses, every day of my life, all around me.
But then I think of the people who are just as real, living under Hussein. I think of the Palestinians in Israel. I think of the people who have died at the hands of other everywhere. And I think that the US military has a place in the world that is not about conquest and money.
[ March 18, 2003, 11:52 AM: Message edited by: Spray92109 ]