thought provoking quotes about war
50 Thought-provoking Quotes About War
This Buzzle article highlights some of the most inspirational quotes about war, and the effects of the same. Continue reading for a great compilation of the best thought-provoking war quotes.
"Fighting for peace, is like f***ing for chastity."
That war is never good, of that we all know. It destroys the very base of humanity; and yet, countries go to war. They fight over invisible borders and materialistic values, they fight over things that should not matter, over an Earth that they don't love as their own. They fight the rich man's war, to appease his hunger for power and money, and they destroy generations and generations of values and culture. They sow the seeds of mistrust and insecurity, and make a mockery of the term human rights. And yet, there is war. And there is constant, unrelenting fear.
Several prolific authors, poets, and other learned people have tackled the subject of war in their works. While some approach it in a direct, hard-hitting manner, others use a more subtle, sarcastic, and sometimes, even funny style to portray the many facets and effects of war. In this Buzzle article, we bring to you a compiled list of thought-provoking quotes about war that will serve as eye openers on what war really is.
― Stephen King
Famous Sayings About War
"War is what happens when language fails."
― Margaret Atwood
"I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."
― Albert Einstein
"Only the dead have seen the end of war."
― Plato
"The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him."
― G.K. Chesterton
"Never think that war, no matter how necessary, nor how justified, is not a crime."
― Ernest Hemingway
"What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or in the holy name of liberty or democracy?"
― Mahatma Gandhi
"War does not determine who is right - only who is left."
― Bertrand Russell
"All war is a symptom of man's failure as a thinking animal."
― John Steinbeck
"It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets."
― Voltaire
"There is no flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people."
― Howard Zinn
"When the rich wage war it's the poor who die."
― Jean-Paul Sartre
"Older men declare war. But it is youth that must fight and die."
― Herbert Hoover
"How is it possible to have a civil war?"
― George Carlin
"How can you have a war on terrorism when war itself is terrorism?"
― Howard Zinn
"Wars are poor chisels for carving out peaceful tomorrows."
― Martin Luther King Jr.
"The world is full enough of hurts and mischances without wars to multiply them."
― J.R.R. Tolkien
"If we don't end war, war will end us."
― H.G. Wells
"Religion isn't the cause of wars, it's the excuse."
― Jasper Fforde
"Men make war to get attention. All killing is an expression of self-hate."
― Alice Walker
"It doesn't make a damned bit of difference who wins the war to someone who's dead."
― Joseph Heller
"There is a savage beast in every man, and when you hand that man a sword or spear and send him forth to war, the beast stirs."
― George R.R. Martin
"I'm fed up to the ears with old men dreaming up wars for young men to die in."
― George S. McGovern
"I dream of giving birth to a child who will ask, Mother, what was war?"
― Eve Merriam
"It is well that war is so terrible, or we should grow too fond of it."
― Robert E. Lee
"Frankly, our ancestors don't seem much to brag about. I mean, look at the state they left us in, with the wars, the broken planet. Clearly, they didn't care about what would happen to the people who came after them."
― Suzanne Collins
"One day President Roosevelt told me that he was asking publicly for suggestions about what the war should be called. I said at once 'The Unnecessary War'."
― Winston S. Churchill
"'Peace?' said Vetinari. 'Ah, yes, defined as period of time to allow for preparation for the next war."
― Terry Pratchett
"Have we raised the threshold of horror so high that nothing short of a nuclear strike qualifies as a 'real' war? Are we to spend the rest of our lives in this state of high alert with guns pointed at each other's heads and fingers trembling on the trigger?"
― Arundhati Roy
"They won the war but lost the peace."
― Jonathan Maberry
"Once you hear the details of victory, it is hard to distinguish it from a defeat."
― Jean-Paul Sartre
"...the object of waging a war is always to be in a better position in which to wage another war."
― George Orwell
"How much energy they put into harming each other. How little into saving."
― Suzanne Collins
"No soldier ever really survives a war."
― Audie Murphy
"These men are worth your tears. You are not worth their merriment."
― Wilfred Owen
"The military don't start wars. Politicians start wars."
― William C. Westmoreland
"You don't spread democracy with a barrel of a gun."
― Helen Thomas
"A bad peace is worse than war."
― Tacitus
"You can't hammer in a nail with words..."
"No, but you can start a war with them."
― Ben Galley
"Well, politics is war, and in war, truth is the first casualty."
― Jeff Greenfield
"War grows out of desire of the individual to gain advantage at the expense of his fellow man."
― Napoleon Hill
"The folly of war is that it can have no natural end except in the extinction an entire people."
― Joyce Carol Oates
"There is only one way to win a war which has begun: To stop it immediately; that is the way!"
― Mehmet Murat ildan
"War is merely the continuation of politics by other means."
― Carl von Clausewitz
"You must learn to end the wars in your world by ending them in your minds."
― Barbara Marciniak
Funny Sayings About War
"God created war so that Americans would learn geography."
― Mark Twain
"We are going to have peace even if we have to fight for it."
― Dwight D. Eisenhower
"I would rather make love than war, but only because condoms kill millions of lives more enjoyably."
― Jarod Kintz
"This film cost $31 million. With that kind of money I could have invaded some country."
― Clint Eastwood
"I'd start a war just to illustrate the value of peace."
― Jarod Kintz
"No two countries that both had McDonald's had fought a war against each other since each got its McDonald's."
― Thomas L. Friedman