Michael Huffington Quotes

Blunders are an inescapable feature of war, because choice in military affairs lies generally between the bad and the worse.

For some years I have spent my time on exactly these questions - both in thinking about ways to prevent war, and in thinking about how to fight, survive, and terminate a war, should it occur.

From the point of the view of the nation's power, it was obvious that while we were fighting the Sino-Japanese war, every effort was to be made to avoid adding to our enemies and opening additional fronts.

To go to war, you must always think of, can you win?

President Kennedy was willing to go to war. He was not a coward. The man had been in war and so had Ken O'Donnell. He was ready to protect this nation, but he was not ready for a military solution just because it was being rammed down his throat.

I think in national security, the war in Iraq is troublesome and a difficult challenge, but our troops and the military leaders we have are managing that situation, although it continues to be very risky and very dangerous.

The Commonwealth of Venice in their armoury have this inscription, "Happy is that city which in time of peace thinks of war.

It is better to make our enemy's country the theater of war than our own.

In cases of defense, it is best to weigh the enemy more than he seems.

Whenever we get involved in a war, the White House seems to have 3 priorities: We cannot appear to be losing; we must appear to be winning; we must look like we know what we are doing.

Every aspect of war is political.

Any future Defense Secretary who advises the President to again send a big American land army into Asia or into the Middle East or Africa should have his head examined.

Wars the United States starts do not necessarily end when and how it wants them to.

Israel must win every single war that it fights. Our enemies only have to win one war.

Obama's decision to leave, to not sustain the victory that resulted after eight years of fighting, from 2003 to 2011 in Iraq, was another incredibly stupid decision. It was totally based on politics, not based on any notion of national security. It's a nightmare for our national security. And then you have the Libya intervention.

War is, in fact, an extension of politics, and in any war, military operations have to be conducted in such a way that they contribute to sustainable political outcomes consistent with vital interests that are at stake in that war.

Internal unity means that external security issues can be dealt with.

We are a fighting nation, continually struggling to overcome diseases from within... and to face up to foreign intervention from without.

I know I will be severely criticized by the interventionists in America when I say we should not enter a war unless we have a reasonable chance of winning.

America's foreign policy lacks the backbone to do the right thing in Afghanistan - which is leave.

To protect America's security, we are going to have to pull America's military out of the swamp of Washington politics.

I've kind of found out that when I do get into trouble, that when I do have people on base, sometimes the best thing is to throw a little bit more off-speed, back off a little bit.

Charlie Rangel is angry about the Iraq war, the one that Henry Kissinger has told us we can't win. Thanks, Henry, but most Americans figured that out before you did. Rangel saw combat in Korea. Kissinger has only seen combat on TV. That might have something to do with why Kissinger thinks our troops should stay in Iraq even though we can't win.

National security is not just things that go boom. It is not just terrorists and foreign adversaries.

Do not swallow bait offered by the enemy. Do not interfere with an army that is returning home.