Richard Cobden Quotes

To be prepared for war is one of the most effective means of preserving peace.

I came here as a practical man, to talk, not simply on the question of peace and war, but to treat another question which is of hardly less importance - the enormous and burdensome standing armaments which it is the practice of modern Governments to sustain in time of peace.

Whenever there is talk of peace, there is anger in the military- industrial- political complex.

A certain degree of preparation for war ... affords also the best security for the continuance of peace.

Anyone who believes that the eternal question of war and peace in Europe is no longer there risks being deeply mistaken.

... the notion that the greater the preparation for war the smaller the probability of its occurrence might well appear a reductio ad absurdum of militarism, implying, as it does, that the only way to secure an eternal world peace is to concentrate the entire energy of all nations upon the art of war ...

To insist on strength ... is not war-mongering. It is peace-mongering.

The Mutual Security Act was intended not to fight a war but to prevent a war.

But I feel convinced, and I venture even to prophesy in this regard, that the time will come when there will also be a minister of peace in the cabinet, seated beside the ministers of war.

That is the best Government, which best provides for war.

Our modern states are preparing for war without even knowing the future enemy.

War and preparations for war have acquired a kind of legitimacy.

To secure peace is to prepare for war.

The only foreign policy advice I heard from China was when they said to Sudan, 'Don't go back to war.' That's all they said. They didn't push anything else.

War is just one more big government program.

I know that military alliances and armament have been the reliance for peace for centuries, but they do not produce peace; and when war comes, as it inevitably does under such conditions, these armaments and alliances but intensify and broaden the conflict.

What a country calls its vital... interests are not things that help its people live, but things that help it make war.

The firmest security of peace is the preparation during peace of the defenses of war.

The duty of defense is maintain peace and avoid war.

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

The most expensive peace is far less costly than the cheapest war.

Wars are most often won by those who have made the greatest effort to prevent them.

As long as there are sovereign nations possessing great power, war is inevitable.

Though the object of being a Great Power is to be able to fight a Great War, the only way of remaining a Great Power is not to fight one.

I have done all I can to prevent wars. All my life I've been dedicated to preventing just what has happened today.