Eric Shinseki Quotes

I worked for the troops my entire time in the United States Armed Forces because we know in the United States Armed Forces that it's not the generals and the colonels that win battles, it's the soldiers: it's the people at the front, the mechanics with their wrenches, the drivers moving the logistics back in the rear.

I always said my favorite position was company commander in the Paratroop Brigade.

I think the troops deserve the best equipment on the battlefield, the best training, and American armor if they get in trouble.

In my proper character, I am an officer of the United States Army.

As a Marine officer in combat, I was responsible for the lives and safety of all the Marines who served with me.

You know, the commander-in-chief's first responsibility is look out for those in uniform who fight the wars.

I submit that those who run the American military at the top, and those whose boots are on the ground and who run the machinery and equipment, are sending a signal: You asked us to do something. Give us some time and we will solve the problems and we will do it.

I was commanding officer of a supersonic fighter squadron, F-8 Crusaders.

I am a general. My soldiers are the keys and I have to command them.

The military executes policy decisions.

History tells us that a general can move and feed an army as efficiently as he likes, but the real litmus test is the battlefield.

I joined the Marines, passed Special Forces selection, and became a young leader in the military.

The right rules of engagement means giving our forward commanders the authority and flexibility to take the initiative and win. Trust our forward deployed warriors to do their job. Political appointees running the war from Washington is just wrong.

Our military sons and daughters that are placed in harm's way deserve the right equipment, the right training, and the right rules of engagement to win decisively on any field of battle.

Picatinny Arsenal is essential to the safety of our women and men in the field and to delivering a qualitative edge for our military.

You have to give the soldiers, the Army, a clear vision.

A lot of what a military officer does is not just leading troops in combat. It's also doing budgets. It's solving complex problems. If you can sit down with warlords, you can certainly sit down with different parties and folks with different interests and come out with an amenable solution.

We get our military people to come back and make recommendations to me and I will follow those recommendations. I will follow them very strongly.

When the higher officers are angry and insubordinate, and on meeting the enemy give battle on their own account from a feeling of resentment, before the commander-in-chief can tell whether or not he is in a position to fight, the result is ruin.

The most important thing I learned is that soldiers watch what their leaders do. You can give them classes and lecture them forever, but it is your personal example they will follow.

To hope for safety in flight, when you have turned away from the enemy the arms by which the body is defended, is indeed madness. In battle those who are most afraid are always in most danger; but courage is equivalent to rampart.

Armour is light at table.

The best generals I have known were... stupid or absent-minded men. Not only does a good army commander not need any special qualities, on the contrary he needs the absence of the highest and best human attributes - love, poetry, tenderness, and philosophic inquiring doubt. He should be limited, firmly convinced that what he is doing is very important (otherwise he will not have sufficient patience), and only then will he be a brave leader. God forbid that he should be humane, should love, or pity, or think of what is just and unjust.

The 'eathen in 'is blindness must end where 'e began. But the backbone of the Army is the non-commissioned man!

An army which cannot be regularly recruited is a doomed army.