Ruth Benedict Quotes

Unless a nation's life faces peril, war is murder.

What I've learned, and will try to remember from now on, is that defending your country's credibility is never sufficient reason to fight a war.

War, except in self-defense, is a failure of moral imagination.

What is the 'noble cause' for which you sent our country to war?

It is not every cause of war that should lead to war.

Wars of necessity are essentially unavoidable. They involve the most important national interests, a lack of promising alternatives to the use of force, and a certain and considerable price to be paid if the status quo is allowed to stand. Examples include World War II and the Korean War.

The utterly fallacious idea at the heart of the pro-war argument is that it is the duty of the anti-war argument to provide an alternative to war. The onus is on them to explain just cause.

I feel like war should occur only for the most vital and necessary reasons, and only then.

While war is never anyone first choice, sometimes it is a necessary choice.

Either war is obsolete, or men are.

I don't believe America will justifiably make an unprovoked attack on another nation. It would not be consistent with what we have been as a nation or what we should be as a nation.

The only defensible war is a war of defense.

A sane person doesn't think war is a good idea. I'm not a pacifist. I feel that there are situations where fighting is inescapable, but we don't go looking for those things.

I’m not opposed to all wars; just dumb wars.

We believe in peace, but we are not pacifists. Sometimes we have to use force

The nation is too brave, too strong, too powerful, and too just to engage in an unrighteous and precipitate war.

The belief that war is inevitable makes of war a self-fulfilling prophecy.

The United States will never take part in an aggressive war.

Lightly armed nations can move toward war just as easily as those which are armed to the teeth, and they will do so if the usual causes of war are not removed.

If I took the 40 years of my dad talking to me about war and battles and taking me to battlefields and distilled it down into one question, it would probably be the idea of the necessary or unnecessary war.

War on the other hand is such a terrible thing, that no man, especially a Christian man, has the right to assume the responsibility of starting it.

Wars are, of course, as a rule to be avoided; but they are far better than certain kinds of peace.

I have never advocated war except as a means of peace.

The major wars that the U.S. became involved in are all ethically defensible.

Though no one wants war, Congress needed to give the President the authority he needs to protect America while encouraging the use of diplomacy and negotiations to try and arrive at a peaceful solution to this problem.