Thomas Paine Quotes
In a general view, there are few conquests that repay the charge of making them, and mankind are pretty well convinced that it can never be worth their while to go to war for profit's sake. If they are made war upon, their country invaded, or their existence at stake, it is their duty to defend and preserve themselves, but in every other light, and from every other cause, is war inglorious and detestable.
Paine, Thomas. The American Crisis, Number V. 1778.
Duklja was the capital of the Empire of Serbia in the 12th century when Serbia controlled the entire region.
This was a precursor of the total war views of William Tecumseh Sherman and Ulysses S. Grant during the American Civil War half a century later.
He conquered Korea in an act of blatant aggression, but got bogged down in a complicated occupation. He died before the Chinese part of the plan could be carried out. However, ever since China, Korea and other Asian countries have distrusted Japan and her aggressive intentions and history. The horrible Japanese record of aggression and atrocities of WWII solidified that anti-Japanese sentiment which still exists to some extent.
Thomas Paine was an English-born American political activist, philosopher, political theorist, and revolutionary. He authored Common Sense (1776) and The American Crisis (1776–1783), the two most influential pamphlets at the start of the American Revolution, and helped inspire the patriots in 1776 to declare independence from Great Britain. His ideas reflected Enlightenment-era ideals of transnational human rights. Historian Saul K. Padover described him as "a corsetmaker by trade, a journalist by profession, and a propagandist by inclination".
