Elihu Root Quotes

In all history there is no war which was not hatched by the governments, the governments alone, independent of the interests of the people, to whom war is always pernicious even when successful.

We cannot be both the world's leading champion of peace and the world's leading supplier of the weapons of war.

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

You help us pay for the war we’ll fight; we’ll launch it while you’re asleep at night. We don’t need friends all around the world; We’ll buy our friends with our flag unfurled, And spread our arms on a global scale To show the world that we still prevail. Oh, we’re not leaders inspiring peace, But we’re in power as the world’s police. So pay your tax for our little war, And we’ll not ask for any more. This year!

It makes no difference who says that our objective is peace, even if he be the President of the United States. Our actions speak louder than words, and our actions in Asia today are the actions of warmaking.

So long as war exists on earth there will be some danger that even the Nation which most ardently desires peace may be drawn into war.

Politics is the womb in which war develops.”

Let us face squarely the paradox that the world which goes to war is a world, usually, genuinely desiring peace.

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

If a nation wants to live in peace with its neighbors, it doesn't keep rattling the saber at them.

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

It has too often been too easy for rulers and governments to incite man to war.

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

And, you see, we are living in a world in which all wars are wars of defense.

We cannot have peace if we are only concerned with peace. War is not an accident. It is the logical outcome of a certain way of life. If we want to attack war, we have to attack that way of life.

All war represents a failure of diplomacy.

It's not a choice between war and peace. It's a choice between war and endless war. It's not appeasement. I think it's better even to call it American self-interest.

Each particular society begins to feel its strength, whence arises a state of war between different nations.

There is no avoiding war; it can only be postponed to the advantage of others.

You could argue that war is always an irrational act, and yet many states enter into military conflict out of rational calculation or national interest or the stability or longevity of their regime.

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.

War is never a solution; it is an aggravation.

It is easy to get into war, not so easy to get out.

I care about politics just like any other citizen. I'm against the war in Iraq, or any type of war.

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