William Kirby Quotes

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

It is idle to say that nations can struggle to outdo each other in building armaments and never use them. History demonstrates the contrary, and we have but to go back to the last war to see the appalling effect of nations competing in great armaments.

In times of peace, the war party insists on making preparation for war. As soon as prepared for, it insists on making war.

The history of our civilization has been one of intermittent war.

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

The cause of war is preparation for war.

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

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.

Organized murder is war, and though we demonstrate against a particular war, the nuclear, or any other kind of war, we have never demonstrated against war.

War had always seemed to me to be a purely human behavior. Accounts of warlike behavior date back to the very first written records of human history; it seemed to be an almost universal characteristic of human groups.

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

This is a war universe. War all the time. That is its nature. There may be other universes based on all sorts of other principles, but ours seems to be based on war and games.

He said that if we were going to have a war, they would never be the first ones to start it.

I think, unfortunately, we live in a world where people attack other people and I think a legitimate rationale for war is the saving of human life, the saving of lives of people who cannot defend themselves.

The history of mankind is a history of war.

Every move we make in fear of the next war in fact hastens it.

No war is inevitable until it breaks out.

I think that war is diplomacy by other means, for sure, and there have been wars that have been fought for righteous reasons. There are wars that have had to be fought, and there will probably continue to be.

Well, I asked him who would start the war first.

No man could know whether war might not at any moment break out.

War is one of the constants of history, and it has not diminished with civilization or democracy. In the last 3,421 years of recorded history only 268 have seen no war.

Almost certainly there will be vicious wars between the states.

Nations drift into wars.

War is just a racket... I believe in adequate defense at the coastline and nothing else.

Preparation for war is a constant stimulus to suspicion and ill will.