Christopher Hitchens Quotes

Most people, when they meet me, one of the first things they say is, 'Why would you voluntarily subject yourself to war? Why would you go into these places where you know there's a risk of getting killed?'

I was a witness to lots of death... Saving a human life was something really, really beautiful... no matter who they are. Not only Israeli people owe me their lives. I guarantee many terrorists, many Palestinian leaders, owe me their lives - or in other words, they owe my Lord their lives.

In my 20 years as a photographer, covering conflicts from Bosnia to Gaza to Iraq to Afghanistan, injured civilians and soldiers have passed through my life many times.

I don't want to go and start trying to make jokes in places like India, Tanzania or Iraq. Afghanistan is not a funny place.

I'd been to a number of war zones before in my life, but I had never been in one as terrifying as Chechnya.

I've gone to war zones before and never got shot.

I have seen streets where someone said it's all fine, and then it was full of land mines.

I worry a bit about the unknowns when it comes to travelers to the war zones in Syria and Iraq. Who don't I see? And I worry about the people who may be in their basements radicalizing that I can't see.

My time in war zones have been fleeting and infrequent. I've been to Iraq. I've been to Afghanistan. I've been to other places where I've collected hazardous duty pay.

Iraq is now the central front in the war against al-Qaeda.

The peace movement didn't stop the Iraq but I think that Blair would not be able to go along and support an Iranian war.

Women tend to be more interested in reconciliation. A Kenyan woman leader said to me, "You know, in a war, men and women want different things. The men care a lot about territory. And they care where the borders are. And they want this whole state. The women," she said, "they want a safe place." And she put her fingers like this, "They want a safe place for their children to go to school without being shot, for their daughters to not be raped."

Coalition forces have encountered serious violence in some areas of Iraq. Our military commanders report that this violence is being insticated by three groups.

In countries where there are real civil wars, people go through a lot, and we should be willing to go through a lot to help them.

I want my fellow citizens to wise up and stop falling for [war]. I try with my limited access, I'm not getting into Kabul with a camera, they're not letting me get into Benghazi with a camera. I do what I can with my flimsy American passport and a visa. The photos are a bit more heavy from Southern Sudan and Haiti and Cuba.

The more I've traveled to war zones, the more I'm convinced that the impact and the effects are way beyond anything we can even begin to imagine.

He [Johnny Cash] was so fragile. We invaded Iraq in March, and he died in September. And because his health was so fragile, he couldn't take the controversy of making a public statement against the war. He knew that people were rabid. They attacked me mercilessly after I did the press conference with Musicians United to Win Without War. He knew that he couldn't tolerate that.

Take the Iraq War,it's the second worst crime after the Second World War. It's the first time in history, in the history of imperialism, there were huge demonstrations, before the war was officially launched.

I always carry a pistol when I go [to the New York Public Library]. Never did trust those stone lions.

War is a dead end, literally. And, what is more, we simply can't afford it. Not morally, and not financially. How long will it take the citizens of the United States, one wonders, to recognize that the house their country bombed in Iraq is the same one they were living in until it was foreclosed?

My parents tried to keep me safe, but to me the world was not a safe place.

We are so appreciative of the men and women in uniform who are protecting us, whether in Afghanistan or Iraq or on ships around the world. For our security, they are taking the offensive to the terrorists overseas.

I never felt in competition with anybody in war photography. You're lucky to get your ass in and out again. It's as simple as that. It's the easiest photography in the world to shoot somebody who's been shot up. It doesn't take a genius. That's easy. The only thing you need to know is your photography. Get in and if you're lucky get out. And get as close as you can get.

A certain peace is better and safer than a victory in prospect; the former is at your own disposal, the latter depends upon the gods.

Iraq was a war of choice, not necessity.