Gerhard Schroder Quotes

Is a military solution the only way to stop nations from doing bad things?

It is easier to begin a war than to end one, which is why the decision to start a conflict should not be entrusted to the person who wages it. Post‐war presidents have abandoned this wisdom.

War is much too serious a thing to be left to military men.

I also hear your president say that war is the means of last resort and I think he means that. I met him last autumn and he assured me that they wanted to come through and disarm Iraq by peaceful means, and that's what we are trying to do as hard as we can.

We wanted this war and now we've got it, and I'm not sure that we know what to do with it.

The real peril of war lies not in military defeat. It lies in war itself, whether we win or lose.

War is the continuation of politics by other means.

The main force used in the evolving world of humanity has hitherto been applied in the form of war.

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

War is too serious a matter to entrust to military men.

Our national aims can be realized only by military means. The matter needs no further elaboration or interpretation.

We have to deal with it diplomatically if we can, militarily if we must.

Every war I have ever covered – Kosovo, Bosnia, Sierra Leone and Liberia – withstood all diplomatic efforts to end it until Western military action finally forced a resolution.

We need, from time to time, to use military force or all of the resources at our command in order to defend the nation and defend our friends. Sometimes, that requires us to take actions that generate controversy. I think there are probably some who actually believe, if we just go talk nice to these folks, everything is going to be OK. I don't think the world works that way.

Anyone contemplating world war is certifiably insane, no matter how calm they seem.

The only way to end war is communication between people.

We hope that diplomacy works before you ever use force. The hardest decision a president makes is ever to use force.

No one starts a war—or rather, no one in his senses ought to do so—without first being clear in his mind what he intends to achieve by that war, and how he intends to conduct it.

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

War is too serious a matter to be entrusted to generals.

The most expensive peace is far less costly than the cheapest war.

Talking to the superpowers about disarmament is like talking to drug dealers about stopping drug deliveries.

It is simply not true that war never settles anything.

You can't get a diplomatic solution unless behind that, is the threat of force.

In this age there can be no losers in peace and no victors in war. We must recognize the obligation to match national strength with national restraint.