Hans von Seeckt Quotes

I don't really do without any plans. If somebody is trying to do something, you must have plans.

It takes time and effort and preparation to think. Statesmen are far too busy making speeches to think.

Plans get you into things, but you got to work your way out.

It's one thing to make a choice. It's another to put that choice into practice.

Chess is a forcing house where the fruits of character can ripen more fully than in life

A military mindset is objectively analyzing a planned course of action and anticipating the likely consequences before you take that action.

A heart to resolve, a head to contrive, and a hand to execute.

I learned how to order my thoughts, and most important, learned how to develop a plan. I discovered the power of a plan. If you can plan it out, and it seems logical to you, you can do it. And that was the secret to success.

You can't just have a thought. You have to follow the thought through. But everything starts with the thought.

You must elect your work; you shall take what your brains can, and drop all the rest. Only so can that amount of vital force accumulate which can make the step from knowing to doing. No matter how much faculty of idle seeing a man has, the step from knowing to doing is rarely taken. It is a step out of a chalk circle of imbecility into fruitfulness.

If you're not gonna pull the trigger, don't point the gun.

Reason must be our last judge and guide in everything.

We must carry things beyond conversation to conclusion.

The novice in the military art flew from point to point, retarding his own preparations by the excess of his violent and somewhat distempered zeal; while the more practiced veteran made his arrangements with a deliberation that scorned every appearance of haste

Action should be founded on contemplation, and those of us who act don't put enough time, don't give enough emphasis, to contemplation.

The quality of our thinking will determine the quality of our future

Plans are of little importance, but planning is essential.

I started playing chess when I was about 4 or 5 years old. It is very good for children to learn to play chess, because it helps them to develop their mental abilities. It also helps to consolidate a person's character, because as it happens both in life and in a chess game we have to make decisions constantly. In chess there is no luck and no excuses: everything is in your hands.

The persistent man with a poor plan stands a better chance of winning than the man with a perfect plan who hesitates and waivers in carrying it out.

After we have thought out everything carefully in advance and have sought and found without prejudice the most plausible plan, we must not be ready to abandon it at the slightest provocation. should this certainty be lacking, we must tell ourselves that nothing is accomplished in warfare without daring; that the nature of war certainly does not let us see at all times where we are going; that what is probable will always be probable though at the moment it may not seem so; and finally, that we cannot be readily ruined by a single error, if we have made reasonable preparations.

It is one thing to see your road, another to cut it.

The strength of the group is in the will of the leader, and the will is character in action.

When you have a time of crisis what happens depends on what ideas are floating around, and what ideas have been developed, and thought through, and are made effective.

Decision is the ultimate power. Decisions shape destiny.

In real life, strategy is actually very straightforward. You pick a general direction and implement like hell.