Desmond Tutu Quotes

I try to avoid conflict. I don't want people to be unhappy.

I'm not looking for a battle with anybody, neither the council nor our labor partners.

There should be an honest attempt at the reconciliation of differences before resorting to combat.

It is highly probable that in most cases, war could be avoided or ended. For discussions allow passion to subside, and to persuade alienated neighbors, or at least one of them, to listen to the voice of a conciliator is a step in the direction of peace.

Let us move from the era of confrontation to the era of negotiation.

Better talk than fight, if nothing of sovereign value is anyway lost. Dialogue has achieved more than confrontation in many parts of the world.

I like to win without fighting. But if I can't, then I'm prepared to fight.

The best way to avoid warfare is if no one shows up.

Wars should be fought with words, not bombs, not weapons. And calm words. I think that wars should be fought over a chessboard and a cup of something to drink.

But we want peace, I would move all my people down this way. I could then keep them all quietly near camp.

I will make the greatest efforts to seek a way for Taiwan and mainland China to interact that is mutually acceptable to both sides. I will not be provocative; there will not be any surprises.

War should never be entered upon until every agency of peace has failed; peace is preferable to war in almost every contingency. Arbitration is the true method of settlement of international as well as local or individual differences.

The alternative is not war or doing nothing. Whoever rejects war is not doomed to appeasement.

All States do not have the same interests, but are there any interests which cannot be infinitely better reconciled before than after a war?

One should not maintain a dispute.

Better build them a golden bridge than offer a decisive battle.

I have desired as sincerely as any man—I sometimes think more than any other man—that our present difficulties might be settled without the shedding of blood.

I want peace [in my administration] and I am told that your friend Theodore [Roosevelt]—whom I know only slightly—is always getting into rows with everybody. I am afraid he is too pugnacious.

We believe in resolving all disputes peacefully.

We cannot afford to fight our neighbor, even if we disagree on many things.

History has proved that the most ardent enemies have settled their differences through talks and not war.

Mediation is one of the most effective tools of non-violence. It can turn parties away from conflict, towards compromise.

There is no conflict in the world that cannot be solved.

I hope everybody will go back to the negotiating table. I've always said this is the only way forward.

Number one, that it is smart to communicate and negotiate with your enemy instead of just waging war with bombs and weapons of mass destruction.