Robert Dallek Quotes

Going to war is a rare experience in American culture, so it's easy for simple notions to gain a lot of weight. The reality is always more complex.

People have a very political way of looking at war, and that's understandable.

We say that we care about the war, but we don't even really know what we're fighting for.

Well, we've faced very difficult decisions and challenges in our country, every one of us have, as we - since September 11th, as we fought the war on terror, all of those decisions that the President had to make to put young men and women in harm's way.

It is better to make our enemy's country the theater of war than our own.

When we go to war we always make some wrong assumptions. The most common is that the war will be short.

This war is being played in the realm of public opinion and has dire consequences for our soldiers in Iraq, the future of our country, and freedom around the world.

For a long time, it was believed that war was waged by armies which could not be identified with the nation itself. Professional soldiers took upon themselves the job of defending national interests, and it was understood that the war affected only them; the country itself went on living and working.

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

Why did we go to war? Why did we pick people from South Carolina, California, and all the places in between to go to a foreign land and risk their lives and have some die? To make sure that Saddam Hussein could do no more damage to the region or us than he has already done.

No: war material is life-saving for one's own people and whoever works and performs in these spheres can be proud of it; here enterprise as a whole finds its highest justification of existence.

Since the end of the Cold War, America has been grasping left and right for an identity.

The most difficult idea to reconcile in war is the notion that anything is going to be solved by killing a stranger, or in risking your life for a cause anchored in some distant political arena.

Almost all wars, perhaps all, are trade wars connected with some material interest. They are always disguised as sacred wars, made in the name of God, or civilization or progress. But all of them, or almost all of the wars, have been trade wars.

All the rest of us - you and me and even the thousands of soldiers behind the lines in Africa - we want terribly yet only academically for the war to get over.

When the country is at war, you need to support the president.

There's no excuse for skimping on national defense when the country is at war.

What a country calls its vital... interests are not things that help its people live, but things that help it make war.

We have to make sure that we are a force for peace and stability in the world, and that we're prepared to defend freedom and the security of the American people.

I think in national security, the war in Iraq is troublesome and a difficult challenge, but our troops and the military leaders we have are managing that situation, although it continues to be very risky and very dangerous.

I don’t think that Americans should die to make Iraq free. What are we going to do? Have these endless wars of altruism?

I believe in peace through strength. I would prefer to rely on the military rather than diplomats to protect our homes.

Ministers [government officials] in the conduct of war … assume that war having been declared, the sole duty and anxiety of Ministers should consist in supporting generals and armies in the field.

It’s very easy to advocate going to war if you’re not one of the people who is going.

For better or worse the country has no alternative other than trust the President when we are at war.