Combat Leadership Quotes

By integrating women into particularly military institutes, it cripples the readiness of our defense. Schools like The Citadel train young men to confidently lead other young men into a battlefield where one of them will die. And when you have women in that situation, it creates a whole new set of dynamics which are distracting to training these men to kill or be killed.

I think the troops deserve the best equipment on the battlefield, the best training, and American armor if they get in trouble.

I am a combat leader. As such I am responsible for everything that is done in my unit. I just wish that our civilian leaders would accept the same kind of responsibility.

Our military sons and daughters that are placed in harm's way deserve the right equipment, the right training, and the right rules of engagement to win decisively on any field of battle.

In real war an officer may have only one chance at succeeding. Consider each problem.

I have never met a woman … whom I would trust with combat leadership…. The Naval Academy is a horny woman’s dream.

I've always believed that no officer's life, regardless of rank, is of such great value to his country that he should seek safety in the rear... Officers should be forward with their men at the point of impact.

We must ensure that our troops are ready when called upon, that they are fully capable of fighting, and that they must win every war

I started my career in the U.S. military. Traditionally, in the military... you either start with a technical background or a more leadership-focused one. I took the leadership path.

My officers and men understood wishes so well that this movement was executed under fire, the right wing keeping up fire, without giving the enemy any occasion to seize or even to suspect their advantage.

Forty years after a battle it is easy for a non-combatant to reason about how it ought to have been fought. It is another thing personally and under fire to direct the fighting while involved in the obscuring smoke of it.

Nicknamed 'Mad-Dog Mattis' by his men, he was a command warrior in the old George Patton mode. He wasn't an armchair general by any definition of that much-maligned term. If a Marine re-upped at a location where he was present, he would personally go to that Marine and thank him or her for rejoining.

The Mexican War was a training ground for generals, so that when the sad self-murders settled on us, the leaders knew the techniques for making it properly horrible.

The commander must decide how he will fight the battle before it begins. He must then decide who he will use the military effort at his disposal to force the battle to swing the way he wishes it to go; he must make the enemy dance to his tune from the beginning and not vice versa.

I was the Commander in Chief with men and women in combat. And the idea of trying to agonize in public or show weakness would have demoralized them.

The only situation a commander can know fully is his own: his opponent's he can know only from unreliable intelligence.

Every great general and warrior from the beginning of time was high.

[ General James Mattis] is a Marine's Marine who has served in combat in both Afghanistan and Iraq.

Fighting with a large army under your command is nowise different from fighting with a small one: it is merely a question of instituting signs and signals.

If we read history with an open mind, we cannot fail to conclude that, among all the military virtues, the energetic conduct of war has always contributed most to glory and success.

Today we should make poems including iron and steel And the poet should know how to lead an attack.

Nothing matures a military force quicker than actual military operations.

No matter how enmeshed a commander becomes in the elaboration of his own thoughts, it is sometimes necessary to take the enemy into account.

… one of my soldiers can handle three Communist soldiers