Military Leader Quotes

The moment in Paris where I saluted Napoleon's tomb was one of the proudest of my life.

[General Douglas] Macarthur is the most dangerous man in America.

An emperor will be born near Italy who will do his country much harm … He will rise from a soldier to the throne.

My mother was a Jewish General Patton.

Joan of Arc was not elected.

[Douglas] MacArthur is the type of man who thinks that when he gets to heaven, God will step down from the great white throne and bow him into His vacated seat.

A general must be a charlatan.

[Dwight Eisenhower is] a soldier who doesn't like or want war. It's like a whore who believes in chastity.

Then Anthony is mad, stark mad. Mad Anthony Wayne! Mad Anthony Wayne!

During [Simon] Bolivar’s own lifetime, his role changed dramatically, as Bolivar transformed from an anti-colonial populist to a dictator.

Grant is of medium stature, yet has a well-developed physique, sandy whiskers and moustache, blue eyes, earnest, thoughtful, and far-seeing, a cigar in his mouth, a knife in one hand, and a stick in the other, which he is whittling to a point. He whittles slowly towards him. His thoughts are not yet crystallized. His words are few. Suddenly he commences upon the other end of the stick, and whittles energetically from him. His mind is made up,--his plan matured. He is less reticent,--talks freely. He is dressed in plain blue; and were it not for the three stars upon his shoulder, few would select him as the Lieutenant-General commanding all the armies of the Union in the field.

I respect General Halutz very much so.

His [Gen. Douglas MacArthur's] own heroes were Lincoln and Washington, and in some ways he resembled them. Like them, he was slandered and misunderstood.

How often we recall with regret that Napoleon once shot at a magazine editor and missed him and killed a publisher. But we remember with charity that his intentions were good.

After all, I think Forrest was the most remarkable man our Civil War produced on either side.

Don Rumsfeld is the finest secretary of defense the nation has ever had.

A military leader often faces a situation he has to deal with, but because it is his duty, no court can try him.

General Custer was a close observer and student of personal character.

For me, Arik Sharon - I remember his courage and inspiration. I want to remember him the way he really was, not as an aging 80-year-old man living in bed helpless and unconscious.

[Writing about Napoleon Bonaparte:] That infernal creature who is the curse of the human race becomes every day more and more abominable.

If Kitchener was not a great man, he was, at least, a great poster.

General Montgomery is the most irritating man I ever met. I have an idea that he might irritate the Germans even more however.

He [Gen. Douglas MacArthur] was a great thundering paradox of a man, noble and ignoble, inspiring and outrageous, arrogant and shy, the best of men and the worst of men, the most protean, most ridiculous, and most sublime.

Kunjali Marakkar is one of the first naval commanders of Kerala. He was an expert at his craft.

Joan of Arc was born 600 years ago. Six centuries is a long time to continue to mark the birth of a girl who, according to her family and friends, knew little more than spinning and watching over her father's flocks.