War Decision Quotes

To counter this situation it would be most convenient if the Japanese side could prove to us that the emperor is completely blameless. We think the forthcoming trials offer the best opportunity to do that. Tojo, in particular, should be made to bear all responsibility at his trial. In other words I want you to have Tojo say as follows: “… I had already decided to push for war even if his majesty the Emperor was against going to war with the United States.”

The Egyptian army concentrations in the Sinai approaches do not prove that Nasser was really about to attack us. We must be honest with ourselves. We decided to attack him.

There seems to be a sense in the British media that prime ministers enjoy going to war. They do not. The decision to send British soldiers into battle is the worst and most stomach-churning senior politicians have to take. It makes them wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat worrying if they have done the right thing.

In Hitler's launching of the Nazi campaign upon Russia we can already see, after less than six months of fighting, that he made one of the outstanding blunders of history, and the results so far realized constitute an event of cardinal importance in the final decision of the war.

Libya, more than anyone else's war, was Hillary Clinton's war. Barak Obama initially opposed it. Who was the person championing it? Hillary Clinton.

In no part of the Constitution is more wisdom to be found than in the clause which confides the question of war or peace to the legislature, and not to the executive department. ... War is in fact the true nurse of executive aggrandizement. In war, a physical force is to be created; and it is the executive will which is to direct it. In war, the public treasures are to be unlocked; and it is the executive hand which is to dispense them. ... It is in war, finally, that laurels are to be gathered, and it is the executive brow they are to encircle. The strongest passions and most dangerous weaknesses of the human breast; ambition, avarice, vanity, the honorable or venial love of fame, are all in conspiracy against the desire and duty of peace

If we really see the necessity for military action against Serbia, I would think it regrettable if we did not take advantage of the present moment, which is favorable from our point of view.

When Bush first got elected, the very first time there was talk of going to war with Iraq, the mainstream media gave his position total credibility. I didn't get it then, and I don't get it now.

Going to war is an easy decision.

Unlike Hillary Clinton, who voted for the war without knowing what she was doing, I would not have had our people in Iraq. Iraq was disaster.

Will we fight or will we retreat? That is the question that is posed to us. Some of my friends on the other side of the aisle often refer to Iraq as a distraction.

Saddam Hussein was a brutal tyrant. I am glad he is now on trial for crimes against humanity. But, opposition to a dictator is not the measure I use when deciding whether to send our men and women in uniform off to war and possible death.

Vote for war allowed war only after all else failed.

If Wilson "took" the United States into the war, he must have done so by overcoming that "softness" of which [Theodore] Roosevelt so bitterly complained.

Politicians do not enter into wars lightly. It is usually the military themselves who are keener to become involved.

I would not have had our troops in Iraq.

For no good reason, George W. Bush and the best and brightest he could muster, including the likes of Paul Bremer and Paul Wolfowitz, decided it made sense to attack Iraq.

Also, General Zinni, who commanded central command, was very much opposed to the war in the first place, as I was. We were both quoted to that effect in February of 2003.

Do the American people really want their President ... to have no other option than to go to war or do nothing?

I would have voted 'no' on the Iraq war and 'yes' to Afghanistan.

War is often about making the least-worst decision. The same could be said about politics. But the stakes are higher in war, when the commander-in-chief is called upon to defend the nation.

The Constitution is clear, Article I, Section 8, power vetted in Congress to declare war. If you go back to the founding documents of this nation, the decision of going to war was to be made by people closest to the ground - the elected officials - to make those decisions.

President Bush admitted that the United States went to war in Iraq based on bad intelligence. But he says knowing what we know now he would still do it again. So at least we're learning from our mistakes.

To go to war, you must always think of, can you win?

I thought, giving Jeb Bush the benefit of the doubt all these years, that he was sitting, saying, what a numbnut, what an idiot. My brother's a fool. He's listening to these neocons that talked him into this war. Dad would have never done this.