Quotes & Sayings About Infantry
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Top Infantry Quotes
Political novice Ulysses S. Grant was the first of six Union veterans to become president, five of whom were born in Ohio. The 23rd Ohio Infantry Regiment alone produced Maj. Gen. Rutherford B. Hayes and Maj. William McKinley. Former Brig. Gen. Benjamin Harrison defeated Grover Cleveland in 1888 partly because — Thomas R. Flagel
The tank was originally invented to clear a way for the infantry in the teeth of machine-gun fire. Now it is the infantry who will have to clear a way for the tanks. — Winston Churchill
I always feel I had a very lucky life. For example, I sure didn't want to go in the army: when I was drafted in the Korean War, I wanted to go as a photographer. But luckily, they put me in the infantry - luckily because the official photographer was photographing the medal awarding and all the official situations. — Harold Feinstein
I was trained in Army Intelligence, but spent most of my army career in the infantry. But like many people of my generation, I was very much caught up in the Cold War, and books and movies about espionage. — Nelson DeMille
There should be a law, I thought. If you support a war, if you think it's worth the price, that's fine, but you have to put your own precious fluids on the line. You have to head for the front and hook up with an infantry unit and help spill the blood. — Tim O'Brien
I think war is a crime. If you don't believe me, ask the infantry, ask the dead. — Michael McCormick
It is remarkable that this people, though unarmed, dares attack an armed foe; the infantry defy the cavalry, and by their activity and courage generally prove victors. — Giraldus Cambrensis
As a civilian, I know nothing about combat, the Marine Corps experience or modern man's struggle adjusting to peace after war. I only know what's been shared with me; confidences I would never betray, nor use as details in a novel. — Tiffany Madison
I've been in love (truly) with five women, the Spanish Republic and the 4th Infantry Division. — Ernest Hemingway,
The Puerto Ricans forming the ranks of the gallant 65th Infantry on the battlefields of Korea ... are writing a brilliant record of achievement in battle and I am proud indeed to have them in this command. I wish that we might have many more like them. — Douglas MacArthur
This war proceeds along its terrible path by the slaughter of infantry ... I say to myself every day. What is going on while we sit here, while we go away to dinner or home to bed? Nearly, 1000 - Englishmen, Britishers, and the other is America ... Everything else is swept away. — Winston Churchill
You've got soldiers in the 3rd Infantry Division who are going every day on operations and they don't all have what is considered to be the gold standard in armor — Duncan Hunter
Yam raised an army of sea creatures designed to march on Mount Aqraa, to destroy Baal. He created some of the craziest monstrosities every seen: lobsters rode four-legged tuna like proud cavalry, sword fish infantry marched onward in perfect step, biped whales thundered towards the mountain, while winged sharks provided air support. An elite group of electric eel assassins were armed with both their innate ability to shock in melee combat and throwing star fish for long range skirmishes. — Dylan Callens
My father - I once asked him what was his greatest achievement. He said his greatest achievement was that he fought in five wars in the infantry, always on the front line, and never hurt anybody. — Etgar Keret
There had so lately been a large force of Spanish cavalry at the village, which had made a great impression on the minds of the young men, as to their power, consequence, which my appearance with 20 infantry was by no means calculated to remove. — Zebulon Pike
I proudly served in the United States Army during the Korean War as an artillery operations specialist in the all-black 503rd Field Artillery Battalion in the Second Infantry Division. — Charles B. Rangel
The day of democracy is past," he said. "Past for ever. That day began with the bowmen of Crecy, it ended when marching infantry, when common men in masses ceased to win the battles of the world, when costly cannon, great ironclads, and strategic railways became the means of power. To-day is the day of wealth. Wealth now is power as it never was power before - it commands earth and sea and sky. All power is for those who can handle wealth ... — H.G.Wells
We were lavish of blood in those days, and it was thought to be a great thing to charge a battery of artillery or an earthwork lined with infantry. — Daniel Harvey Hill
By the last returns to the Department of War the militia force of the several States may be estimated at 800,000 men - infantry, artillery, and cavalry. — James Monroe
Oh, there's not much to tell. I served in the Ninth Iowa Infantry. That's where I met Frankie...Frank. I mean, Mr. Greerson. We were discharged almost a year go, July of last year, and stayed with my mother over the winter. And then we came here. That's about it. — Dean Frech
When God made the world he made the big plain just for the cavalry. It was firm, or would be when the sun had dried off the night's rain, and it was mostly level. The sabres could fall like scythes in the corn. The Arapiles, Greater and Lesser, God made for the gunners. From their summits, conveniently made flat so that the artillery could have a stable platform, the guns could dominate the plain. God had made nothing for the infantry, except a soil easily dug into graves, but the infantry were used to that. All — Bernard Cornwell
However, while the Nazi barbarians and their collaborators threatened the entire world, I could not accept his philosophy and, after several earlier attempts, was finally accepted into the Canadian Infantry Corps during the last year of World War II. — Walter Kohn
When everyone's focused on the conventional parts of war - doing infantry imbeds or chasing IEDs - you look at the thing that seems not that interesting to people, like the circumstances of logistics workers cooking the troops' food or cleaning their latrines. — Sarah Stillman
[Li Ch'uan cites the case of Fu Chien, prince of Ch'in, who in 383 A.D. marched with a vast army against the Chin Emperor. When warned not to despise an enemy who could command the services of such men as Hsieh An and Huan Ch'ung, he boastfully replied: "I have the population of eight provinces at my back, infantry and horsemen to the number of one million; why, they could dam up the Yangtsze River itself by merely throwing their whips into the stream. What danger have I to fear?" Nevertheless, his forces were soon after disastrously routed at the Fei River, and he was obliged to beat a hasty retreat.] If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle. [Chang Yu said: "Knowing the enemy enables you to take the offensive, knowing yourself enables you to stand on the defensive." He adds: "Attack is the secret of defense; defense is the planning of an attack." It would be hard to find a better epitome of the root-principle of war.] — Sun Tzu
Linguists holding bullhorns hollered, "A bas les Boches! A bas les Marcon! Down with the Boches! Down with the Macaronis! Vive la France!" A mortar crew with the 18th Infantry fired a special shell the size of an ostrich egg. It soared 200 feet into the night, detonated with dazzling pyrotechnic sparkle, and unfurled an American flag, which floated to earth; given a clear target at last, French gunners replied with eager fire. — Rick Atkinson
As Ernest Hemingway wrote, 'Never think that war, no matter how necessary, nor how justified, is not a crime. Ask the infantry and ask the dead ... ' — Christopher Flynn
There are several reasons why a study of the French military experience in Algeria in this present work is necessary. The entire doctrinal system contained within Casey's Infantry Tactics and Hardee's Rifle and Light Infantry Tactics originated with the French infantry's experiences in North Africa, and these were but translations of a work utilized by French chasseurs and Zouaves. — Brent Nosworthy
Good infantry is without doubt the sinews of an army; but if it has to fight a long time against very superior artillery, it will become demoralized and will be destroyed. — Napoleon Bonaparte
The army consists of the first infantry division and eight million replacements. — Sebastian Junger
The conquest was not achieved without one frightful convulsion of revolt. "In this year A.D. 61", according to Tacitus, "a severe disaster was sustained in Britain." Suetonius, the new governor, had engaged himself deeply in the West. He transferred the operational base of the Roman army to Chester. Because it was the centre of Druid resistance he prepared to attack "the populous island of Mona [Anglesey], which had become a refuge for fugitives, and he built a fleet of flat-bottomed vessels suitable for those shallow and shifting seas. The infantry crossed in the boats, the cavalry went over by fords: where the water was too deep the men swam alongside of their horses. The enemy lined the shore, a dense host of armed men, interspersed with women clad in black like the Furies, with their hair hanging down and holding torches in their hands. Round this were Druids — Winston S. Churchill
Nathan Bedford Forrest ... used his horsemen as a modern general would use motorized infantry. He liked horses because he liked fast movement, and his mounted men could get from here to there much faster than any infantry could; but when they reached the field they usually tied their horses to trees and fought on foot, and they were as good as the very best infantry. Not for nothing did Forrest say the essence of strategy was to git thar fust with the most men. — Bruce Catton
Once the mass of the defending infantry become possessed of low moral, the battle is as good as lost. — Douglas Haig
To the everlasting glory of the Infantry - — Robert A. Heinlein
I love the infantry because they are the underdogs. They are the mud-rain-frost-and-wind boys. They have no comforts, and they even learn to live without the necessities. And in the end they are the guys that wars can't be won without. — Ernie Pyle
The Turkish infantry were as fine as they had ever been, and their field artillery was presentable. But they had none of the modern weapons which from May, 1940, were proved to be decisive. Aviation was lamentably weak and primitive. They had no tanks or armoured cars, and neither the workshops to make and maintain them nor the trained men and staffs to handle them. They had hardly any anti-aircraft or anti-tank artillery. Their signal service was rudimentary. Radar was unknown to them. Nor did their warlike qualities include any aptitude for all these modern developments. — Winston S. Churchill
Everyone's for a free Tibet, but no one's for freeing Tibet. So Tibet will stay unfree - as unfree now as it was when the first Free Tibet campaigner slapped the very first "FREE TIBET" sticker on the back of his Edsel. Idealism as inertia is the hallmark of the movement...He's [the guy with the bumper sticket] advertising his moral superiority, not calling for action. If Rumsfeld were to say, "Free Tibet? Jiminy, what a swell idea! The Third Infantry Division goes in on Thursday," the bumper-sticker crowd would be aghast. They'd have to bend down and peel off the "FREE TIBET" stickers and replace them with "WAR IS NOT THE ANSWER. — Mark Steyn
In the summer of 1952, when I was 30, the Army assigned me to an infantry unit fighting in Korea. Meanwhile, though, there was other news in my family: My father had become the Republican presidential nominee. As an ambitious young major, I refused any offers for other assignments. — John Eisenhower
We are the boys who go to a particular place, at H-hour, occupy a designated terrain, stand on it, dig the enemy out of their holes, force them then and there to surrender or die. We're the bloody infantry. — Robert A. Heinlein
My grandfather was in World War II and fought in Europe in Army Infantry, so I have such a huge respect for him, and he's shared some personal experiences with me. — Ashton Holmes
Everyone knows that when advancing into danger, the soprano goes first. They are your infantry, while the altos and tenors are your cavalry, and the bass your artillery. — Rick Riordan
I'm convinced that the infantry is the group in the army which gives more and gets less than anybody else. — Bill Mauldin
He was a district attorney in Pennsylvania. I was a writer on Cape Cod. We had been privates in the war, infantry scouts. We had never expected to make any money after the war, but we were doing quite well. — Kurt Vonnegut
There are now 17,000 local American police forces that are armed with rocket launchers, bazookas, heavy machine guns, all kinds of chemical sprays, in fact some of them have tanks. You now have local police departments that are equipped beyond the standard of American heavy infantry. — Paul Craig Roberts
Artillery conquers and infantry occupies. — J. F. C. Fuller
I fought as an infantry Marine on one of the Vietnam War's harshest battlefields. After leaving the Marine Corps, I studied law and found a fulfilling career as an author and journalist. But again and again, I came back to the personal fulfillment that can only come from public service. — Jim Webb
In the case of a single nineteen year old infantry soldier mangled in the devastating blast of a carefully laid roadside bomb, some fifty or even sixty years of exigent torment - some 500,000 hours of constant, inescapable misery - has been created out of virtually nothing, far exceeding the total output of brutal (albeit dazzling) terror felt by another less fortunate soldier in the seconds before his body is irreparably torn apart by shrapnel and his life is extinguished on a poorly defined battlefield, his account closed forever. — John Zande
Guarded within the old red wall's embrace, Marshalled like soldiers in gay company, The tulips stand arrayed. Here infantry Wheels out into the sunlight. — Amy Lowell
As a result of the cold, the machine-guns were no longer able to fire ... the result of all this was a panic ... The battle worthiness of our infantry is at an end — Heinz Guderian
Charges of cavalry are equally useful at the beginning, the middle and the end of a battle. They should be made always, if possible, on the flanks of the infantry, especially when the latter is engaged in front. — Napoleon Bonaparte
Lieutenant Mortas is the black sheep of the family--I thought you knew that. — Henry V. O'Neil
The armored infantry was Santa Claus, the battle was out Christmas. What else for the elves to do on Christmas Eve but to let their hair down and drink a a little eggnog. — Hiroshi Sakurazaka
Artillery is more essential to cavalry than to infantry, because cavalry has no fire for its defence, but depends on the sabre. — Napoleon Bonaparte
"Some say the most beautiful thing in the world is a great cavalry riding down over the hill. Others say it's a vast infantry on the march. But I say the most beautiful thing is the beloved." How political can you get? — Sam Hamill
Flattery is the infantry of negotiation. — Oliver Lyttelton, 1st Viscount Chandos
They're not shooting at us, they're not shooting at us," one infantry commander insisted, even as French artillery plastered his battalion. — Rick Atkinson
From the time I left the Marine Corps after serving as an infantry platoon and company commander in Vietnam, I decided that I would focus on immediate goals that inspired me to devote all of my energy to them, rather than putting together the more cautious and traditional building blocks of a predictable career. — Jim Webb
Oh-h-h-h - Hidey, tidey, Christ Almighty Who the hell are we? Flim, flam, God damn We're the infantry ... — Richard Yates
A perfect writer would make words sing, dance, kiss, do the male and female act, bear children, weep, bleed, rage, stab, steal, fire cannon, steer ships, sack cities, charge with cavalry or infantry, or do anything that man or woman or the natural powers can do. — Walt Whitman
There are no women in these ground combat jobs.Women, of course, have been flying combat missions in fighter jets, attack helicopters, for more than 20 years, but beginning this week, those ground combat jobs in infantry, artillery and armor will be open to women. Officials don't expect a rush of women interested. — Renee Montagne
I would have skipped the following day if I could have. I ddin't even like Disney World. I was, in fact, slightly afraid of it. When Khrushchev visited Disneyland in 1959, he wasn't allowed in. It was said that the American authorities couldn't guarantee his safety inside. And whatever else Khrushchev was, I would have backed him against an infantry division. — Austin Grossman
How long you been in the infantry, sir? Anything under ten miles counts as 'almost there'. — Henry V. O'Neil
Only certain portions of the line had to undergo carnage in the French style, but knowledge of it was all-pervasive. Everything the 19th River Guard knew came from quiet meetings in the communications trenches, conversations with sleepless, bitter infantrymen who had been transferred up from the fiercer fighting in the south. If some of the River Guard were on the edge, many of the regular infantry had gone over it long before. Especially disturbing to the naval contingent were reports from down below that Italian troops now were shot quite casually for disciplinary reasons, and that the Italian generals, like their French counterparts, were executing men in decimations for crimes they had not committed. Men with families were pulled from the ranks along with equally mystified adolescents and put to death for acts attributed to others whom they had never seen. — Mark Helprin
No one knew much about the Twenty-Eighth Infantry. It was not a glamour outfit.
They knew about the Big Red One and the Screaming Eagles, about the Eighty-Second Airborne and Hell On Wheels, but not about Twenty-Eighth Infantry. The name was met with a certain silence, as if he was in a room full of Harvard graduates and told them his degree was by correspondence. — Miles Watson
The Dead and Those About to Die is a gripping, first-hand account of the desperate battle for Omaha Beach on D-Day by the legendary 1st Infantry Division, the Big Red One. On the 70th anniversary of that momentous event, John C. McManus's tale of courage under fire is a vivid reminder that freedom isn't free and that when the chips are down stalwart American soldiers will always answer the call of duty. — Carlo D'Este
I could see that Konny didn't belong in the dropship infantry, but not because he was a bad person. He simply loved life too much. — Phillip Richards
For unlike many of our previous opponents, Russian troops tended to stand firm when under air attack. Rather than dive for cover, most would blaze away at us with whatever weapons they had to hand. And as infantry weapons did not use tracer bullets, we were often unaware of the volume of enemy fire that was being directed at us. It was only when we returned to base and saw the enormous number of bullet holes in our machines that we realized just how much lead we had been flying through. — Helmit Mahlke
Commanders and historians are the people who discuss wars; I was in the infantry, and most of the time I did not know where I was or what I was doing except that I was obeying orders and trying not to be killed in any of the variety of horrible ways open to me. — Robertson Davies
There was something terrible, but also something sad and melancholy in this long cry uttered by the Russian infantry as they staged an attack. As it crossed the cold water, it lost its fervour. Instead of valour or gallantry, you could hear the sadness of a soul parting with everything that it loved, calling on its nearest and dearest to wake up, to lift their head from their pillows and hear for the last time the voice of a father, a husband, a son or a brother ... — Vasily Grossman
the memorial stained-glass window dedicated to the King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry, on whose side God had been in two world wars, though this hadn't prevented them suffering heavy casualties. — David Nobbs
The first Embassy to Afghanistan by a western power left the Company's Delhi Residency on 13 October 1808, with the Ambassador accompanied by 200 calvary, 4,000 infantry, a dozen elephants and no fewer than 600 camels. It was dazzling, but it was also clear from this attempt to reach out to the Afghans that the British were not interested in cultivating Shah Shuja's friendship for its own sake, but were concerned only to outflank their imperial rivals: the Afghans were perceived as mere pawns on the chessboard of western diplomacy, to be engaged or sacrificed at will. It was a precedent that was to be followed many other times, by several different powers, over the years and decades to come; and each time the Afghans would show themselves capable of defending their inhospitable terrain far more effectively than any of their would-be manipulators could possibly have suspected. — William Dalrymple
Yes ... how else could Demandred explain the skill of the enemy general? Only a man with the experience of an ancient was so masterly at the dance of battlefields. At their core, many battle tactics were simple. Avoid being flanked, meet heavy force with pikes, infantry with a well-trained line, channelers with other channelers. And yet, the finesse of it ... the little details ... these took centuries to master. No man from this Age had lived long enough to learn the details with such care. — Robert Jordan
There should be a law, I though. If you support a war, if you think it's worth the price, that's fine, but you he to put your own precious fluids on the line. You have to head for the front and hook up with an infantry unit and help spill the blood. And you have to bring along your wife, or your kids, or your lover. A law, I thought. — Tim O'Brien
I was out in the combat engineers. We would throw up bridges in advance of the infantry but mainly we would just throw up. — Mel Brooks
Infantry Marines live only and forever in the real world. — Nathaniel Fick
Long-range missiles with hybrid thermonuclear and necromantic payloads. Grafted and crossbred infantry divisions. Strategic alliances with folkloric, extraplanar, and subterranean entities. Field deployment of weaponized paleofauna. Large-scale saturation of target areas with invasive fungal and floral xeno organisms. Megadeaths and mega-undeaths. This is the Cold War now. An American president must be found who, whatever his other qualifications, is prepared to maintain our competitiveness in this area. I'm afraid that that person is you. — Austin Grossman
The sharply precise divisions and boundaries, together with the fact that - wind and your more exotic-type spins aside - balls can be made to travel in straight lines only, make textbook tennis plane geometry. It is billiards with balls that won't hold still. It is chess on the run. It is to artillery and airstrikes what football is to infantry and attrition. — David Foster Wallace
To All the World: I declare the earth is hollow and habitable within; containing a number of solid, concentric spheres; one within the other, and that it is open at the poles twelve or sixteen degrees. - J. Cleves Symmes of Ohio, late Captain of Infantry, April 10, 1818; quoted in Sprague de Camp and Ley, Lands Beyond, New York, Rinehart, 1952, x — Umberto Eco
All front-line combat jobs in the infantry, special operations units and elsewhere are now open to women. — Renee Montagne
General: I attempted to take Williamsport yesterday, but found too large a force of infantry and artillery. After a long fight, I withdrew to this place. — John Buford
I think the guys who are sort of infantry in Somali piracy are not unlike low-level drug dealers in urban areas in America, who see it as, you know, not having many other options. I think it comes down to money and needing to survive. — Cutter Hodierne
Susan, Susan -- Poetry: aviation! Prose: infantry. [to Susan Sontag] — Joseph Brodsky
Imperialism has now reached a degree of almost scientific perfection. It uses White workers to conquer the non-white workers of The Colonies. Then, it hurls the non-white workers of one colony against those of another non-white colony. Finally, it relies on the Colored workers of the colonies to rule the White workers. Recently, White French soldiers near mutiny in the occupied Ruhr of Germany, were surrounded by French African soldiers, and colored native light-infantry were sent against White German strikers ... — Ho Chi Minh
In the US. Infantry Manual published during World War II, the soldier was told what to do if a live grenade fell into the trench where he and others were sitting: to wrap himself around the grenade so as to at least save the others. (If no one "volunteered," all would be killed, and there were only a few seconds to decide who would be the hero. — Anatol Rapoport
At the outbreak of the war it was found very difficult to raise infantry in Texas, as no Texan walks a yard if he can help it. Many mounted regiments were therefore organized, and afterwards dismounted. — Arthur Fremantle
In the space of a single year, a crumbling rural village had sprouted an army town, like a great parasitical growth. The former peacetime aspect of the place was barely discernible. The village pond was where the dragoons watered their horses, infantry exercised in the orchards, soldiers lay in the meadows sunning themselves. All the peacetime institutions collapsed, only what was needed for war remained. Hedges and fences were broken or simply torn down for easier access, and everywhere there were large signs giving directions to military traffic. While roofs caved in, and furniture was gradually used up as firewood, telephone lines and electricity cables were installed. Cellars were extended outwards and downwards to make bomb shelters for the residents; the removed earth was dumped in the gardens. The village no longer knew any demarcations or distinctions between thine and mine.
pp. 36-37 — Ernst Junger
He relaxed into the dirt, it was all right, he was infantry and the dirt was home. He felt warm liquid all over his left thigh and wondered if he'd peed himself, it didn't matter, none of it mattered, the stars were out in the blackness overhead and that was where he was going. — Henry V. O'Neil
Being shelled is the main work of an infantry soldier, which no one talks about. Everyone has his own way of going about it. In general, it means lying face down and contracting your body into as small a space as possible. — Louis Simpson
The General knew he would probably die, for infantry took pleasure in killing cavalry and he would be the leading horseman in the attack on the bridge, but the General was a soldier and he had long learned that a soldier's real enemy is the fear of death. Beat that fear and victory was certain, and victory brought glory and fame and medals and money and, best of all, sweetest of all, most glorious and wondrous of all, the modest teasing grin of a short black-haired Emperor who would pat the Dragoon General as though he was a faithful dog, and the thought of that Imperial favour made the General quicken his horse and raise his battered sword. — Bernard Cornwell
Patriotism is the primary moral armor of our ground combatants. — Dick Couch
The Marines already have started putting women through infantry training. They've done it for the past couple of years. And it's tough. Roughly one-third of women have made it through that infantry training. So you're not going to see a lot of women actually make it through this. — Renee Montagne
What branch do you want to go in?" "I don' give a god-damn," said Pilon jauntily. "I guess we need men like you in the infantry." And Pilon was written so. He turned then to Big Joe, and the Portagee was getting sober. "Where do you want to go?" "I want to go home," Big Joe said miserably. The sergeant put him in the infantry too. — John Steinbeck
The beauty of the infantry is its ability to truly teach tolerance. At the lowest level, when it is simply a matter of survival to count on everyone around you, regardless of religion or skin color, the only logical option is to ignore the differences. — Adam Fenner
Of course, I also attribute some of my hearing loss to being in the infantry in World War II. It's probably a combination of heredity and noise exposure. — George Kennedy
But they (the infantry) had no use for boys of twelve and thirteen, and before I had a chance in another war, the desire to kill people to whom I had not been introduced had passed away. — Mark Twain
The surest way to become a pacifist is to join the infantry. — Bill Mauldin
Some say an army of horsemen, or infantry,
A fleet of ships is the fairest thing
On the face of the black earth, but I say
It's what one loves. — Sappho
In the midst of combat, we learned a great deal about mankind and its many different races, creeds and beliefs. — Carlos Wallace