Liddell Quotes & Sayings

But time and surprise are the two most vital elements in war. — B.H. Liddell Hart

While the nominal strength of a country is represented by its numbers and resources, this muscular development is dependent on the state of its internal organs and nerve-system - upon its stability of control, morale, and supply. — B.H. Liddell Hart

It is thus more potent, as well as more economical, to disarm the enemy than to attempt his destruction by hard fighting ... A strategist should think in terms of paralysing, not of killing. — B.H. Liddell Hart

People with disabilities want to be recognised for what they can do, not what they can't do. — Karni Liddell

Someone should write a book about how Alice Liddell from Wonderland falls in love with Huckleberry Finn. I might rather want to read that book. — Heather Lyons

Believe in God the Father, Almighty, Creator, infinitely holy and loving, who has a plan for the world, a plan for my life, and some daily work for me to do. I believe in Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God, as Example, Lord, and Saviour. I believe in the Holy Spirit who is able to guide my life so that I may know God's will; and I am prepared to allow him to guide and control my life. I believe in God's law that I should love the Lord my God with all my heart, and with all my soul, and with all my mind, and with all my strength; and my neighbour as myself. I believe it is God's will that the whole world should be without any barriers of race, colour, class, or anything else that breaks the spirit of fellowship. To believe means to believe with the mind and heart, to accept, and to act accordingly on that basis. — Eric Liddell

Another day, a different dream perhaps — Alice Liddell

The more closely [the German army] converged on [Stalingrad], the narrower became their scope for tactical manoeuvre as a lever in loosening resistance. By contrast, the narrowing of the frontage made it easier for the defender to switch his local reserves to any threatened point on the defensive arc. — B.H. Liddell Hart

The destruction of Wonderland, is the destruction of me?! — Alice Liddell

Wonderlawn's lost us for ever. Alis, alas, she broke the glass! Liddell lokker through the leafery, ours is mistery of pain. — James Joyce

If, in the quiet of your heart, you feel something should be done, stop and consider whether it is in line with the character and teaching of Jesus. If so, obey that impulse to do it, and in doing so you will find it was God guiding you. — Eric Liddell

For whoever habitually suppresses the truth in the interests of tact will produce a deformity from the womb of his thought. — B.H. Liddell Hart

The historian's rightful task is to distil experience as a medicinal warning for the future generations, not to distil a drug. — B.H. Liddell Hart

Sunday is God's day, and he was committed to honoring it. Just because he was in Paris to compete in the Olympics didn't justify changing his lifelong commitment. — Craig Groeschel

No man can exactly calculate the capacity of human genius and stupidity, nor the incapacity of will. — B.H. Liddell Hart

It was a strategic victory as bloodless for the defeated as for the victor-and the less men slain on the other side, the more potential adherents and recruits for Caesar. Despite the substitution of manoeuvre for direct assaults upon his enemy the campaign had cost him only six weeks of his time. — B.H. Liddell Hart

I've never found that getting physical is ever the best response in a bar. You just have to make sure you keep your distance, and if it gets to a point where it gets aggressive then the best thing to do is go get a bouncer and get the situation resolved intelligently. — Chuck Liddell

Opposition to the truth is inevitable, especially if it takes the form of a new idea, but the degree of resistance can be diminished- by giving thought not only to the aim but to the method of approach. Avoid a frontal attack on a long established position; instead, seek to turn it by flank movement, so that a more penetrable side is exposed to the thrust of truth. But, in any such indirect approach, take care not to diverge from the truth- for nothing is more fatal to its real advancement than to lapse into untruth. — B.H. Liddell Hart

The destruction of the enemy's armed forces is but a means
and not necessarily an inevitable or infallible one
to the attainment of the real objective. The object of war is not to destroy the enemy's tanks but to destroy his will. — Liddell Hart

A fighter with heart will almost always win out against a fighter with skill but no will. — Chuck Liddell

The strategy of Fabius was not merely an evasion of battle to gain time, but calculated for its effect on the morale of the enemy-and, still more, for its effect on their potential allies. It was thus primarily a matter of war-policy, or grand strategy. Fabius recognized Hannibal's military superiority too well to risk a military decision. While seeking to avoid this, he aimed by military pin-pricks to wear down the invaders' endurance and, coincidentally, prevent their strength being recruited from the Italian cities or their Carthaginian base. The key condition of the strategy by which this grand strategy was carried out was that the Roman army should keep always to the hills, so as to nullify Hannibal's decisive superiority in cavalry. Thus this phase became a duel between the Hannibalic and the Fabian forms of the indirect approach. — B.H. Liddell Hart

I don't think much of Tito Ortiz. He needs to grow balls and sign to fight Chuck Liddell. — Tank Abbott

But Polybius brought out the basic lesson in his reflection-'for as a ship, if you deprive it of its steersman, falls with all its crew into the hands of the enemy; so, with an army in war, if you outwit or out-manoeuvere its general, the whole will often fall into your hands'. — B.H. Liddell Hart

The downfall of civilized states tends to come not from the direct assaults of foes, but from internal decay combined with the consequences of exhaustion in war. — B.H. Liddell Hart

The evolution of the sport is so fast, if you slow down for a second, you're past. — Chuck Liddell

She did get put through the system with a lot of the hit songwriters, who were great songwriters, but it was more like 'This is how it's done here. It turned her off - not specific people, but the whole system turned her off. And she wanted to do something, I think, that she could play for her friends in Texas and they would say, Okay, well you're still Miranda. — Frank Liddell

Each of my career decisions has been very much about doing what I wanted to achieve in the role and then finding another challenge. — Chris Liddell

The kingdom is where the King reigns. If He is reigning in my heart, then the Kingdom of Heaven has come to me. — Eric Liddell

The hydrogen bomb is not the answer to the Western peoples' dream of full and final insurance of their security ... While it has increased their striking power it has sharpened their anxiety and deepened their sense of insecurity. — B.H. Liddell Hart

To ensure attaining an objective, one should have alternate objectives. An attack that converges on one point should threaten, and be able to diverge against another. Only by this flexibility of aim can strategy be attuned to the uncertainty of war. — B.H. Liddell Hart

Helplessness induces hopelessness, and history attests that loss of hope and not loss of lives is what decides the issue of war. — B.H. Liddell Hart

In the dust of defeat as well as the laurels of victory there is a glory to be found if one has done his best. — Eric Liddell

In reality, it si more fruitful to wound than to kill. While the dead man lies still, counting only one man less, the wounded man is a progressive drain upon his side. — B.H. Liddell Hart

An army should always be so distributed that its parts can aid each other and combine to produce the maximum possible concentration of force at one place, while the minimum force necessary is used elsewhere to prepare the success of the concentration. — B.H. Liddell Hart

The legitimate object of war is a more perfect peace-this sentence — B.H. Liddell Hart

While there are many causes for which a state goes to war, its fundamental object can be epitomized as that of ensuring the continuance of its policy - in face of the determination of the opposing state to pursue a contrary policy. In the human will lies the source and mainspring of conflict. — B.H. Liddell Hart

The predominance of moral factors in all military decisions. On them constantly turns the issue of war and battle. In the history of war they form the more constant factors, changing only in degree, whereas the physical factors are different in almost every war and every military situation. — B.H. Liddell Hart

No man of action has more completely attained the point of view of the scientific historian, who observes the movements of mankind with the same detachment as a bacteriologist observes bacilli under a microscope and yet with a sympathy that springs from his own common manhood. In — B.H. Liddell Hart

In the case of a state that is seeking not conquest but the maintenance of its security, the aim is fulfilled if the threat is removed - if the enemy is led to abandon his purpose. — B.H. Liddell Hart

The practical value of history is to throw the film of the past through the material projector of the present on to the screen of the future. — B.H. Liddell Hart

Engineering is a fantastic base for any career. — Chris Liddell

For Caesar met failure each time he relied on the direct, and retrieved it each time he resorted to the indirect. — B.H. Liddell Hart

The chief incalculable in war is the human will. — B.H. Liddell Hart

I don't try to knock 'em out, I just know I will — Chuck Liddell

The history of ancient Greece showed that, in a democracy, emotion dominates reason to a greater extent than in any other political system, thus giving freer rein to the passions which sweep a state into war and prevent it getting out - at any point short of the exhaustion and destruction of one or other of the opposing sides. Democracy is a system which puts a brake on preparation for war, aggressive or defensive, but it is not one that conduces to the limitation of warfare or the prospects of a good peace. No political system more easily becomes out of control when passions are aroused. These defects have been multiplied in modern democracies, since their great extension of size and their vast electorate produce a much larger volume of emotional pressure. — B.H. Liddell Hart

Direct experience is inherently too limited to form an adequate foundation either for theory or for application. At the best it produces an atmosphere that is of value in drying and hardening the structure of thought. The greater value of indirect experience lies in its greater variety and extent. History is universal experience, the experience not of another, but of many others under manifold conditions. — B.H. Liddell Hart

The military weapon is but one of the means that serve the purposes of war: one out of the assortment which grand strategy can employ. — B.H. Liddell Hart

Every action is seen to fall into one of three main categories, guarding, hitting, or moving. Here, then, are the elements of combat, whether in war or pugilism. — B.H. Liddell Hart

If we clear the air of the fog of catchwords which surround the conduct of war, and grasp that in the human will lies the source and mainspring of all conflict, as of all other activities of man's life, it becomes clear that our object in war can only be attained by the subjugation of the opposing will. All acts, such as defeat in the field, propaganda, blockade, diplomacy, or attack on the centres of government and population, are seen to be but means to that end. — B.H. Liddell Hart

Keep strong, if possible. In any case, keep cool. Have unlimited patience. Never corner an opponent, and always assist him to save his face. Put yourself in his shoes - so as to see things through his eyes. Avoid self-righteousness like the devil - nothing is so self-blinding. — B.H. Liddell Hart

The more usual reason for adopting a strategy of limited aim is that of awaiting a change in the balance of force ... The essential condition of such a strategy is that the drain on him should be disproportionately greater than on oneself. — B.H. Liddell Hart

Air forces offered the possibility of striking a the enemy's economic and moral centres without having first to achieve 'the destruction of the enemy's main forces on the battlefield'. Air-power might attain a direct end by indirect means - hopping over opposition instead of overthrowing it. — B.H. Liddell Hart

It should be the aim of grand strategy to discover and pierce the Achilles' heel of the opposing government's power to make war. Strategy, in turn, should seek to penetrate a joint in the harness of the opposing forces. To apply one's strength where the opponent is strong weakens oneself disproportionately to the effect attained. To strike with strong effect, one must strike at weakness. — B.H. Liddell Hart

I switch on and off very easily; I'm inherently lucky in that sense. I sleep well. — Chris Liddell

Ensure that both plan and dispositions are flexible, adaptable to circumstances. Your plan should foresee and provide for a next step in case of success or failure. — B.H. Liddell Hart

If you want peace, understand war. — B.H. Liddell Hart

In should be the duty of every soldier to reflect on the experiences of the past, in the endeavor to discover improvements, in his particular sphere of action, which are practicable in the immediate future. — B.H. Liddell Hart

You just have to realize that Jet Li is a movie star. He's great at what he does, but if he stepped into our world he wouldn't last long. — Chuck Liddell

While many lessons can be found in Frederick's campaigns, the main one would appear to be that his indirectness was too direct. To express this in another way, he regarded the indirect approach as a matter of pure manoeuvre with mobility, instead of a combination of manoeuvre with mobility and surprise. Thus, despite all his brilliance, his economy of force broke down. — B.H. Liddell Hart

The profoundest truth of war is that the issue of battle is usually decided in the minds of the opposing commanders, not in the bodies of their men. — B.H. Liddell Hart

If you find your opponent in a strong position costly to force, you should leave him a line of retreat as the quickest way of loosening his resistance. It should, equally, be a principle of policy, especially in war, to provide your opponent with a ladder by which he can climb down. — B.H. Liddell Hart

You will know as much of God, and only as much of God, as you are willing to put into practice. — Eric Liddell

Circumstances may appear to wreck our lives and God's plans, but God is not helpless among the ruins. God's love is still working. He comes in and takes the calamity and uses it victoriously, working out His wonderful plan of love. — Eric Liddell

While hitting one must guard ... In order to hit with effect, the enemy must be taken off his guard. — B.H. Liddell Hart

And where does the power come from, to see the race to its end? From within. — Eric Liddell

No man who really is a man ever cared for the easy task. There is no enjoyment in the game that is easily won. It is that in which you have to strain every muscle and sinew to achieve victory that provides real joy. — Eric Liddell

Choices in life are not and should not be determined by our life circumstances. — Karni Liddell

In any problem where an opposing force exists and cannot be regulated, one must foresee and provide for alternative courses. Adaptability is the law which governs survival in war as in life ... To be practical, any plan must take account of the enemy's power to frustrate it; the best chance of overcoming such obstruction is to have a plan that can be easily varied to fit the circumstances met. — B.H. Liddell Hart

One direct approach had, by its vain cost, done much to undo the aggregate advantage which indirect approaches alone had built up. And it is not the least significant feature that the issue was finally settled, in the reverse way, by yet another example of the indirect approach. — B.H. Liddell Hart

The blurring of the line between policy and strategy] encouraged soldiers to make the preposterous claim that policy should be subservient to their conduct of operations, and (especially in democratic countries) it drew the statesman on to overstep the definite border of his sphere and interfere with his military employees in the actual use of their tools. — B.H. Liddell Hart

When the campaign had opened the scales were heavily weighted and steeply tilted on the side of Antigonus. Rarely has the balance of fortune so dramatically changed. It would seem clear that Antigonus's balance had been upset by the indirect approach which Cassander planned. This dislocated the mental balance of Antigonus, the moral balance of his troops and his subjects, and the physical balance of his military dispositions. — B.H. Liddell Hart

The most consistently successful commanders, when faced by an enemy in a position that was strong naturally or materially, have hardly ever tackled it in a direct way. And when, under pressure of circumstances, they have risked a direct attack, the result has commonly been to blot their record with a failure. — B.H. Liddell Hart

The effect to be sought is the dislocation of the opponent's mind and dispositions - such an effect is the true gauge of an indirect approach. — B.H. Liddell Hart

Throughout the ages, effective results in war have rarely been attained unless the
approach has had such indirectness as to ensure the opponent's unreadyness to meet it.
The indirectness has usually been physical, and always psychological. — Liddell Hart

To foster the people's willing spirit is often as important as to possess the more concrete forms of power. — B.H. Liddell Hart

War is always a matter of doing evil in the hope that good may come of it. — B.H. Liddell Hart

As has happened so often in history, victory had bred a complacency and fostered an orthodoxy which led to defeat in the next war. — B.H. Liddell Hart

For there is nothing more intolerable to mankind than suspense; when a thing is once decided, men can but endure whatever out of the catalogue of evils it is their misfortune to undergo. — B.H. Liddell Hart

What you learn at university is a good discipline but has little relevance to a real job. — Chris Liddell

Air Power is, above all, a psychological weapon - and only short-sighted soldiers, too battle-minded, underrate the importance of psychological factors in war. — B.H. Liddell Hart

I don't have a tolerance for long meetings. I generally expect to get things over with quickly. — Chris Liddell

I believe every single one of us has a choice in life and that we can all choose to live out whatever our exceptional minds dream up. — Karni Liddell

God made me fast. And when I run, I feel His pleasure. — Eric Liddell

In strategy the longest way round is often the shortest way there- a direct approach to the object exhausts the attacker and hardens the resistance by compression, whereas an indirect approach loosens the defender's hold by upsetting his balance. — B.H. Liddell Hart

For if we merely take what obviously appears the line of least resistance, its obviousness will appeal to the opponent also; and this line may no longer be that of least resistance. In studying the physical aspect, we must never lose sight of the psychological, and only when both are combined is the strategy truly an indirect approach, calculated to dislocate the opponent's balance. — B.H. Liddell Hart

Purity does not mean crushing the instincts but having the instincts as servants and not the master of the spirit. — Eric Liddell

It has been a wonderful experience to compete in the Olympic Games and to bring home a gold medal. But since I have been a young lad, I have had my eyes on a different prize. You see, each one of us is in a greater race than any I have run in Paris, and this race ends when God gives out the medals. — Eric Liddell

To move along the line of natural expectation consolidates the opponent's balance and thus increases his resisting power. In war, as in wrestling, the attempt to throw the opponent without loosening his foothold and upsetting his balance results in self-exhaustion, increasing in disproportionate ratio to the effective strain put upon him. Success by such a method only becomes possible through an immense margin of superior strength in some form-and, even so, tends to lose decisiveness. In most campaigns the dislocation of the enemy's psychological and physical balance has been the vital prelude to a successful attempt at his overthrow. — B.H. Liddell Hart

Loss of hope rather than loss of life is what decides the issues of war. But helplessness induces hopelessness. — B.H. Liddell Hart

I'll fight somebody in my backyard for free, just to see if I'm better than him. — Chuck Liddell

The hardest part of your journey to success will be telling people your crazy dreams and ideas. But I've found as soon as you say your dreams aloud, many people will come to your side and help guide your journey in the right direction. During my 30 year journey with my disease I have discovered that you will always be surrounded by help, support and light if you stay positive in spite of hardships. — Karni Liddell

Man I told Dana when I first came to the UFC, I don't wanna fight none of these bums ... I want the best. I wanted this man right here [points to poster of Brock Lesnar], but he was sick. I didn't know that. So I said, 'what about Chuck, Chuck, whatever his name is, Chuck Liddell?' He was sitting there all scared and nervous. — James Toney

Thus through the folly of a single hot-headed general, whose offensive spirit was not balanced by judgment, the Empire suffered a blow from which it never recovered-although it had sufficient power of endurance to survive, in a diminished form, for a further four hundred years. — B.H. Liddell Hart

So, what genetic disposition do you need to be a CFO? Essentially, you need to be miserable, you need to be the sort of person who takes drinks away from people at the end of a party. — Chris Liddell

Frederick consistently used his central position to concentrate against one fraction of the enemy, and he always employed tactics of indirect approach. Thereby he gained many victories. But his tactical indirect approach was geometrical rather than psychological-unprepared by the subtler forms of surprise favoured by Scipio-and for all their executive skill, these manoeuvres were narrow. The opponent might be unable to meet the following blow, owing to the inflexibility of his mind or his formations, but the blow itself did not fall unexpectedly. — B.H. Liddell Hart

If you wish for peace, understand war. — B.H. Liddell Hart

What went on between you and my mom? Did you seduce all the Liddell women? Did you tell them the same pretty words you told me?" I curl my legs beneath my dress, feeling small and vulnerable for even asking.
Morpheus scoots aside some glass with his boot and kneels. He takes my hand in his. "I've known but three generations of Liddell women. Counting the ones in London, there's been twenty or so. Most were oblivious and unreachable - they didn't hear the nether-call. The others weren't strong enough to face their lineage without losing their minds. As for Alison, she and I were business partners. There has never been more than that between us. There's only one Liddell I desire, only one who earns my undying devotion." He works a fingertip into the lace at my elbow and drags off the glove. "The one who was my truest friend ... who took my place and braved the attack that was meant for me." — A.G. Howard

The statesman will soon find himself thwarted in some way or other, will deduce from this opposition a menace first to his plans, then to national prestige, and finally to the existence of the state itself - and so, regarding his country as the party attacked, will engage in a war of defence. — B.H. Liddell Hart

I've always found diversity more interesting than specialisation. I like mixing it up across years, within days, within weeks - that's what stimulates me, gives me energy. — Chris Liddell

As Christians, I challenge you. Have a great aim - have a high standard - make Jesus your ideal ... make Him an ideal not merely to be admired but also to be followed. — Eric Liddell