Military Civilians Quotes & Sayings

Military strength in reserve is better than military strength being reigned upon the other side including all of its innocent civilians. — Theodore C. Sorensen

A few months ago, and again this week, bin Laden publicly vowed to publicly wage a terrorist war against America, saying, and I quote, "We do not differentiate between those dressed in military uniforms and civilians. They're all targets." Their mission is murder, and their history is bloody. — William J. Clinton

I have never met anyone who built a bomb shelter and felt protected by it. I have never met a modern military man who did not realize that military victory is a concept which became obsolete with the coming of the nuclear age, and most civilians realize this also. Wisdom demands that we stop preparing to wage a war which would eliminate mankind - and start preparing to eliminate the seeds of war. — Peace Pilgrim

To be a good reporter, writing about war, you have to write about the people. It's not about the tanks or the RPGs or military strategy. It's always about the effect war has on civilians, on society, and how it disrupts and destroys lives. — Janine Di Giovanni

What's brilliant about the United States system of government is separation of power. Not only the executive, legislative, judicial branches, but also the independence of the military from civilians, an independent media and press, an independent central bank. — Feisal Abdul Rauf

If you shell a military base and happen to kill civilians, you have not committed a war crime; if you deliberately target cities and towns, you have. — Sebastian Junger

If civilians are killed in an attack on a military installation, it is certainly regrettable, but I will not morally blame the I.R.A. for it. — Peter T. King

We attacked selected military targets of the P.L.O. Around, civilians were hurt, I don't want to deny it. Very regrettable, very regrettable. We regret it deeply. — Menachem Begin

We used to have a War Office, but now we have a Ministry of Defence, nuclear bombs are now described as deterrents, innocent civilians killed in war are now described as collateral damage and military incompetence leading to US bombers killing British soldiers is cosily described as friendly fire. Those who are in favour of peace are described as mavericks and troublemakers, whereas the real militants are those who want the war. — Tony Benn

Even during the years of the Cold War, the intense confrontation between the Soviet Union and the United States, we always avoided any direct clash between our civilians and, most certainly, between our military. — Vladimir Putin

The military mind tends to be conservative, realistic and historical. The civilian mind tends to be liberal, idealistic and Utopian. Journalists, obviously, are civilians, and they tend to distrust, and to suspect, the military's motives. — Mark Riebling

A lot of guns there's no need for civilians to own those those are for military — Willie Nelson

the out-of-control momentum of extreme violence of unlimited warfare fueled race hatred. "Successive generations of Americans, both soldiers and civilians, made the killing of Indian men, women, and children a defining element of their first military tradition and thereby part of a shared American identity. — Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz

Looking back at the recent history of the world, I find it amazing how far civilization has retrogressed so quickly. As recently as World War I - granted the rules were violated at times - we had a set of rules of warfare in which armies didn't make war against civilians: Soldiers fought soldiers. Then came World War II and Hitler's philosophy of total war, which meant the bombing not only of soldiers but of factories that produced their rifles, and, if surrounding communities were also hit, that was to be accepted; then, as the war progressed, it became common for the combatants simply to attack civilians as part of military strategy. By the time the 1980s rolled around, we were placing our entire faith in a weapon whose fundamental target was the civilian population. — Ronald Reagan

England looked strange to us returned soldiers. We could not understand the war-madness that ran wild everywhere, looking for a pseudo-military outlet. The civilians talked a foreign language. I found serious conversation with my parents all but impossible. — Robert Graves

It'll be worse than having civilians on the battlefield."
"Marginally. She's had some military training, right?"
It was Reza's turn to frown. He hadn't the slightest clue what military training she had, if any. Maybe she'd just been handed her uniforms and told to report to Fort Hood. Stranger things had happened. "I have no idea," he admitted.
"Well, find out. And make sure she doesn't accidently set off any pyro."
Reza winced at the jab and flipped Evan off. "Very funny. — Jessica Scott

Thus all civilian officials and military officers in the United States government who either knew or should have known that the Reagan administration intended to assassinate Qaddafi and participated in the bombing operation are "war criminals" according to the U.S. government's own official definition of that term. The American people should not have permitted any aspect of their foreign affairs and defense policies to be conducted by acknowledged "war criminals." They should have insisted upon the impeachment, dismissal, resignation, and prosecution of all U.S. government officials guilty of such war crimes. Nevertheless, U.S. public opinion had been so effectively brutalized by five years of Reaganism that over three-quarters of the American people rallied to the support of their demented leadership over the destruction, injuries, and death it had inflicted upon hundreds of innocent civilians in Tripoli and Benghazi. — Francis A. Boyle

As far as I know, the question of whether and how it could be strategically or morally justified was never the subject of open debate in Germany after 1945, no doubt mainly because a nation which had murdered and worked to death millions of people in its camps could hardly call on the victorious powers to explain the military and political logic that dictated the destruction of the German cities. — W.G. Sebald

The military community in particular, I think, could always be more supported, especially people who are being processed out of the military and trying to readjust to being civilians. — Adam Driver

I messed up on the Vietnam Special, because I gave it to civilians? Only military men can handle that. — Si Robertson

We must all realise that the Israeli society is a military society - men and women. We cannot describe the society as civilian ... they are not civilians or innocent. — Yusuf Al-Qaradawi

Military guys are rarely as smart as they think they are, and they've never gotten over the fact that civilians run the military. — Maureen Dowd

The American Army has supplied, assigned a very capable man to me, to help me, bring me to military justice. I don't think I need no civilians. All I want to do is clear myself with the American Army. — Robert Jenkins

The Islamic method of waging war is not to kill innocent civilians, but it was Christians in World War II who bombed innocent civilians in Dresden and dropped the nuclear bomb on Hiroshima, neither of which were military targets. — Feisal Abdul Rauf

Civilians are like beans; you buy 'em as needed for any job which merely requires skill and savvy.
But you can't buy fighting spirit. — Robert A. Heinlein

In Sherman's famous march through Georgia, his soldiers left a swath of death and destruction, destroying crops, burning homes and killing civilians. Sherman himself acknowledged that only 20% of the destruction inflicted by his invasion was inflicted on military objectives. Civilian non-combatants, essentially innocents, suffered 80% of the losses. — John Pugsley

Under international law, the responsibility for protecting civilians in conflict falls on the belligerents. Under military occupation, responsibility for the welfare of the population falls on the occupiers. — Kofi Annan

Either that information was not believed or inexplicably never passed on to the regional military command. When the attack finally came, Vienamese civilians were defenseless. — Nayan Chanda

These mercenaries and hirelings kidnapped civilians in the Al-Faw Peninsula so that they might claim that they captured Iraqi soldiers. — Mohammed Saeed Al-Sahaf

There are hundreds of electromagnetic cases where spacecraft have been observed by police, military personnel and civilians to affect car engines, radios and other electric devices. — Steven M. Greer

9:37, the west wall of the Pentagon was hit by hijacked American Airlines Flight 77, a Boeing 757. The crash caused immediate and catastrophic damage. All 64 people aboard the airliner were killed,as were 125 people inside the Pentagon (70 civilians and 55 military service members). One hundred six people were seriously injured and transported to area hospitals.192 While no emergency response is flawless, the response to the 9/11 terror= ist attack on the Pentagon was mainly a success for three reasons:first,the strong professional relationships and trust established among emergency responders; second, the adoption of the Incident Command System; and third, the pursuit of a regional approach to response. Many fire and police agencies that responded had extensive — Anonymous

Yes and no. Because America has only about 1 percent of the population serving in the military, it is hard for many civilians to understand the sacrifices military families make. However, my experience is that after the Vietnam War, the public learned that they should support the military whether or not they support the war. You've seen that outpouring of support for the veterans of both Iraq and Afghanistan. — Steve Stivers

We civilians defend our own right to free speech. The military in Iraq does not defend our right to free speech. — Medea Benjamin

Fighting Maoism isn't like fighting an enemy across the border. They are civilians. The military and paramilitary have been trained to fight the enemy, but these are tribals dwelling in forests. They are also our citizens, whom we have ill-treated. — Kishore Chandra Deo

Luis Moreno Ocampo, chief prosecutor of the international criminal court, wrote in 2006: International humanitarian law and the Rome statute permit belligerents to carry out proportionate attacks against military objectives, even when it is known that some civilian deaths or injuries will occur. A crime occurs if there is an intentional attack directed against civilians (principle of distinction) ... or an attack is launched on a military objective in the knowledge that the incidental civilian injuries would be clearly excessive in relation to the anticipated military advantage (principle of proportionality). — Anonymous

U.S. Government propaganda tries to give the impression that aerial bombardment achieves near-surgical accuracy, so that military targets can be destroyed with minimal effect on civilians. Technical documents give a different picture. — Noam Chomsky

Any action taken will be against the terrorist network of Bin Laden ... As for the Taleban, they can surrender the terrorists or face the consequences - and again in any action the aim will be to eliminate their military hardware, cut off their finances, disrupt their supplies, target their troops, not civilians. — Tony Blair

It is vital that Iraq and the United States together send the clearest possible signal that those who commit acts of violence against American military forces and American civilians will not be rewarded with amnesty. — Ike Skelton

The rulling to kill the Americans and their allies - civilians and military - is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in anyh country in which it is possible to do it ... to comply iwth God's order to kill the Americnns and plunder their money wherever and whenever they find it. We also call on Muslim ulema, leaders, youths, and soldiers to launch the raid on Satan's U.S. troops and the devil's supporters allying with them ... — Osama Bin Laden

To confine soldiers to purely military functions while urgent and vital tasks have to be done, and nobody else is available to undertake them, would be senseless. The soldier must then be prepared to become a propagandist, a social worker, a civil engineer, a schoolteacher, a nurse, a boy scout. But only for as long as he cannot be replaced, for it is better to entrust civilian tasks to civilians. — David Galula

If progressive deep frames had been articulated and present in the public mind, the idea of a "war on terror" never would have made sense. If we viewed our strength as our diplomatic ability to forge international consensus and coalitions, and if we recognized that killing and maiming civilians through military action creates more terrorists and fosters more acts of terrorism, we wouldn't have looked to our military to solve the problem. Had progressive deep frames been prevalent at the time of 9/11, Americans would have taken "war on terror" as a powerful metaphor but not a literal guide to action, like the "war on poverty." They would have seen it as a major crime problem - like international organized crime - and sought to bring these criminals to justice by the means that work best, like tracing bank accounts, placing spies in their organizations, and so on. It — George Lakoff

There is the guilt all soldiers feel for having broken the taboo against killing, a guilt as old as war itself. Add to this the soldier's sense of shame for having fought in actions that resulted, indirectly or directly, in the deaths of civilians. Then pile on top of that an attitude of social opprobrium, an attitude that made the fighting man feel personally morally responsible for the war, and you get your proverbial walking time bomb. — Philip Caputo

The Pentagon got fed up with its recruits getting ripped off by payday lenders and in 2007 got Congress to make it illegal to extend such loans to members of the military. But civilians remain fair game. — Timothy Noah

You next saw her when the incident occurred?"

"That's correct."

"Did you try to figure out what was happening?"

"You're not military, you don't understand how we work. I'm not supposed to ask questions. I was just following orders."

"What orders were those?"

"We have a duty to protect civilians."

"So there wasn't a specific order that drove your decision?"

"Now you're nitpicking."

"We're being exact, Major. We'd appreciate it if you tried to do the same. — Amie Kaufman

With the indiscriminate nature of modern military technology (no such thing as a "smart bomb," it turns out) all wars are wars against civilians, and are therefore inherently immoral. This is true even when a war is considered "just," because it is fought against a tyrant, against an aggressor, to correct a stolen boundary. — Howard Zinn

In this atmosphere of doubt why was the extreme risk approved? Partly because exasperation at the failure of all her efforts at intimidation had led to an all-or-nothing state of mind and a helpless yielding like Bethmann's by the civilians to the military. — Barbara W. Tuchman

The war is not going well and it is time to say why ... It has been fought with half-measures. It has been fought with an eye on the wishes of our 'coalition partners.' It has been fought to assuage the Arab 'street.' It has been fought to satisfy the diplomats rather than the generals ... why have we not loosed the B-52s and the B-2s to carpet-bomb Taliban positions? And why are we giving the Taliban sanctuary in their cities? We could drop leaflets giving civilians 48 hours to evacuate, after which the cities become legitimate military targets. — Charles Krauthammer