Quotes & Sayings About The Navy

It rarely snows because Antarctica is a desert. An iceberg means it's tens of millions of years old and has calved from a glacier. (This is why you must love life: one day you're offering up your social security number to the Russia Mafia; two weeks later you're using the word calve as a verb.) I saw hundreds of them, cathedrals of ice, rubbed like salt licks; shipwrecks, polished from wear like marble steps at the Vatican; Lincoln Centers capsized and pockmarked; airplane hangars carved by Louise Nevelson; thirty-story buildings, impossibly arched like out of a world's fair; white, yes, but blue, too, every blue on the color wheel, deep like a navy blazer, incandescent like a neon sign, royal like a Frenchman's shirt, powder like Peter Rabbit's cloth coat, these icy monsters roaming the forbidding black. — Maria Semple

I left Scotland when I was 16 because I had no qualifications for anything but the Navy, having left school at 13. — Sean Connery

any medium. Henry Stupen of Elco, the electric boat company, purchased PT 9 along with reproduction rights and lengthened the boat to 77 feet in order to carry the four torpedo tubes the U.S. Navy wanted. With Scott-Paine at the controls and the Rolls Royce engines purring beneath him, PT 9 won every sea trial it entered. The US Navy had their PT Boat. Three Packard marine engines replaced PT 9's Rolls Royce engines. — Michael Engelmann

Every man should own a navy cashmere jacket with gold buttons, a grey suit, black shoes shoes for the city, brown shoes for elsewhere. Everything else should be simple and really well made. — Thom Browne

What is the great fear of the United States? That an Eastern power will build a navy to challenge us. How do you keep them from doing that? Keep them at each other's throats so they don't have any money to do this. This is why we fought the First World War, the Second World War, and the Cold War. — George Friedman

And then, when I left Princeton in the middle of my sophomore year, I went into the navy. — Harry Mathews

I was a radioman when I first went into the Navy, so I learned to type by taking Morse code. So I was using the typewriter from day one. My handwriting wasn't any good anyway. — Robert Stone

I always wanted to go into the military or something like that - my whole family, all my friends are either Air Force, Navy, or Marines. — RJ Mitte

If you're one of those delusional 2nd Amendment types who believes you and your trailer park 'militia' might need to take on the Army, the Navy, the 101st Airborne and SEAL Team 6; not only should you be denied the right to bear arms
but the right to your belt & shoelaces as well ... 'cause you're stark, ravin' batshit!!! — Quentin R. Bufogle

The Guardian's Wildchild: Lorna tossed used linen onto the floor and snapped fresh sheets into place on the bed. She fluffed pillows into submission so they sat only as her big hands demanded. Lorna turned around and saw Sam standing in the main infirmary. She hustled into the main room and snapped to attention in front of him.
"You caught me working again." She feigned worry. "Damn! — Feather Stone

The general's staff is a handpicked collection of killers, spies, geniuses, patriots, political operators and outright maniacs. There's a former head of British Special Forces, two Navy Seals, an Afghan Special Forces commando, a lawyer, two fighter pilots and at least two dozen combat veterans and counterinsurgency experts. They jokingly refer to themselves as Team America, taking the name from the South Park-esque sendup of military cluelessness, and they pride themselves on their can-do attitude and their disdain for authority. — Michael Hastings

The Japanese Navy not only outgunned American forces in the Pacific but proved more powerful in that ocean than the combined navies of the United States, Great Britain, and the Netherlands. — James M. Scott

The wife of a junior officer cooped up in a horrible canvas partition in steerage for five months wrote:
"I had enjoyed much peace there in the absence of every comfort, even of such as are now enjoyed in jail. I used to say that there were four privations in my situation - fire, water, earth and air. No fire to warm oneself on the coldest day, no water to drink but what was tainted, no earth to set the foot on, and scarcely any air to breathe. Yet, with all these miserable circumstances, we spent many a happy hour by candlelight in that wretched cabin whilst I sewed and he read the Bible to me. — Stephen Taylor

Al Qaeda attacked the U.S.S. Cole and bombed several U.S. embassies in East Africa in the late 1990s. We knew who did it, but we didn't go after them. Instead, we beefed up security at our embassies and changed the Navy's rules of engagement. It only served to embolden Al Qaeda. — Kathleen Troia McFarland

My name is Lieutenant Meyer. I'll be your rescuer today. This rescue of your person is brought to you by the United States Navy and SEAL Team 8. we hope you have a nice rescue, and please feel free to fill out the questionnaire at the end of the trip. Tips are welcome. — Sophie Oak

It has been more than 30 years since this disgraceful episode occurred, and I believe that the United States government should demand the return of the USS Pueblo to the United States Navy without further delay. — Wayne Allard

To have command of the air means to be able to cut an enemy's army and navy off from their bases of operation and nullify their chances of winning the war. — Giulio Douhet

I read somewhere that every inch of rope used in the British Navy has a strand of red in it, so that wherever a bit of it is found it is known. That is the text of my little sermon to you. Virtue, which means honour, honesty, courage, and all that makes character, is the red thread that marks a good man wherever he is. — Louisa May Alcott

The Bane
... where coxswain's dirt
and seaman's shirts
brushed bawdily upon her chest ... — Muse

When I was in the Navy, everyone fell under the purview of "navy gray". It is the military's way of reminding its enlisted personnel that they are all equal. Man or woman, black or white, young or old, everyone was navy gray. With God's grace I can proudly say a better understanding of this concept has helped me ameliorate disputes, mend fences that appeared hopeless and find light in the midst of darkness. — Carlos Wallace

I got called back into the Navy during the Korean War. — Daniel J. Evans

I remember saying goodbye to my father the night he left to join the Navy. He didn't have to. He was older than other servicemen and had a family to support but he wanted to be a part of the fight against fascism, not just make movies about it. I admired this about him. — Jane Fonda

I want to go slow, baby, I really do," he whispered at the side of her neck. "But I'm not going to be able to this first time."
"Thank heavens. — Robin Bielman

The wonder is always new that any sane man can be a sailor. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

During the Depression, much of my career was dictated by a fanatical aversion to washing dishes. The only job I could find to finance college involved washing dishes,so I joined the Navy instead. — Keith Robertson

I thought living in London, my favorite city, would be wonderful, but I worried about the impact the move would have on my career. I discussed my options with Bill Setterstrom of the bank's personnel department. Bill had been in the navy and viewed family separations as fairly normal. At first, he suggested that I stay at my job in New York. I pointed out that Pat was not being assigned to a battleship at sea where I could not follow. "In fact," I said, "this is London, Bill, and I want to go!"
In the end, he offered me six months' leave of absence "to enjoy your new baby and living in London. — Mary Robertson

To achieve these Jeffersonian ends, Alexander Hamilton - Jefferson's philosophical rival - devised an ingenious strategy that entailed a strong manufacturing base, a national banking system, a centralized federal government, and an export-led economic scheme protected by the U.S. Navy. — Patrick Mendis

I am an officer of the Royal Manticoran Navy, Sir - " Venizelos felt an undeniable rush of adrenaline and pleasure as he faced the burly captain squarely " - and the Royal Manticoran Navy does not 'bluff. — David Weber

It sucked, but it was way cool at the same time," Gazzy said. "I felt like the Blue Angels!"
"Yeah, except the blue Angels are an extremely well funded, well equipped, well trained, well fed, and no doubt squeaky-clean group of crack navy pilots," I said. "And we're a bunch of unfunded, unequipped, semitrained, not nearly well fed enough, and filthy mongrel avian-human hybrids. But other than that, it's exactly the same. — James Patterson

This was the argument put forward during the War when the expenditure on the army and navy had to be met; and this was the argument put forward in Germany and Austria after the War when a part of the population had to be provided with cheap food, the losses on the operation of the railways and other public undertakings met, and reparations payments made. The assistance of inflation is invoked whenever a government is unwilling to increase taxation or unable to raise a loan; that is the truth of the matter. — Ludwig Von Mises

Extraordinary people are the Green Berets and the Navy Seals and the Olympic athletes - these are the ones who can face these extraordinary physical challenges and be triumphant. — Jonathan Demme

Shuffled footsteps caught her attention. "Hey," Owen said. She took in the sight of him, dressed in a new borrowed outfit - a long sleeved navy T-shirt and a pair of khakis that had been too long for John. The shirt highlighted the difference in his eyes.
Well, okay, there was the reason she hadn't been thinking about the real world. — Laura Kaye

The United States Navy, during the war, used Navajos as "code-talkers" who relayed messages from ship to ship, talking in Navajo (a language not studied in Japan). — Michael Lesk

I was a mechanic in the Navy. And mechanics in the Navy are like mechanics in airlines. You may have more stripes than I do, but you don't know how to fix the airplane. — Gordon Bethune

I hope we'll be friends." His grin was pure sin....
She stuck with the truth. "I hope we won't be enemies. — Dana Marton

I am the son and grandson of Navy admirals, and I was born into America's service, ... It wasn't until I was deprived of her company that I fell in love with America. — John McCain

My father was raised with brothers, he was a football player and a boxer, he was a chief petty officer in the Navy, he was a man of his times. — Hillary Clinton

A persistent case of the bingos was enough to wash a man out of night carrier landings. That did not mean you were finished as a Navy pilot. It merely meant that you were finished so far as carrier ops were concerned, which meant that you were finished so far as combat was concerned, which meant you were no longer in the competition, no longer ascending the pyramid, no longer qualified for the company of those with the right stuff. — Tom Wolfe

Hot pink, I'm sure she spent a few minutes debating it - was she tan enough, maybe the navy silky sleeveless top instead, can't go wrong with navy - and over her shoulder, a cognac Prada the exact same shade as her shoes, the perfect match more age revealing than the skin starting to pucker in her neck. She had at least ten years on me, I determined, relieved. — Jessica Knoll

One night I was on my [Navy] ship ... on my first cruise crossing the North Atlantic in a horrible storm, chained to the rails so I wouldn't fall overboard. In this lightning and thunder and hail, in this misery, I shouted at the heavens with my little squeaky voice and said, Someday I'm going to be a photographer! It was as big an epiphany as any man ever had. — Ralph Gibson

Adam Brown's zest for life led him down a few dark alleys and more than one dead end. Kind-hearted and wild, Adam led a life that lacked direction. God, a woman, and the U.S. Navy gave it to him. FEARLESS is a love story ... several love stories: a man for his woman, a warrior for his team, parents for kids, and soldiers for their country. There is no greater love than that a man lay down his life for his friends. Be warned - reading FEARLESS will change the way you see the world. — Stu Weber

He yanked off his shift, and she kicked off her sandals. Then she was on her knees on the bed, unfastening his belt and unzipping his zipper. He was already full to bursting. She glanced up at him. "It looks like you're eager to see me."
"Hell, yeah. — Terry Spear

You have to really want to be a Navy SEAL. The passion you need to endure the rigors of training, to become the best of the best ... It's admirable. — Suzanne Brockmann

Gap was essentially the American wardrobe that was well-priced, and it was attractive, and it was happy, and it had great color, and it has jeans, and I think we did the same with Old Navy. And I think we do the same with J.Crew at a much higher level, Madewell at another level. — Mickey Drexler

I don't go anywhere without clean shoes. That's one thing I've got from the navy. — Mark Hadlow

I enlisted when I was a boy. The Navy looked after me like my mother. It fed me, took care of me and gave me wonderful opportunities. — Tony Curtis

The Royal Navy of England hath ever been its greatest defense and ornament; it is its ancient and natural strength; the floating bulwark of the island. — William Blackstone

The heart and soul of a Navy SEAL is somebody who's committed to their country and committed to their teammates. — Howard E. Wasdin

The Navy runs their process. The House of Representatives doesn't do anything about their process. We do not select. Navy officers select. — Patricia Schroeder

I went to the surplus store on Santa Monica and Vine (in Los Angeles) and went and got me a Navy outfit, put the black tape under my eyes. I got me a whistle and went in there with a hat looking like a full-on drill sergeant. — Tyrese Gibson

You can't do a blocking spell, and you've never heard of L'Occhio di Dio? Man, what kind of witch are you?
I had an incredibly nasty retort ready that involved his mother and the U.S. Navy, but before I could get it out ... — Rachel Hawkins

She was dressed in the softest grape blue, a gentle color neither navy nor purple, nor yet silver. It was subtle, expensive and extremely flattering. — Anne Perry

I basically have the diet of a 19th-century Irish navy, apart from the litre of stout a day. It's meat and potatoes and bread and cheese: those are my four food groups. — Daniel Radcliffe

If it takes the entire army and navy to deliver a postal card in Chicago, that card will be delivered. — Grover Cleveland

Scaling back the U.S. fleet of 14 nuclear-armed submarines to eight would maintain a robust deterrent at sea while generating billions in savings and easing pressure on the Navy's shipbuilding budget. — Mike Quigley

The Air Force has it far worse than the Navy in terms of existential fears, primarily due to the rapid rise and unbelievable dissemination of drones, where seemingly now every military unit has their own miniature air wing of what would have recently passed as toys. — Thomas P.M. Barnett

It was easy to make fun of the marines when they weren't listening. In Holden's navy days, making fun of jarheads was as natural as cussing. But four marines had died getting him off the Donnager, and three of them had made a conscious decision to do so. Holden promised himself that he'd never make fun of them again. — James S.A. Corey

Christian, beware how thou thinkest lightly of sin. Take heed lest thou fall by little and little. Sin, a little thing? Is it not a poison? Who knows its deadliness? Sin, a little thing? Do not the little foxes spoil the grapes? Doth not the tiny coral insect build a rock which wrecks a navy? Do not little strokes fell lofty oaks? Will not continual droppings wear away stones? Sin, a little thing? It girded the Redeemer's head with thorns, and pierced His heart! It made Him suffer anguish, bitterness, and woe. Could you weigh the least sin in the scales of eternity, you would fly from it as from a serpent, and abhor the least appearance of evil. Look upon all sin as that which crucified the Saviour, and you will see it to be exceeding sinful. — Charles Haddon Spurgeon

I love the Army-Navy surplus store Surplus Value Center. They have really good long underwear and multicolored bandanas, cool camo jackets, and really, really scary-looking knives. If you're into that sort of thing. — Jill Soloway

I went to military college in Canada and graduated as an officer in the Navy but also as an engineer. — Marc Garneau

But I felt it necessary to be part of the war effort and I enlisted in the Navy to be a flyer. — Paul Berg

Oh Come All Ye Faithful "Occum" Claus stood a head taller than most of the other men at the party. Like most of his crazy family, he wore a Santa suit, only the coat of his outfit was missing, exposing suspenders and a sleeveless white tank top. The man was heavily muscled and looked angry; a mixture of holiday cheer and a Navy SEAL having a really bad day. He was the picture that went along with the headline "Christmas Nightmare" or "Crazed Santa Attacks Orphans with Fire Ax. — Elizabeth Gannon

When the Navy sends their elite, they send the SEALs. When the SEALs send their elite, they send SEAL Team Six. — Stephen Templin

Fear and hatred are the legacy of Ronald Reagan. America's vision of peace and freedom [is being] blasted by the guns of the U.S. Navy in Lebanon, the guns of U.S. paratroopers in Grenada, and the guns of U.S. helicopters in Honduras and El Salvador. — Alan Cranston

There are many who predict that China is the next challenger to the United States, not Russia. I don't agree with that view for three reasons. First, when you look at a map of China closely, you see that it is really a very isolated country physically. With Siberia in the north, the Himalayas and jungles to the south, and most of China's population in the eastern part of the country, the Chinese aren't going to easily expand. Second, China has not been a major naval power for centuries, and building a navy requires a long time not only to build ships but to create well-trained and experienced sailors. Third, there is a deeper reason for not worrying about China. China is inherently unstable. Whenever it opens its borders to the outside world, the coastal region becomes prosperous, but the vast majority of Chinese in the interior remain impoverished. — George Friedman

Zane liked his love life simple: catch and release, and then move on. The problem was, Missy wasn't anything like his usual prey. — Cat Johnson

I'd put the ninety-nine billion dollars - whatever it is - that's being appropriated for the Air Force and the Navy, and I'd put it into schools. I'd put it into traveling scholarships. — Nelson Algren

The characteristic feature of militarism is not the fact that a nation has a powerful army or navy. It is the paramount role assigned to the army within the political structure. Even in peacetime the army is supreme; it is the predominant factor in political life. The subjects must obey the government as soldiers must obey their superiors. Within a militarist community there is no freedom; there are only obedience and discipline. — Ludwig Von Mises

I went to the University of Maryland for a year and was considering maybe, you know, being a medical doctor but decided my other interest was maybe flying airplanes in the Navy and just kind of changed my mind and changed schools and changed majors and decided to focus a hundred percent on that. — Scott Kelly

Hopefully one day Wars will only be fought in movies. And may the best producer win! — Stanley Victor Paskavich

Although I had lived a far from perfect life, my heart and soul belonged to God, country, and family long before the Navy got hold of me. — Jeremiah Denton

The Navy's a very gentlemanly business. You fire at the horizon to sink a ship and then you pull people out of the water and say, 'Frightfully sorry, old chap.' — William Golding

As kids, we were taught to be the psychological equivalent of Navy SEALS- an elite parochial-school unit, drilled to take life's blows on the chin without wincing. — Maureen Corrigan

You want to know who's now running the U.S. Army, the U.S. Navy and the Marines and calling the shots where it counts? Fundamentalist Muslims and homosexual activists. — Bryan Fischer

I joined the Navy hoping to be submariner and ended up in the sub service aboard a tender in the Pacific. — Tony Curtis

I love my country, and the mental and physical demands of the Navy SEALs was what I had been training for my whole life growing up in Montana. There's a reason Montana produces more SEALs than any other state. As a collegiate athlete, I enjoyed the mental and physical challenges Division I football presented. When a recruiter first told me about the Navy SEALs, I knew it was the right fit. — Ryan Zinke

I thought of Pericles' speech to the families of the Athenian war dead, in which he said, What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others. — Eric Greitens

Putin likes to quote a sentence from Czar Alexander III, who said that Russian has only two allies - the army and the navy. As a citizen, this makes me sit up and take notice. This is a concept of self-imposed isolation, a defense strategy that sees Russia surrounded by enemies. — Vladimir Sorokin

Since he belonged, even at the age of six, to that great clan which cannot keep this feeling separate from that, but must let future prospects, with their joys and sorrows, cloud what is actually at hand, since to such people even in earliest childhood any turn in the wheel of sensation has the power to crystallise and transfix the moment upon which its gloom or radiance rests, James Ramsay, sitting on the floor cutting out pictures from the illustrated catalogue of the Army and Navy stores, endowed the picture of a refrigerator, as his mother spoke, with heavenly bliss. — Virginia Woolf

Outrage steamed her brain. "I've waited three days... Do you know what day it is?"
He gave a one-sided shrug, his massive shoulder muscles shifting. "Who has time to check the calendar when people are shooting at you and snakes are biting you in the ass? — Dana Marton

We're the front line," Danny had told Wade. "On September eleventh, 2001, they didn't call the navy. They didn't call the Marine Corps. They called the policemen and the firemen. We are the soldiers of our community. — Fernanda Santos

I feel that the recent ruling of the United States Army and Navy regarding the refusal of colored blood donors is an indefensible one from any point of view. As you know, there is no scientific basis for the separation of the bloods of different races except on the basis of the individual blood types or groups. — Charles R. Drew

I grew up in Manchester, and we were very poor. My father was a miner who joined the Navy during the war and developed a lung disease and had to have a lung removed. — Bernard Hill

I asked the first guy, "So what was it that made you want to become a Navy SEAL - chance for adventure? Family tradition? Physical challenge? Desire to see the world?" "Oh no, ma'am. Chicks dig it," he said. — Dana Perino

After the navy, I transferred to Harvard and finished there. I was there the spring term of 1951 and I stayed through the summer term and a whole other year, so I was able to do two years in a little less than a year and a half. — Harry Mathews

Modest, conventional expectations weren't enough to lure Adam Brown away from the power of drug addiction that ensnared him. Instead, the college dropout already in his mid-twenties found only the big, near-impossible dream of being a Navy SEAL captivating enough to consistently draw him to different choices. — Eric Blehm

I stepped into the bedroom where he was killed and looked up at the ceiling, where you could still see the patterns of blood that had spurted from bin Laden's head when the bullet fired by a U.S. Navy SEAL tore through the terrorist leader's face. — Peter L. Bergen

He gripped the back of her neck again in that purely dominating way that made her melt. "We're finishing this when we get back." His voice was a low, raspy growl. — Katie Reus

The English too, were turning their eyes to the South. In 1769, there was to be a transit of the planet Venus across the disc of the sun, a rare event which astronomers wanted to observe. The newly discovered island of Tahiti was judged the perfect site. The Royal Society in London asked the Royal Navy to organize the expedition. The Navy obliged. This was to have profound and unlooked-for consequences. It led to the virtual monopolization by naval officers of British Polar exploration until the first decade of this century. The voyage inspired by the transit of Venus was commanded by a man of quiet genius, James Cook, one of the greatest of discoverers. — Roland Huntford

War is a nasty, dirty, rotten business. It's all right for the Navy to blockade a city, to starve the inhabitants to death. But there is something wrong, not nice, about bombing that city. — Sir Arthur Harris, 1st Baronet

Sit down on your ass, or what's left of it after four years in the navy. — William S. Burroughs

Kennedy lied and lied about his health while he was alive, even using his father's influence to get into the Navy without ever taking a medical examination. — Richard Reeves

I have just realized that it is due to you, and to Mr. James Thomas and his staff of the Army Navy Country Club that the putting green here on the White House lawn is already in such excellent condition. I assure you that I get a great deal of pleasure and relaxation out of using the green in an occasional late afternoon hour ... — Dwight D. Eisenhower

I'm so glad you're here, Anne,' said Miss Lavendar, nibbling at her candy. 'If you weren't I should be blue ... very blue ... almost navy blue. Dreams and make-believes are all very well in the daytime and the sunshine, but when dark and storm come they fail to satisfy. One wants real things then. But you don't know this ... seventeen never knows it. At seventeen dreams do satisfy because you think the realities are waiting for you further on. — L.M. Montgomery

You can't run, you can't hide, and the idea that you have no control at all just gets into your head and it sticks there. In my time in the Navy, I was never so scared in my life. Bombs and smoke everywhere, fires on the deck. Meanwhile, the guns are booming and the noise is like nothing you've ever heard. Thunder times ten, maybe, but that doesn't describe it. In the big battles, Japanese Zeros strafed the deck continually, the shots ricocheting all over the place. — Nicholas Sparks

To Admiral Cunningham it was against all tradition to abandon the Army in such a crisis. He declared, It takes the Navy three years to build a new ship. It will take three hundred years to build a new tradition. — Winston S. Churchill

The war was not won by any single individual, be it Abraham Lincoln or Ulysses S. Grant. The Union, as a whole, triumphed. The national army, fielding over two million men in toto, led by legions of staff, company, field, and general officers; a correspondingly potent navy; and a far more powerful economy than its adversary were all needed to ultimately subdue the Confederacy. — Joseph A. Rose

Then it hits me ...
And it hits me with the force of a blow. I am maybe fifteen years old. I am a girl. I am also acting lieutenant in the Royal Navy, and, by the Naval Rules and Regulations as regards the chain of command, I am in command of His Majesty's Ship Wolverine. — L.A. Meyer

The navy is like a socialist country. Efficiency isn't part of the jargon. — James W. Blinn

When I'm inside you, buried so deep I'm the only thing that exists in your world, that's when I'm not going to go slow. It's going to be fast and hard because I'm going to lose my mind. — Robin Bielman