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I used to think that the causes of war were predominantly economic. I came to think that they were more psychological. I am now coming to think that they are decisively “personal,” arising from the defects and ambitions of those who have the power to influence the currents of nations.

B. H. Liddell Hart

With growing experience, all skillful commanders sought to profit by the power of the defensive, even when on the offensive.
B. H. LIDDELL HART

Growing Military Offensive
The implied threat of using nuclear weapons to curb guerrillas was as absurd as to talk of using a sledge hammer to ward off a swarm of mosquitoes.
B. H. LIDDELL HART

Hammers Military Mosquitoes
The urge to gain release from tension by action is a precipitating cause of war.
B. H. LIDDELL HART

Causes Gains War
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

Lying Men Reality
Loss of hope rather than loss of life is what decides the issues of war. But helplessness induces hopelessness.
B. H. LIDDELL HART

Issues Loss War
No man can exactly calculate the capacity of human genius and stupidity, nor the incapacity of will.
B. H. LIDDELL HART

Men Military Stupidity
The most dangerous error is failure to recognize our own tendency to error.
B. H. LIDDELL HART

Dangerous Errors Tendencies
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

Dream Hydrogen Bomb Military
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

Military Produce
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

Balance Military Usual
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

Air Soldier War
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

Next Should Steps Thinking
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

Mean Military War
Natural hazards, however formidable, are inherently less dangerous and less uncertain than fighting hazards. All conditions are more calculable, all obstacles more surmountable than those of human resistance.
B. H. LIDDELL HART

Fighting Hazards Military
The higher level of grand strategy [is] that of conducting war with a far-sighted regard to the state of the peace that will follow.
B. H. LIDDELL HART

Level Military War
A modern state is such a complex and interdependent fabric that it offers a target highly sensitive to a sudden and overwhelming blow from the air.
B. H. LIDDELL HART

Air Blow Target

I used to think that the causes of war were predominantly economic. I came to think that they were more psychological. I am now coming to think that they are decisively “personal,” arising from the defects and ambitions of those who have the power to influence the currents of nations.

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I used to think that the causes of war were predominantly economic. I came to think that they were more psychological. I am now coming to think that they are decisively “personal,” arising from the defects and ambitions of those who have the power to influence the currents of nations.

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Popular Authors

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