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 HARTInflict the least possible permanent injury, for the enemy of to-day is the customer of the morrow and the ally of the future
More B. H. Liddell Hart Quotes
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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.
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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.
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War is always a matter of doing evil in the hope that good may come of it.
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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.
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For whoever habitually suppresses the truth in the interests of tact will produce a deformity from the womb of his thought.
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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.
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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.
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With growing experience, all skillful commanders sought to profit by the power of the defensive, even when on the offensive.
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The nearer the cutting off point lies to the main force of the enemy, the more immediate the effect; whereas the closer to the strategic base it takes place, the greater the effect.
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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 -
Inflict the least possible permanent injury, for the enemy of to-day is the customer of the morrow and the ally of the future
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As has happened so often in history, victory had bred a complacency and fostered an orthodoxy which led to defeat in the next war.
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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.
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No man can exactly calculate the capacity of human genius and stupidity, nor the incapacity of will.
B. H. LIDDELL HART