In a campaign against more than one state or army, it is more fruitful to concentrate first against the weaker partner than to attempt the overthrow of the stronger in the belief that the latter’s defeat will automatically involve the collapse of the others.
B. H. LIDDELL HARTThe 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.
More B. H. Liddell Hart Quotes
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Avoid self-righteousness like the devil- nothing is so self-blinding.
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The search for the truth for truth’s sake is the mark of the historian.
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The easiest and quickest path into the esteem of traditional military authorities is by the appeal to the eye, rather than to the mind. ‘The polish and pipeclay’ school is not yet extinct, and it is easier for the mediocre intelligence to become an authority on buttons, than on tactics.
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.
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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.
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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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Direct pressure always tends to harden and consolidate the resistance of an opponent.
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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.
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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 -
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.
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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.
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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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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.
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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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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