War leader

“ But on each side there was among all these leaders one supreme leader on whose ability and decision depended not only the results of certain battles, but the lives of their millions of soldiers—yes, even the fate of millions upon millions of men, women and children. ”

“ But if ye think with me, three things have ye to determine: first, whether ye will abide your foes in your own houses, or will go meet them at theirs; next, whether ye will take to you as fellows in arms a valiant folk of the children of the Gods, who are foemen to our foemen; and lastly, what man ye will have to be your War-leader. ”

“ By altering his arrangements and changing his plans, he keeps the enemy without definite knowledge. By shifting his camp and taking circuitous routes, he prevents the enemy from anticipating his purpose.
38. At the critical moment, the leader of an army acts like one who has climbed up a height and then kicks away the ladder behind him. He carries his men deep into hostile territory before he shows his hand. ”

“ Today he enjoys the confidence of his countrymen to a degree unknown to military leaders during the war. If ultimately successful in the end—if he directs his course through the mazes of the political campaign which has followed hard upon the close of the war as well as he has his military career, posterity will delight, and will find little difficulty, in tracing out a comparison between his character and that of the country's first great leader. ”

“ But when he has disposed of foreign enemies by conquest or treaty, and there is nothing to fear from them, then he is always stirring up some war or other, in order that the people may require a leader. ”

“ Thus we are fighting—make no mistake about it—not only for our honour but also for our life.
This is what we are fighting for. But it is equally important to know what we are fighting against. We are not merely fighting the German Emperor, or the German Army, or the German people, united and indistinguishable in the present campaign as I believe all these to be. We are fighting the spirit that is behind the Emperor, the Army and the people. Believe me, if you are to understand the German action, you must understand the German mind. The psychology of the war is as important as its progress. ”

“ What good has a general to expect from peace? Could not this civilian understand that a commander-in-chief is only a commander-in-chief in war-time, and that in peace-time he is nothing more than a professor with a collar of gold braid? ”

“ Sir, in all these multiform manifestations of our national and imperial life, history will assign a part of singular dignity and authority to the great Ruler whom we have lost. In external affairs his powerful personal influence was steadily and zealously directed to the avoidance not only of war, but of the causes and pretexts of war, and he well earned the title by which he will always be remembered, "the Peacemaker of the World." ”

“ Make him a General, and retire him with the highest military title. Let him grandly wear the laurels he so nobly won, and should the sky at any time be darkened with a cloud of foreign war, this country will again hand him the sword. ”

“ Second rate generals accept such opportunities, but in doing so they make fatal mistakes. The great masters of the art of war manœuvre for position, and become themselves the besiegers, or decide upon the open battle-field the fate of their fortresses and their armies. ”

“ I am not a soldier, Miss Wellington. But all victories are not won on the battlefields. The art—one of the arts—of diplomacy is to bring on war, if war must be, when you are ready and your adversaries are not. ”

“ But if we were to search the countless treatises on battles and campaigns written in every modern language, we should soon be forced to record that there were five men, and only five, whom the experts of every race united in singling out. In any list of the ten greatest soldiers, prepared in any country in the world, these five names would surely appear, even tho the other names on the several lists might be those of merely national heroes. The five international masters of war are Alexander, Hannibal, Cæsar, Frederick, and Napoleon. ”

“ It is the fashion for politicians (and I am sorry to find them supported by eminent statesmen) to preach the doctrine of armaments; they allege that in order to preserve peace it is necessary to be prepared for war, that a nation with a large army or navy commands respect, and that her word carries weight. This argument cuts both ways, for a nation occupying such a commanding position may be unreasonable and a terror to weaker nations. ”

“ Under the cover of that renowned triumph, it was, that these soldiers could venture to search so deeply the question of war in general; it was in the person of its imperial hero, that the statesman could venture to touch so boldly, an institution which gave to one man, by his own confession no better or wiser than his neighbours, the power to involve nations in such horrors. ”

“ For the dear-bought experience of our four great wars is entirely unheeded, indeed almost unknown to the mass of the people; and the army to-day, in organization as in numbers, in its influence upon the military ideas and aptitudes of the nation in peace as in its capacity for expansion in time of war, is inadequate to our needs as a great nation. ”

“ True, a great European Commander has said that soldiers will become attached to any General; a remark true of the times perhaps—true of the troops of that day,—but far from being true of volunteers, who are in the field from what they consider the necessity of the country, and whose souls are bent upon a speedy, honorable, and victorious termination of the war. ”

“ Hardly have these halcyon notes ceased upon our ears, when, in resumed public session, we are summoned to fresh warlike operations; to create a new army of thirty thousand men for the further prosecution of the war; to carry the war, in the language of the President, still more dreadfully into the vital parts of the enemy, and to press home, by fire and sword, the claims we make, and the grounds which we insist upon, against our fallen, prostrate, I had almost said, our ignoble enemy. ”

“ A people may be both warlike and military, or it may be either and not the other. The distinction was evidently not in the president’s mind, for he said that we love peace, that we go to war only to assure it, and so forth. ”

“ And this great restless body of returned troops, veterans of wars beyond the seas, may change our whole foreign policy in ways of which we do not dream. We shall be a more warlike nation, less patient to bear insult, more ready for war, unless this war ends all wars. ”

“ It is our army, and our army solely, in league with the valiant troops of our allies, that has the honor and the duty of national defense. Let us intrust the army with our final deliverance.
Toward the persons of those who are holding dominion among us by military force, and who assuredly cannot but be sensible of the chivalrous energy with which we have defended and are still defending our independence, let us conduct ourselves with all needful forbearance. ”

“ While the soldier-messenger was eating his meal she had been thinking. “The soldier has generally no part nor voice in creating the war in which he fights. He simply obeys, as he must, his superiors and the laws of his country.” ”

“ It must be remembered, also, that this higher humanity resided in a man who was the human instrument partly responsible for an awful amount of slaughter and human anguish. He was not only the commander-in-chief of a great army which fought a long and bloody war, but he was the statesman who had insisted that, if necessary, the war should be fought. ”

“ The obvious comment is, "Well, there is a nation organised to win a war—that is the sort of nation which the men in the opposite trenches have behind them. A nation which has organised itself for war, and is already organising itself for peace after the war" ”

“ But even in passing, war should be honored as the school of experience which compelled a race of arrogant individualists to submit themselves to highly concentrated authority—a chief executive. Old-fashioned war did select the innately great men for leadership, but modern war no longer does this. To discover leaders society must now turn to the conquests of peace: industry, science, and social achievement. ”

“ A king of men, a stronger soul, a man with more ambition or more boundless energy than his compeers, carried his fellows, by the divine right of leadership, to war. Except as a consequence of his greater bravery, he stood in no one place higher than those he led. The fighting was individual. There were no tactics; there was no systematic military organisation. All fought singly, with a view to the common end of success. ”

“ Paradoxical as it may appear, some of the most distinguished and honorable soldiers have been the most successful bloodless peace-makers, while, on the other hand, some of the most contemptible cowards, with peaceable pretensions always on their lips, have distinguished themselves by very little besides their successful contrivances to keep all engaged in war with whom they have had to do. ”

“ I consider war, as a profession, both necessary and honourable, and a nation is bound to be prepared for any foreign attack, and to act upon the defensive, or on the offensive, if it is necessary. It is not that. I do not consider the soldier who fights for his country is not doing his duty, nor the seamen who are employed by the state are not equally justified in their profession. ”

“ You fill a flower-pot with gunpowder and chuck it in the other fellow's face, and heigh presto! the war is won. All the soldiers fall down dead! And You: you who forced the idea on the reluctant military, are the Man that Won the War. ”

“ It is of vital importance that we should understand the attitude of every one of the nations—both friends and enemies—involved in this war. For in this way only can we know what is necessary to be done to achieve victory. ”

“ Peace-loving nations are confronted by a Power which has prepared for war for forty years, equipped in every detail as no Power has ever been equipped before, with a docile and well-disciplined people trained to arms, fortified by a well-founded belief in their invincibility, reinforced by armies of spies in every country, hostile or neutral. ”

“ A famous British General (still living) was once asked, "What is the most essential quality for a great leader of men?" And he replied in one word "SYMPATHY." The General was speaking of leadership in relation to warfare ”

“ The near approach of peace renders it improbable that you will again be called upon to undergo the fatigues of the toilsome march or the exposure of the battle-field, but should the assistance of keen blades wielded by your sturdy arms be required to hasten the coming of that glorious peace for which we have been so long contending, the General commanding is proudly confident that, in the future as in the past, every demand will meet with a hearty and willing response. ”

“ My warriors shall be mighty In the strength of the Creator. Between him and my song they are For it was he who gave the song This war song that I sing! 82. When the warriors of the Five Nations are on an expedition against an enemy, the War Chief shall sing the War Song as he approaches the country of the enemy and not cease until his scouts have reported that the army is near the enemies' lines when the War Chief shall approach with great caution and prepare for the attack. ”

“ Energetic fighting men had been pushed forward, by the necessities of the times, to the front, and put in command of national affairs. A vast army, trained for fighting, was at hand. When suddenly the war was at an end, and he who with patient wisdom had stood at the helm, and guided the nation through such troubled seas, was stricken down. ”

“ Generals in our day grow obsolete as rapidly as inventions and sciences. The war has taught us that the blood of nations, the incalculably precious blood, is to be entrusted only to the freshest, the most elastic, the most gifted of military spirits, the very cream of the crop. ”

“ Five, eight, or ten leaders learned in the order of battle and in strategy consult together concerning the business of war, and command their bands after consultation. It is their wont to take out with them a body of boys, armed and on horses, so that they may learn to fight, just as the whelps of lions and wolves are accustomed to blood. And these in time of danger betake themselves to a place of safety, along with many armed women. After the battle the women and boys soothe and relieve the pain of the warriors, and wait upon them and encourage them with embraces and pleasant words. ”

“ With profound gratitude toward the God of battles, by whose blessing our enemies have been humbled and arms rendered triumphant, your Commanding General avails himself of this his first opportunity to express to you his admiration of the heroic manner in which you have passed through the series of battles which to-day resulted in the surrender of the enemy's entire army. ”

“ My father and my grandfather led the troops of the Empire when they went forth to battle. Happily in our day war is a remote contingency, but it is not impossible. We preserve peace by being prepared for war. It seems to me a terrible responsibility to submit to a change which might result in the event of war in the army not being led by its emperor. ”

“ It is in this belief that I wish to fight, conquer, and die, certain that my dying eyes will see victory. Soldiers, do your duty: think on the sacrifice of your cities in flames, and on your children, who implore your protection; think on your Emperor, your lord, who considers you as the nerve of his power, and to-morrow, before the sun shall have gone down, you will have traced your faith and your fidelity on your country's soil with the blood of the aggressor and his warriors. ”

“ To the excellence of the soldiery witness, direct or indirect, is borne in every one of those military treatises which give us such a vivid picture of the warfare of the age. Unless the general is incompetent or the surrounding circumstances unusually adverse, the authors always assume that victory will follow the banner of the Empire. ”