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.

If you want peace, understand war.

The most effective indirect approach is one that lures or startles the opponent into a false move - so that, as in ju-jitsu, his own effort is turned into the lever of his overthrow.

The downfall of civilized states tends to come not from the direct assaults of foes, but from internal decay combined with the consequences of exhaustion in war.

If you wish for peace, understand war.

As has happened so often in history, victory had bred a complacency and fostered an orthodoxy which led to defeat in the next war.

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.