The world has a way of undermining complex plans. This is particularly true in fast moving environments. A fast moving environment can evolve more quickly than a complex plan can be adapted to it. By the time you have adapted, the target has changed.

Any complex activity, if it is to be carried on with any degree of virtuosity, calls for appropriate gifts of intellect and temperament. If they are outstanding and reveal themselves in exceptional achievements, their possessor is called a 'genius'.

In war more than anywhere else, things do not turn out as we expect.

There are very few men-and they are the exceptions-who are able to think and feel beyond the present moment

Desperate affairs require desperate remedies.

Every age has its own kind of war, its own limiting conditions and its own peculiar preconceptions.

Talent and genius operate outside the rules, and theory conflicts with practice.