Modern wars are seldom fought without hatred between nations; this serves more or less as a substitute for hatred between individuals.

Men are always more inclined to pitch their estimate of the enemy's strength too high than too low, such is human nature.

Boldness becomes rarer, the higher the rank.

The art of war in its highest point of view is policy.

However much pains may be taken to combine the soldier and the citizen in one and the same individual, whatever may be done to nationalize wars, never will it be possible to do away with the professionalism of the business; and if that cannot be done, then those who belong to it will always look upon themselves as a kind of guild, in the regulations, laws, and customs in which the "Spirit of War" finds its expression. It would be very wrong to look down upon this corporate spirit, or esprit de corps, which may and should exist more or less in every Army.

War is nothing but a continuation of politics with the admixture of other means.

In short, absolute, so-called mathematical, factors never find a firm basis in military calculations. From the very start, there is an interplay of possibilities, probabilities, good luck and bad, that weaves its way throughout the length and breadth of the tapestry. In the whole range of human activities, war most closely resembles a game of cards.