I suppose if I had lost the war, I would have been tried as a war criminal.... Every soldier thinks something of the moral aspects of what he is doing. But all war is immoral and if you let that bother you, you're not a good soldier.

I don't have time to distinguish between the unfortunate and the incompetent.

If you kill enough of them, they stop fighting.

I think there are many times when it would be most efficient to use nuclear weapons. However, the public opinion in this country and throughout the world throw up their hands in horror when you mention nuclear weapons, just because of the propaganda that's been fed to them.

My solution to the problem would be to tell [the North Vietnamese Communists] frankly that they've got to draw in their horns and stop their aggression or we're going to bomb them into the Stone Age. And we would shove them back into the Stone Age with Air power or Naval power - not with ground forces.

You've got to kill people, and when you've killed enough they stop fighting.

Today, shooting wars are won or lost before they start. If they are fought at all, they would be fought principally to confirm which side had won at the outset.