You cannot allow any of your people to avoid the brutal facts. If they start living in a dream world, it's going to be bad.

An untrained or uneducated Marine ... deployed to the combat zone is a bigger threat to mission accomplishment ... than the enemy.

The first time you blow someone away is not an insignificant event. That said, there are some *******s in the world that just need to be shot. There are hunters and there are victims. By your discipline, you will decide if you are a hunter or a victim.

I would happily storm hell in the company of these troops ... how strongly they have demonstrated to the world that free men and women can fight like the dickens.

The most important six inches on the battlefield is between your ears.

If in order to kill the enemy you have to kill an innocent, don't take the shot. Don't create more enemies than you take out by some immoral act.

I find it disturbing that no member of the Senate Armed Services Committee is willing to acknowledge that record of failure and to ask our next secretary of defense what he proposes to do to amend that sorry record.