The only thing that makes battle psychologically tolerable is the brotherhood among soldiers. You need each other to get by.

The attacks of 9/11 came out of Afghanistan. It was a failed state, a rogue nation. That's why al Qaeda was there in the first place.

War is a lot of things and it's useless to pretend that exciting isn't one of them. (pg. 144)

A grenade launcher will easily take out a tank; a Molotov cocktail placed in its air intake will destroy one as well.

The army consists of the first infantry division and eight million replacements.

I had grown up during Vietnam. I had no connections to the U.S. military, and I had a pretty cynical default opinion about the U.S. military.

I don't think people would climb mountains or jump off bridges with parachutes or kayak Class V rapids if those things didn't offer the brief and horrible illusion of imminent death. They would just be complicated, time-consuming endeavors that we'd steer well clear of because they got in the way of real life.