I do not want to be a pawn in a political campaign.
-Norman schwarzkopf
It takes a hero to be one of those men who goes into battle.
-Norman schwarzkopf
Someone once asked, ‘What is the difference between me and Saddam Hussein?’ The answer is, ‘I have a conscience and he doesn’t.’
For the entire first part of my career, I prided myself on being unflappable even in the most chaotic of circumstances.
-Norman schwarzkopf
Going to war without France is like going hunting without an accordion.
The fun of fishing is catching ’em, not killing ’em.
-Norman schwarzkopf
Well, unfortunately, I have always regretted the fact that I have a temper, but I also have, you know, have great love and respect for all of the people that have worked for me. I think like everything else, this is one of those things that has been blown out of proportion.
-Norman schwarzkopf
It doesn’t take a hero to order men into battle. It takes a hero to be one of those men who goes into battle.
-Norman schwarzkopf
As far as Saddam Hussein being a great military strategist, he is neither a strategist, nor is he schooled in the operational arts, nor is he a tactician, nor is he a general, nor is he a soldier. Other than that, he’s a great military man, I want you to know that.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I do hunt, and I do fish, and I don’t apologize to anybody for hunting and fishing.
-Norman schwarzkopf
As young West Point cadets, our motto was ‘duty, honor, country.’ But it was in the field, from the rice paddies of Southeast Asia to the sands of the Middle East, that I learned that motto’s fullest meaning. There I saw gallant young Americans of every race, creed and background fight, and sometimes die, for ‘duty, honor, and their country.’
-Norman schwarzkopf
All you have to do is hold your first soldier who is dying in your arms, and have that terribly futile feeling that I can’t do anything about it… Then you understand the horror of war.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I am living proof that if you catch prostate cancer early, it can be reduced to a temporary inconvenience, and you can go back to a normal life.
-Norman schwarzkopf
You learn far more from negative leadership than from positive leadership. Because you learn how not to do it. And, therefore, you learn how to do it.
-Norman schwarzkopf
A professional soldier understands that war means killing people, war means maiming people, war means families left without fathers and mothers.
-Norman schwarzkopf
This gulf war syndrome thing is truly unfortunate, and I’ve met some of the vets who have this. These are my guys, and I feel terrible about it.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I may have made my reputation as a general in the Army, and I’m very proud of that. But I’ve always felt that I was more than one-dimensional. I’d like to think I’m a caring human being.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I’m not a type-B personality who knows I have a cancer growing inside of me and can live with the knowledge. I go into a kung-fu attack position when I go through the door of a hospital.
-Norman schwarzkopf
A great deal of the capability of an army is its dedication to its cause and its will to fight. You can have the best equipment in the world, you can have the largest numbers in the world, but, if you’re not dedicated to your cause, if you don’t have the will to fight, then, you are not going to have a very good army.
-Norman schwarzkopf
The more you sweat in peace, the less you bleed in war.
-Norman schwarzkopf
True courage is being afraid, and going ahead and doing your job anyhow, that’s what courage is.
-Norman schwarzkopf
What people don’t understand is this is something that we only have in America. There is no other country in the world where the ordinary citizen can go out and enjoy hunting and fishing. There’s no other nation in the world where that happens. And it’s very much a part of our heritage.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I can stand in a crystal stream without another human around me and cast all day long, and if I never catch a single fish, I can come home and still feel like I had a wonderful time. It’s the being there that’s important.
-Norman schwarzkopf
Good generalship is the realisation that you’ve got to figure out how to accomplish your mission with the minimum loss of human life.
-Norman schwarzkopf
Generals aren’t in the business of commenting on the correctness or incorrectness of the President’s decisions. Anybody who thinks he should be able to do that ought to be fired on the spot.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I am not one of these guys who is just going to waste American lives by throwing people needlessly in frontal attacks up against the enemy if I can avoid doing that.
-Norman schwarzkopf
An awful lot has been written about my temper.
-Norman schwarzkopf
War’s a profanity because, let’s face it, you’ve got two opposing sides trying to settle their differences by killing as many of each other as they can.
-Norman schwarzkopf
Tanks being deployed far forward is an indication of offensive action; tanks in depth is an indication of defensive action.
-Norman schwarzkopf
The Patriot missile is a point defence missile. Point defence means that you put the missile at a location to defend a very specific target such as an airfield, a supply dump or a headquarters.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I get angry at a principle, not a person.
-Norman schwarzkopf
Leadership is a potent combination of strategy and character. But if you must be without one, be without the strategy.
-Norman schwarzkopf
To be an effective leader, you have to have a manipulative streak – you have to figure out the people working for you and give each tasks that will take advantage of his strength.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I saw Kuwait many times before the war. I remember it as a beautiful place, full of very nice people, and it’s a tragedy to see that somebody could set out to deliberately destroy a country the way the Iraqis have.
-Norman schwarzkopf
When the Normandy Invasion was planned, a very specific strategic objective was given, and that strategic objective was the basis upon which the plan for the Normandy Invasion was derived.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I’ve managed to convince my wife that somewhere in the Bible it says, ‘Man cannot have too many shotguns and fishing poles.’
-Norman schwarzkopf
There’s no doubt in my mind that whichever commander ordered the blowing up of Kamisiyah did so in following the instructions that he had received.
-Norman schwarzkopf
Had we taken all of Iraq, we would have been like a dinosaur in the tar pit – we would still be there, and we, not the United Nations, would be bearing the costs of that occupation.
-Norman schwarzkopf
Had the United States and the United Kingdom gone on alone to capture Baghdad, under the provisions of the Geneva and Hague conventions we would have been considered occupying powers and therefore would have been responsible for all the costs of maintaining or restoring government, education and other services for the people of Iraq.
-Norman schwarzkopf
Unfortunately, if you’ve ever been in southern Georgia on the beaches in a lightning storm, if you’re out there, you’re in great, great danger, and you can be killed very, very quickly.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I think any student of military strategy would tell you that in order to attack a position, you should have a ratio of approximately 3 to 1 in favor of the attacker.
-Norman schwarzkopf
With a chemical alarm, you’re going to build one that is oversensitive because you would rather the alarm go off and give you a false alarm than to err on the other side
-Norman schwarzkopf
I’d like to think I’m a caring human being.
-Norman schwarzkopf
Any soldier worth his salt should be antiwar. And still there are things worth fighting for.
-Norman schwarzkopf
He is neither a strategist nor is he schooled in the operational arts, nor is he a tactician, nor is he a general. Other than that he’s a great military man.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I prided myself on being unflappable even in the most chaotic of circumstances.
-Norman schwarzkopf
First of all, Saddam did not win the war, even though he says he did, I mean, you know, that’s a joke and everybody in the world knows it.
-Norman schwarzkopf
Fish are a renewable resource, and one of the problems we’ve had is people feel obliged to catch the limit, then throw ’em in the garbage can.Nobody can ever pin you down when you speculate.
-Norman schwarzkopf
When I fish, I stop thinking about anything else. But truth be told, if you want to declare victories, I can tell you the fish have won a lot more than I have. It’s interesting that something with a brain the size of a fish’s can outsmart us humans, who think we are el supremo.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I can’t even begin to visualize myself as a five-star general… When I think of the people who are five-star generals, I can’t even see myself standing in their shadow.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I’ve got to tell you what, the soldier doesn’t fight very hard for a leader who is going to shoot him, okay, on his own whim. That’s not what military leadership is all about.
-Norman schwarzkopf
Moving into an unoccupied village when there’s no opposition, I don’t call that a military victory.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I’m not proud of killing, of being responsible for the death of a single person. I never will be.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I like to say I’m not a hero.
-Norman schwarzkopf
If Saddam were to be replaced tomorrow he would probably be replaced with someone who’s just as bad or worse than he is.
-Norman schwarzkopf
They say the good Lord doesn’t charge you for the days you hunt and fish, and I believe that.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I may have made my reputation as a general in the Army and I’m very proud of that. But I’ve always felt that I was more than one-dimensional.
-Norman schwarzkopf
Hey, I’m not a politician. I’m a ham. I love to give speeches.
-Norman schwarzkopf
I’m not a politician. I’d make a lousy politician.
-Norman schwarzkopf