Carl von Clausewitz Quotes About Soldiers

Quotes about: Soldiers

• Whenever armed forces . . . are used, the idea of combat must be present. . . . The end for which a soldier is recruited, clothed, armed, and trained, the whole object of his sleeping, eating, drinking, and marching is simply that he should fight at the right place and the right time.

  Carl von Clausewitz

  Drinking, Sleep, Fighting

  Carl von Clausewitz (2008). “On War”, p.95, Princeton University Press

• The more a general is accustomed to place heavy demands on his soldiers, the more he can depend on their response.

  Carl von Clausewitz

  Soldier, Demand, Heavy

  Carl von Clausewitz, Michael Howard, Peter Paret (1989). “On War”, p.189, Princeton University Press

• But the main point is that soldiers, after fighting for some time, are apt to be like burned-out cinders. They have shot off their ammunition, their numbers have been diminished, their strength and their morale are drained, and possibly their courage has vanished as well. As an organic whole, quite apart from their loss in numbers, they are far from being what they were before the action; and thus the amount of reserves spent is an accurate measure on the loss of morale.

  Carl von Clausewitz

  Fighting, Loss, Numbers

  Carl von Clausewitz, Michael Howard, Peter Paret (1989). “On War”, p.231, Princeton University Press

• In War, the young soldier is very apt to regard unusual fatigues as the consquence of faults, mistakes, and embarrassment in the conduct of the whole, and to become distressed and depondent as a consequence. This would not happen if he had been prepared for this beforehand by exercises in peace.

  Carl von Clausewitz

  Mistake, War, Exercise

• 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.

  Carl von Clausewitz

  Pain, War, Taken

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