B. H. Liddell Hart Quotes About Enemies

Quotes about: Enemies

• In the case of a state that is seeking not conquest but the maintenance of its security, the aim is fulfilled if the threat is removed - if the enemy is led to abandon his purpose.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Enemy, Purpose

• In any problem where an opposing force exists and cannot be regulated, one must foresee and provide for alternative courses. Adaptability is the law which governs survival in war as in life ... To be practical, any plan must take account of the enemy's power to frustrate it; the best chance of overcoming such obstruction is to have a plan that can be easily varied to fit the circumstances met.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, War, Law

• Air forces offered the possibility of striking a the enemy's economic and moral centres without having first to achieve 'the destruction of the enemy's main forces on the battlefield'. Air-power might attain a direct end by indirect means - hopping over opposition instead of overthrowing it.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Mean, Air

• Inflict the least possible permanent injury, for the enemy of to-day is the customer of the morrow and the ally of the future

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Enemy, Allies

• The nearer the cutting off point lies to the main force of the enemy, the more immediate the effect; whereas the closer to the strategic base it takes place, the greater the effect.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Lying, Cutting

• The most consistently successful commanders, when faced by an enemy in a position that was strong naturally or materially, have hardly ever tackled it in a direct way. And when, under pressure of circumstances, they have risked a direct attack, the result has commonly been to blot their record with a failure.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Strong, Military, Successful

• It is thus more potent, as well as more economical, to disarm the enemy than to attempt his destruction by hard fighting ... A strategist should think in terms of paralysing, not of killing.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Fighting, Thinking

• While hitting one must guard ... In order to hit with effect, the enemy must be taken off his guard.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Taken, Order

  B.H. Liddell Hart (2013). “Foch - The Man Of Orleans”, p.367, Read Books Ltd

• The art of the indirect approach can only be mastered, and its full scope appreciated, by study of and reflection upon the whole history of war. But we can at least crystallize the lessons into two simple maxims- one negative, the other positive. The first is that, in face of the overwhelming evidence of history, no general is justified in launching his troops to a direct attack upon an enemy firmly in position. The second, that instead of seeking to upset the enemy's equilibrium by one's attack, it must be upset before a real attack is, or can be successfully launched

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Art, Real, War

• facebook
• twitter
• googleplus
• email
• linkedin

• facebook
• twitter
• googleplus
• email
• linkedin