Niccolo Machiavelli Quotes

War is the ultimate tool of politics.

We cannot be both the world's leading champion of peace and the world's leading supplier of the weapons of war.

So long as war exists on earth there will be some danger that even the Nation which most ardently desires peace may be drawn into war.

Lightly armed nations can move toward war just as easily as those which are armed to the teeth, and they will do so if the usual causes of war are not removed.

Unless a nation's life faces peril, war is murder.

I think when war becomes your life, I think it's very difficult to have the proper perspective to be able to create a fully balanced policy.

War is the continuation of politics by other means.

Now, I believe that war is never inevitable until it starts, but there has been a great proclivity in human history, and including in recent history, for war.

I know that military alliances and armament have been the reliance for peace for centuries, but they do not produce peace; and when war comes, as it inevitably does under such conditions, these armaments and alliances but intensify and broaden the conflict.

The military don't start wars. Politicians start wars.

War is the most serious of the complicated relationships of humankind.

It makes no difference who says that our objective is peace, even if he be the President of the United States. Our actions speak louder than words, and our actions in Asia today are the actions of warmaking.

The belief that war is inevitable makes of war a self-fulfilling prophecy.

All wars are mishandled.

He was afraid of war [with America]. Stain never did anything to provoke a war with the United States. He knew his weakness

Nations drift into wars.

The object of war is victory; that of victory is conquest; and that of conquest preservation.

War should be the only study of a prince. He should consider peace only as a breathing-time, which gives him leisure to contrive, and furnishes as ability to execute, military plans.

Wars are, of course, as a rule to be avoided; but they are far better than certain kinds of peace.

Let us recollect that peace or war will not always be left to our option; that however moderate or unambitious we may be, we cannot count upon the moderation, or hope to extinguish the ambition of others.

Let him who desires peace prepare for war.

What I've learned, and will try to remember from now on, is that defending your country's credibility is never sufficient reason to fight a war.

The only excuse for war is that we may live in peace unharmed.

He said that if we were going to have a war, they would never be the first ones to start it.

And, you see, we are living in a world in which all wars are wars of defense.