Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf Quotes

How can you lay siege to a whole country? Who is really under siege now? Baghdad cannot be besieged.

When you have to besiege a city for a long time, you must not destroy its trees, wielding an ax against them. You may eat of them, but you must not cut them down. Are the trees human, to withdraw before your siege?

Whoever conquers a free town and does not demolish it commits a great error and may expect to be ruined himself.

A little before noon I sent orders to all my batteries to open fire through the streets or at any points where the troops were seen about the city, as a diversion in favor of Jackson.

An easy approach to the walls must be provided against: indeed they should be surrounded by uneven ground, and the roads leading to the gates should be winding and turn to the left from the gates.

This boa, the American columns, are being besieged between Basra and other towns north, west, south and west of Basra. The Americans are the people who are under siege.

They're on our right, they're on our left, they're in front of us, they're behind us; they can't get away from us this time.

Our strategy in going after this army is very simple. First we are going to cut it off, and then we are going to kill it.

The fact is that as soon as they reach Baghdad gates, we will besiege them and slaughter them.

A crafty enemy will set a weak ambush you are meant to break through. Confident because you have dealt with the threat, your guard relaxed, you walk into the second, stronger ambush.

Laying siege to enemy-controlled cities allows attacking armies to keep their own casualties low by avoiding urban combat.

I shall await the first shot, and if you do not batter us to pieces, we shall be starved out in a few days.

In war one must lean on an obstacle in order to overcome it.

They are still trying to bomb with artillery and rocket-propelled grenades to hit the Republican Guard who are controlling Saddam International Airport.

Fighting in cities is a totally different endeavor than obviously fighting out in the open.

When the enemy advances, withdraw; when he stops, harass; when he tires, strike; when he retreats, pursue.

Vicksburg is the nail head that holds the South’s two halves together.

Our movement was a great success; I think the most successful military movement of my life. But I expect to receive more credit for it than I deserve. Most men will think I planned it all from the first; but it was not so. I simply took advantage of circumstances as they were presented to me in the providence of God. I feel that His hand led me - let us give Him the glory.

It is a principle of the art of war that one should simply lay down his life and strike. If one's opponent also does the same, it is a even match. Defeating one's opponent is then a matter of faith and destiny.

The business of a general is to kick away the ladder behind soldiers when they have climbed up a height.

Tis action moves the world....[in] the game of chess, mind that: ye cannot leave your men to stand unmoving on the board and hope to win. A soldier must first step upon the battlefield if does mean to cross it.

Hussein praised his sons for putting up a brave fight, noting that U.S. forces had surrounded their compound with advanced weaponry, ground troops and warplanes. In case that didn't work, U.S. forces were prepared to tell Janet Reno that a small Cuban boy was inside the house.

Hold out baits to entice the enemy. Feign disorder, and crush him.

No longer will you be a weird Robinson Crusoe, imprisoned on an island of night surrounded by oceans of death.

The art of concentrating strength at one point, forcing a breakthrough, rolling up and securing the flanks on either side, and then penetrating like lightning deep into his rear, before the enemy has time to react.