Battlefield Conditions Quotes

You have two enemies in war. The guy who is trying to shoot you, and the guy who is ordering you out to be shot.

In the account book of the Great War the page recording the Russian losses has been ripped out. The figures are unknown. Five millions, or eight? We ourselves know not. All we know is that, at times, fighting the Russians, we had to remove the piles of enemy bodies from before our trenches, so as to get a clear field of fire against new waves of assault.

General: I attempted to take Williamsport yesterday, but found too large a force of infantry and artillery. After a long fight, I withdrew to this place.

When I was in the Army, 100 percent of our effort was to really be sharp, and soldiers, we were under live fire all the time.

Weapons are an important factor in war, but not the decisive one; it is man and not materials that counts.

One of the parodoxes of war is that those in the rear want to get up into the fight, while those in the lines want to get out.

Four elements make up the climate of war: danger, exertion, uncertainty and chance.

If we know that our own men are in a condition to attack, but are unaware that the enemy is not open to attack, we have gone only halfway towards victory. If we know that the enemy is open to attack, but are unaware that our own men are not in a condition to attack, we have gone only halfway towards victory. If we know that the enemy is open to attack, and also know that our men are in a condition to attack, but are unaware that the nature of the ground makes fighting impracticable, we have still gone only halfway towards victory.

All we know is that, at times, fighting the Russians, we had to remove the piles of enemy bodies from before our trenches, so as to get a clear field of fire against new waves of assault.

Ground which can be freely traversed by both sides is called accessible.

We have lost all sense of other considerations, because they are artificial. Only the facts are real and important to us. And good boots are hard to come by." - All Quiet On The Western Front, Ch. 2

The pictorial battlefield becomes a sea of mud mercifully veiled by the fog of war.

Hardly one soldier in a hundred was inspired by religious feeling of even the crudest kind. It would have been difficult to remain religious in the trenches even if one had survived the irreligion of the training battalion at home.

We lie under the network of arching shells and live in a suspense of uncertainty. If a shot comes, we can duck, that is all; we neither know nor can determine where it will fall." - All Quiet On The Western Front, Ch. 6