War Escalation Quotes

I do not know how the Third World War will be fought, but I can tell you what they will use in the Fourth—rocks!

If there were Israeli attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities, it makes it certain there would be a reprisal attack against the United States at some point.

The lesson of history is when a war starts every nation will ultimately use whatever weapon it has available. ... Therefore, we must expect that if another war — a serious war — breaks out, we will use nuclear energy in some form.

The situation in Iraq was dire at the end of 2006, when President George W. Bush decided to implement the surge and selected me to command it. Indeed, when I returned to Baghdad in early February 2007, I found the conditions there to be even worse than I had expected.

Do you want total war? If necessary, do you want a war more total and radical than anything that we can even imagine today?

Warfare has been marvelously developed. It will soon be impossible to raise it to further heights.

I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.

Regarding Syria, we already call for dialogue between Syria and all parties concerned, in order to avoid any kind of escalation in the region which may expose the whole area to chaos.

Lyndon Johnson WAS the Vietnam War. Without the paranoia of Johnson there would never have been a Vietnam.

Vietnam and Iraq are part of the same national trauma and delusion; we folded the war up when Reagan became president and unpacked it with Bush.

The American escalation of the war in Laos provoked a response by the Communist forces, which now control more of Laos than ever before.

If we give Al Haig his way, the next thing we know, we'll be carpet-bombing Central America.

The military plan is basically invasion. When we attack Cuba, we are going to have to attack with an all-out attack," he said. This is almost certain to lead to an invasion. The Soviet Union may, and I think probably will, attack the Turkish missiles. Then the United States would have to attack Soviet ships. And I would say that it is damn dangerous. Now, I'm not sure we can avoid anything like that if we attack Cuba. But I think we should make every effort to avoid it. And one way to avoid it is to defuse the Turkish missiles before we attack Cuba.

The nations slithered over the brink into the boiling cauldron of war without any trace of apprehension or dismay... The nations backed their machines over the precipice not one of them wanted war, certainly not on this scale

The step from one degree of violence to the next is imperceptibly taken and cannot be easily taken back.... Wars have a way of getting out of hand.

Today, with the war between Muslims and the West escalating, you cannot count on the message of solidarity you may get from a civic group or a political party, or the word of support you hear from a kind neighbor or a nice co-worker. The West will eventually turn against its Muslim citizens.

Small wars are always teetering on the brink of becoming big ones.

The number of attacks on the American and allied forces is at the highest level since the insurgency began despite the increase of America combat operations and the introduction of some 40 new Iraq security forces and battalions.

A bombing was planned [in Syria], which would probably make the situation worse, but would at least establish US credibility.

America is on a course, now, that will lead to the final conflagration, The Final War - which has been cold, pretty much, up to now. But it will become hot, and the whole world will be engulfed in this Final War that I think these policies from our government will bring into existence.

I had recently had the impression they were changing - not so much by becoming less pro-Pakistan as by becoming less anti-India. I was wrong. My visit to [Richard] Nixon did anything but avert the war.

Lyndon Johnson may have escalated the war, but when I was drafted and shipped off to Vietnam, the signature on my orders was Nixon's.

We still seek no wider war.

There's been an increase in the number of Iraqis in training, but more Americans are dying and violence is increasing.

We will not really address our foreign policy and these endless wars that show no end in sight and seem to be getting deeper and broader and more catastrophic with each passing day.