Quotation fixation -- War, Weapons, & Armed Forces {1}

1st: Never share a foxhole with anyone braver than you are.
2nd: No battle plan ever survives contact with the enemy.
3rd: The most dangerous thing in the combat zone is an officer with a map.
4th: Incoming fire has the right of way.
5th: The army with the smartest dress uniform will lose.
6th: If your sergeant can see you, so can the enemy.
7th: Don't be conspicuous. In the combat zone, it draws fire. Out of the combat zone, it draws sergeants.
8th: If you really need an officer in a hurry, take a nap.
9th: The quartermaster has only two sizes, too large and too small.
10th: Never worry about the bullet with your name on it. Instead, worry about shrapnel addressed to 'occupant'.
11th: Friendly fire isn't.
12th: The problem with taking the easy way out is that the enemy has already mined it.
13th: The buddy system is essential to your survival; it gives the enemy somebody else to shoot at.
14th: If your advance is going well, you are walking into an ambush.
15th: The only thing more accurate than incoming enemy fire is incoming friendly fire.
16th: Pilots who can see you when dropping you supplies cannot see you when dropping bombs.
17th: Never forget that your weapon was made by the lowest bidder.
18th: All 5-second grenade fuses will burn down in about 3 seconds.
19th: Try to look unimportant because the bad guys may be low on ammo.
20th: If you are forward of your position, friendly artillery will fall short.
21th: When you have secured an area, don't forget to tell the enemy.
22th: If the enemy is in range, so are you
23th: No combat ready unit has ever passed an inspection.
24th: Radios will fail as soon as you need fire support desperately.
25th: Make it tough for the enemy to get in and you can't get out.
26th: Tracers work both ways.
27th: Anything can get you shot, including doing nothing.
28th: Your weapon was made on an assembly line by the same type of people who made your car.
29th: All 15 round magazines will be a few rounds short in a firefight.
30th: No one EVER carries too much ammo.

My other car is a stealth bomber. --Bumper sticker seen on the back of the car of a member of the air force

No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail; for being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned. A man in a jail has more room, better food and commonly better company. --Samuel Johnson

No poor bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making other bastards die for their country.--George Smith Patton

Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result. --Sir Winston Churchill, "The Story of the Malakand Field Force"

Oh, give me a home
Where the peacekeepers roam
And the tariffs are lowered each day
Where the people can vote
And the currencies float
And the countries all do what we say.
--musical review at the Association of Southeast Asian Nations '99, sung by Assistant Secretary of Defense Kurt Campbell (to the tune of "home on the range")

One reason the Services have trouble operating jointly is that they don't speak the same language.
For example:

if you told Navy personnel to "secure a building," they would turn off the lights and lock the doors.
Army personnel would occupy the building so no one could enter.
Marines would assault the building, capture it, and defend it with suppressive fire and close combat.
The Air Force, on the other hand, would take out a three-year lease with an option to buy.

Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants. We know more about war than we know about peace, more about killing than we know about living. We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected the Sermon on the Mount. --General Omar N. Bradley

Quotationfixation
Created by Cassia