"Scores of thousands, literally scores of thousands, of executions in cold blood are being perpetrated by the German policetroops upon the Russian patriots who defend their native soil. Since the Mongol invasions of Europe in the 16th century, there has never been methodical, merciless butchery on such a scale, or approaching such a scale".
-Winston Churchill
"In hitler's launching of the Nazi campaign on Russia, we can already see, after less than six months of fighting, that he has made one of the outstanding blunders in history".
-Winston Churchill
"Yesterday, December 7, 1941- a date which will live in infamy- the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.... No matter how long it may take us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people, in their righteous might, will win through absolute victory".
-President Roosevelt in his Address to Congress
"This is no time to speak of the hopes of the future, or broader world which lies beyond our struggles and our victory. We have to win that world for our children. We have to win it by our sacrifices. We have not won it yet. The crisis is upon us".
-Winston Churchill
"I shall return".
-General MacArthur
"Hit hard, hit fast, hit often".
-Admiral Halsey
"I have never heard or read of this kind of fighting.... These people refuse to surrender. The wounded will wait till men come up to examine them and blow up themselves and the other fellow with a hand grenade".
-Major General Alexander Vandergrift
"Never before have we had so little time in which to do so much".
-President Roosevelt, fireside chat, 2/23/42
"Books cannot be killed by fire. People die, but books never die. No man and no force can abolish memory.... In this war, we know, books are weapons".
-Franklin Roosevelt to the American Booksellers Association, 4/23/42
"This war no longer bears the characteristics of former inter-European conflicts. It is one of those elemental conflicts which usher in a new millenium and which shake the world once in a thousand years".
-adolf hitler 4/26/42
"Never contradict the Fuhrer. Never remind him that once he may have thought differently of something. Never report casualties to him- you have to spare the nerves of the man".
-wilhelm keitel
"If a man starts a war, he must have the nerve to bear the consequences".
-kurt zeitzler
"How could such a tragedy have occurred in a democratic society that prides itself on individual rights and freedoms? I have brooded about this whole episode on and off for the past three decades...".
-Milton Eisenhower, director of the War Relocation Authority
"During the time I have had the WAC's under my command, they have met every test and task assigned to them... their contribution in efficiency, skill, spirit, and determination are immeasureable".
-General Eisenhower
"We proved that the antidote to racism is excellence in performance".
-Tuskegee Airmen Lieutenant Colonel Herbert Carter
"It is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it".
-Douglas MacArthur
"It was involuntary. They sank my boat".
-John Kennedy's answer when asked how he became a hero
"The American people have had every reason to know that this is a tough and destructive war. On my trip abroad, I talked with many military men who faced our enemies in the field. These hard-headed realists testify to the strength and skill and resourcefulness of the enemy generals and men whom we must beat before final victory is won. The war is now reaching the stage where we shall all have to look forward to large casualty lists-dead, wounded, and missing. War entails just that. There is no easy road to victory. And the end is not yet in sight".
-President Roosevelt, fireside chat, 12/24/43
"The enemy is still proud and powerful. He is hard to get at. He still possesses enormous armies, vast resources, and invaluable strategic territories.... No one can tell what new complications and perils might arise in four or five more years of war. And it is the dragging-out of the war at enormous expense, until the democracies are tired or bored or split, that the main hopes of Germany and Japan must reside".
-Winston Churchill
"One of the bravest men I ever saw was a fellow on top of a telegraph pole in the midst of a furious fire fight in Tunisia. I stopped and asked what the hell he was doing up there.... He answered, "Fixing the wire, Sir". I asked, "Don't those planes strafing the road bother you?". And he answered, No Sir but you sure as hell do". Now that was a real man. A real soldier. There was a man who devoted all he had to his duty, no matter how seemingly insignificant his duty might appear at the time, no matter how great the odds".
-George Patton's speech to the Third Army, 6/5/44
"The massed, angered forces of common humanity are on the march. They are going forward- on the Russian front, in the vast Pacific area, and into Europe- converging upon their ultimate objectives: Berlin and Tokyo. I think the first crack in the Axis has come. The criminal, corrupt Fascist regime in Italy is going to pieces".
-President Roosevelt, fireside chat, 7/28/43
"We shall not settle for less than total victory. That is the determination of every American on the fighting fronts. That must be and will be the determination of every American at home".
-President Roosevelt, fireside chat, 7/28/43
"The world has never seen greater devotion, determination, and self-sacrifice than have been displayed by the Russian people... under the leadership of Marshal Joseph Stalin. With a nation that in saving itself is thereby helping to save all the world from the Nazi menace, this country of ours should always be glad to be a good neighbor and a sincere friend in the world of the future".
-President Roosevelt, fireside chat, 7/28/43
"As Stalin entered the room every Russian froze into silence, and the hunted look in the eyes of the generals showed all too plainly the constant fear in which they lived. It was nauseating to see brave men reduced to such servility".
-General Hastings Ismay
"Had I known they had as many tanks as that I would have thought twice before invading".
-adolf hitler on Russia
"To be a successful soldier, you must know history.... What you must know is how man reacts. Weapons change but man who uses them changes not at all. To win battles, you do not beat weapons- you beat the soul of man, of the enemy man".
-George Patton, 6/6/44
"Soldiers, sailors, and airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Force! You are about to embark on the Great Crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you....".
-General Eisenhower, Order of the Day Upon the Invasion of Normandy, June 6, 1944
"We want this war over with. The quickest way to get it over with is to go get the bastards who started it. The quicker they get whipped, the quicker we can go home. The shortest way home is through Berlin and Tokyo. And when we get to Berlin, I am personally going to shoot that paper-hanging son-of-a-***** hitler".
-General Patton's speech to the Third Army on 6/5/44
"Two kinds of people are staying on this beach: the dead and those who are going to die. Now let's get the hell out of here!".
-Colonel George Taylor, Omaha Beach, D day
"This new form of attack imposed upon the people of London was a burden perhaps even heavier than the air raids of 1940 and 1941. Suspense and strain were more prolonged. Dawn brought no relief, and clouds no comfort".
-Winston Churchill on the V-1's
"Compared to war, all other forms of human endeavor shrink to insignificance. God, how I love it".
-George Patton, 8/44
"The troops are everywhere fighting heroically, but the unequal struggle is approaching its end".
-Rommel
"Maybe there are 5000, maybe 10000 Nazi bastards in their concrete foxholes before the Third Army. Now if Ike stops holding Monty's hand and gives me some supplies, I'll go through the Siegfried Line like **** through a goose".
-General Patton
"I had thought for me there could never again be elation in war. But I had reckoned without the liberation of Paris- I had reckoned without remembering that I might be part of this richly historic day. We are in Paris- on the first day- one of the great days of all time".
-Ernie Pyle, 8/28/44
"We have learned that we cannot live alone, at peace; that our own well-being is dependent on the well-being of other nations, far away. We have learned that we must live as men, and not as ostriches, nor as dogs in the manger. We have learned to be citizen's of the world, members of the human community".
-President Roosevelt, Fourth Inaugural Address, 1/20/45
"President Roosevelt died in the harness, and we may well say in battle harness, like his soldiers, sailors, and airmen who died side by side with ours and carrying out their tasks to the end all over the world. What an enviable death was his".
-Winston Churchill, 4/17/45
"You have completed your mission with the greatest victory in the history of warfare. You have commanded with outstanding success the most powerful military force that has ever been assembled. You have been selfless in your actions, always sound and tolerant in your judgements, and altogether admirable in the courage and wisdom of your military decisions".
-General Marshall's cable congratulating Eisenhower on the victory in Europe
"Among the Americans serving on Iwo island, uncommon valor was a common virtue".
-Admiral Chester Nimitz
"As soon as I got all the casualties off, I sat down on a rock and burst out crying. I couldn't stop myself and didn't even want to. I had seen more than a man could stand and still stay normal".
-Captain Bill McLain
"The element uranium may be turned into a new and important source of energy in the immediate future.... This new phenomenon would also lead to the construction of bombs... extremely powerful bombs of a new type... which carried by a boat and exploded in a port might very well destroy the whole port together with some of the surrounding territory".
-Albert Einstein, letter to Roosevelt, 8/2/39
"The whole country was lighted by a searing light with the intensity many times that of the midday sun. Seconds after the explosion came first the air blast pressing hard against the people, to be followed almost immediately by the strong sustained awesome roar that warned of doomsday and made us feel we puny things were blasphemous to dare tamper with the forces heretofore reserved for the Almighty".
-General Farrell after the first atomic bomb test
"To quell the Japanese resistance man by man and conquer the country yard by yard might well require the loss of a million American lives and half that number of British.... I thought immediately of how the Japanese people whose courage I had admired, might find in the apparition of this almost supernatural weapon an excuse which would save their honor and release them from their obligation of being killed to the last fighting man".
-Winston Churchill
"Sixteen hours ago an American airplane dropped one bomb on Hiroshima.... The force from which the sun draws its power has been loosed against those who brought war to the Far East".
-Harry Truman, announcement that the bomb was dropped 8/6/45
"In Germany they came first for the communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade Unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up".
-Reverand Martin Niemoller
"That's the difficulty of these times: ideals, dreams, and cherished hopes rise within us, only to meet the horrible truth and be shattered. It's really a wonder that I haven't dropped all my ideals because they seem so absurd and impossible to carry out. Yet I keep them, because in spite of everything, I still believe people are really good at heart. I simply can't build up my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery, and death".
-Anne Frank
"As I approached them, I could see that they had sunken cheeks, distended bellies, and swollen ankles. Their complexion was sallow. In each row a sick woman was supported or dragged along by her fellow detainees. The young SS woman supervisor with a police dog on a leash led the column, followed by two girls who incessantly hurled abuse at the poor women".
-Red Cross Official
"What makes this inquest significant is that these prisoners... are the living symbols of racial hatreds, of terrorism and violence, and of the arrogance and cruelty of power... Civilization can afford no compromise with the social forces which would gain renewed strength if we deal ambiguously or indecisively with the men in whom those forces now precariously survive".
-Robert Jackson, opening statement at Nuremberg
"There is no doubt that this is probably the greatest and most horrible crime ever committed in the whole history of the world, and it has been done by scientific machinery by nominally civilized men in the name of a great State and one of the leading races in Europe. It is quite clear that all concerned in this crime who may fall into our hands, including the people who only obeyed orders by carrying out the butcheries, should be put to death after their association with the murders has been proved".
-Winston Churchill, after learning about details of Auschwitz.
"As long as there are sovereign nations possessing great power, war is inevitable".
-Albert Einstein
