B. H. Liddell Hart Quotes - Page 2

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• The search for the truth for truth's sake is the mark of the historian.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Sake, Mark, Historian

  7 Copy quote

• Air forces offered the possibility of striking a the enemy's economic and moral centres without having first to achieve 'the destruction of the enemy's main forces on the battlefield'. Air-power might attain a direct end by indirect means - hopping over opposition instead of overthrowing it.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Mean, Air

  10 Copy quote

• The more usual reason for adopting a strategy of limited aim is that of awaiting a change in the balance of force ... The essential condition of such a strategy is that the drain on him should be disproportionately greater than on oneself.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Balance, Usual

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• In a campaign against more than one state or army, it is more fruitful to concentrate first against the weaker partner than to attempt the overthrow of the stronger in the belief that the latter's defeat will automatically involve the collapse of the others.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Army, Stronger

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• For the spread and endurance of an idea the originator is dependent on the self-development of the receivers and transmitters.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Self, Ideas, Endurance

  B.H. Liddell Hart (2015). “Why Don't We Learn from History?”, p.87, Lulu Press, Inc

  9 Copy quote

• The military weapon is but one of the means that serve the purposes of war: one out of the assortment which grand strategy can employ.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, War, Mean

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• No man can exactly calculate the capacity of human genius and stupidity, nor the incapacity of will.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Men, Stupidity

  11 Copy quote

• Guerrilla war is a kind of war waged by the few but dependent on the support of many.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  War, Support, Kind

  17 Copy quote

• With growing experience, all skillful commanders sought to profit by the power of the defensive, even when on the offensive.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Growing, Offensive

  11 Copy quote

• Opposition to the truth is inevitable, especially if it takes the form of a new idea, but the degree of resistance can be diminished- by giving thought not only to the aim but to the method of approach. Avoid a frontal attack on a long established position; instead, seek to turn it by flank movement, so that a more penetrable side is exposed to the thrust of truth. But, in any such indirect approach, take care not to diverge from the truth- for nothing is more fatal to its real advancement than to lapse into untruth.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Real, Ideas, Giving

  B.H. Liddell Hart (2015). “Why Don't We Learn from History?”, p.63, Lulu Press, Inc

  20 Copy quote

• ...regrettable as it may seem to the idealist, the experience of history provides little warrant for the belief that real progress, and the freedom that makes progress possible, lies in unification. For where unification has been able to establish unity of ideas it has usually ended in uniformity, paralysing the growth of new ideas. And where the unification has merely brought about an artificial or imposed unity, its irksomeness has led through discord to disruption.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Real, Lying, Ideas

  B.H. Liddell Hart (2015). “Why Don't We Learn from History?”, p.76, Lulu Press, Inc

  17 Copy quote

• In any problem where an opposing force exists and cannot be regulated, one must foresee and provide for alternative courses. Adaptability is the law which governs survival in war as in life ... To be practical, any plan must take account of the enemy's power to frustrate it; the best chance of overcoming such obstruction is to have a plan that can be easily varied to fit the circumstances met.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, War, Law

  18 Copy quote

• In the case of a state that is seeking not conquest but the maintenance of its security, the aim is fulfilled if the threat is removed - if the enemy is led to abandon his purpose.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Enemy, Purpose

  16 Copy quote

• The easiest and quickest path into the esteem of traditional military authorities is by the appeal to the eye, rather than to the mind. The `polish and pipeclay' school is not yet extinct, and it is easier for the mediocre intelligence to become an authority on buttons, than on tactics.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Eye, School

  19 Copy quote

• The most consistently successful commanders, when faced by an enemy in a position that was strong naturally or materially, have hardly ever tackled it in a direct way. And when, under pressure of circumstances, they have risked a direct attack, the result has commonly been to blot their record with a failure.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Strong, Military, Successful

  18 Copy quote

• In war the chief incalculable is the human will, which manifests itself in resistance, which in turn lies in the province of tactics. Strategy has not to overcome resistance, except from nature. Its purpose is to diminish the possibility of resistance, and it seeks to fulfil this purpose by exploiting the elements of movement and surprise.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, War, Lying

  20 Copy quote

• The higher level of grand strategy [is] that of conducting war with a far-sighted regard to the state of the peace that will follow.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, War, Levels

  8 Copy quote

• The practical value of history is to throw the film of the past through the material projector of the present on to the screen of the future.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Past, Film, Materials

  6 Copy quote

• It is thus more potent, as well as more economical, to disarm the enemy than to attempt his destruction by hard fighting ... A strategist should think in terms of paralysing, not of killing.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Fighting, Thinking

  11 Copy quote

• The implied threat of using nuclear weapons to curb guerrillas was as absurd as to talk of using a sledge hammer to ward off a swarm of mosquitoes.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Hammers, Mosquitoes

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• Vitality springs from diversity -- which makes for real progress so long as there is mutual toleration, based on the recognition that worse may come from an attempt to suppress differences than from acceptance of them. For this reason, the kind of peace that makes progress possible is best assured by the mutual checks created by a balance of forces-alike in the sphere of internal politics and of international relations.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Peace, Spring, Real

  B.H. Liddell Hart (2015). “Why Don't We Learn from History?”, p.77, Lulu Press, Inc

  17 Copy quote

• Direct experience is inherently too limited to form an adequate foundation either for theory or for application. At the best it produces an atmosphere that is of value in drying and hardening the structure of thought. The greater value of indirect experience lies in its greater variety and extent. History is universal experience, the experience not of another, but of many others under manifold conditions.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Lying, Atmosphere, Foundation

  B.H. Liddell Hart (2015). “Why Don't We Learn from History?”, p.8, Lulu Press, Inc

  5 Copy quote

• The art of the indirect approach can only be mastered, and its full scope appreciated, by study of and reflection upon the whole history of war. But we can at least crystallize the lessons into two simple maxims- one negative, the other positive. The first is that, in face of the overwhelming evidence of history, no general is justified in launching his troops to a direct attack upon an enemy firmly in position. The second, that instead of seeking to upset the enemy's equilibrium by one's attack, it must be upset before a real attack is, or can be successfully launched

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Art, Real, War

  11 Copy quote

• To ensure attaining an objective, one should have alternate objectives. An attack that converges on one point should threaten, and be able to diverge against another. Only by this flexibility of aim can strategy be attuned to the uncertainty of war.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, War, Should Have

  11 Copy quote

• The effect to be sought is the dislocation of the opponent's mind and dispositions - such an effect is the true gauge of an indirect approach.

  B. H. Liddell Hart

  Military, Mind, Gauges

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