STARSHIP TROOPERS BOOK QUOTES

“Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any other factor, and the contrary opinion is wishful thinking at its worst.”

“The noblest fate that a man can endure is to place his own mortal body between his loved home and the war’s desolation.”

“The difference between a soldier and a civilian is that the soldier accepts personal responsibility for the safety of the body politic of which he is a member, defending it, if need be, with his life.”

“War is a bloody, killing business. You’ve got to spill their blood, or they will spill yours. Rip them up the belly. Shoot them in the guts.”

“We don’t believe that military rule is in any way inferior to civilian rule; we believe that military rule is simply different.”

“Violence is the supreme authority from which all other authority is derived.”

“The primary lesson of history is that men shouldn’t be too involved in making decisions.”

“Morale is final; and morale comes from four things: officers, civilians, dead bodies, and, I’m sorry to say, lastly, from guns.”

“Anyone who clings to the historically untrue — and — thoroughly immoral doctrine that violence never solves anything I would advise to conjure up the ghosts of Napoleon Bonaparte and the Duke of Wellington and let them debate it. The ghost of Hitler could referee, and the jury might well be the Dodo, the Great Auk, and the Passenger Pigeon.”

“Good Government never depends upon laws, but upon the personal qualities of those who govern. The machinery of government is always subordinate to the will of those who administer that machinery.”

“The Constitution is a statement of the physical facts of the universe, to which every right-thinking person will agree.”

“Moral cowardice that keeps us from defending what we know is right is far worse than tactical cowardice guided by moral certainty.”

“I fostered bees in my garden, and I grew lush flowering plants that formed a cloak for underground installations.”

“Liberty is never unalienable; it must be redeemed regularly with the blood of patriots or it always vanishes.”

“The true enemy won’t be the giant insect or the Federation soldier, but human frailty.”

“One wouldn’t even think of taking the chance of getting killed by enemy fire, but I would if I could teach those blasted fools how to do it!” LOVING AND CARING PERSON QUOTES

“One man’s theology is another man’s belly laugh.”

“One man’s ‘magic’ is another man’s engineering. ‘Supernatural’ is a null word”

“Morals — all correct moral rules — derive from the instinct to survive. Moral behavior is survival behavior above the individual level.”

“We were all taught that the Russians were the people without individual souls; that communism would destroy our way of life. And, I learned here what I had really known all the time – not that communism was wrong, but that the United States was right.”

“When in doubt, win the trick. He who wins the trick makes the rules, and it’s always easier to win if you’re ahead.”

“You are judged by what you do, not what you believe.”

“The very efficient German people could be relied upon to keep their jails full.”

“The religion of one age is the literary entertainment of the next.”

“A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.”

“Human federation is in no sense implicit in the Human condition – men must be coerced ‘if necessary’- but this coercion must not degenerate into suppression; it must be strictly limited in duration to the emergency.”

“To declare men equal in society, outside of wartime, is so grossly unjust that it is being rejected throughout the civilized world.”

“We were not breeding practical farmers – but theoretical scientists and engineers who can find employment in Africa as well as the sub-arctic.”

“History does not record anywhere at any time a religion that has any rational basis. Religion is a crutch for people not strong enough to stand up to the unknown without help. But, like dandruff, most people do have a religion and spend time and money on it and seem to derive considerable pleasure from fiddling with it.”

“Only the incompetent wait until tomorrow, the competent meet their obligations today.”