Top 100 Douglas MacArthur Quotes
#1. While no man in his right mind would advocate sending our ground forces into continental China, and such was never given a thought, the new situation did urgently demand a drastic revision of strategic planning if our political aim was to defeat this new enemy as we had defeated the old.
Douglas MacArthur
#3. I will defend Korea as I would my own country-just as I would California.
Douglas MacArthur
#5. The outfit soon took on color, dash and a unique flavor which is the essence of that elusive and deathless thing called soldiering.
Douglas MacArthur
#6. Our government has kept us in a perpetual state of fear - kept us in a continuous stampede of patriotic fervor - with the cry of grave national emergency.
Douglas MacArthur
#7. Even when opportunity knocks, a man still has to get up off his seat and open the door.
Douglas MacArthur
#9. I had learned one of the bitter lessons of life: never try to regain the past, the fire will have become ashes.
Douglas MacArthur
#11. Roosevelt is dead: a man who would never tell the truth when a lie would serve him just as well.
Douglas MacArthur
#14. A general is just as good or just as bad as the troops under his command make him.
Douglas MacArthur
#15. Like the old soldier of the ballad, I now close my military career and just fade away, an old soldier who tried to do his duty as God gave him the light to see that duty. Goodbye.
Douglas MacArthur
#16. Beware not the enemy from 'without' but the enemy from 'within'.
Douglas MacArthur
#17. I have every confidence in the ultimate success of our joint cause; but success in modern war requires something more than courage and a willingness to die: it requires careful preparation.
Douglas MacArthur
#18. There is not one incident in the history of humanity in which defeatism led to peace which was anything other than a complete fraud.
Douglas MacArthur
#19. I can recall no parallel in history where a great nation recently at war has so distinguished its former enemy commander.
Douglas MacArthur
#20. Blank cartridges should never be used against a mob, nor should a volley be fired over the heads of the mob even if there is little danger of hurting persons in the rear. Such things will be regarded as an admission of weakness, or an attempt to bluff, and may do more harm than good.
Douglas MacArthur
#21. The great question is, can war be outlawed from the world? If so, it would mark the greatest advance in civilization since the Sermon on the Mount.
Douglas MacArthur
#23. The history of the failure of war can almost be summed up in two words: too late.
Douglas MacArthur
#24. Could I have but a line a century hence crediting a contribution to the advance of peace, I would yield every honor which has been accorded by war.
Douglas MacArthur
#25. Always there has been some terrible evil at home or some monstrous foreign power that was going to gobble us up if we did not blindly rally behind it.
Douglas MacArthur
#27. If I had one more division like this First Marine Division I could win this war.
Douglas MacArthur
#28. That democracy works and will always work, because the people are allowed to think, to talk, and keep their minds free, open, and supple.
Douglas MacArthur
#29. The Pacific no longer represents menacing avenues of approach for a prospective invader. It assumes, instead, the friendly aspect of a peaceful lake. Our line of defense is a natural one and can be maintained with a minimum of military effort and expense.
Douglas MacArthur
#30. We must offer the world leadership designed to advance the goal of universal progress and enduring peace.
Douglas MacArthur
#31. You don't win wars by dying for your country you win wars by making the other son of a bitch die for his
Douglas MacArthur
#32. By profession I am a Soldier & take pride in that fact, but I am prouder to be a father.
Douglas MacArthur
#33. A true leader has the confidence to stand alone, the courage to make tough decisions, and the compassion to listen to the needs of others. He does not set out to be a leader, but becomes one by the equality of his actions and the integrity of his intent.
Douglas MacArthur
#36. Let us pray that peace be now restored to the world, and that God will preserve it always.
Douglas MacArthur
#37. The inescapable price of liberty is an ability to preserve it from destruction.
Douglas MacArthur
#38. Give me ten thousand Filipino soldiers and I will conquer the world.
Douglas MacArthur
#39. I have returned. By the grace of Almighty God, our forces stand again on Philippine soil.
Douglas MacArthur
#40. The untruthful soldier trifles with the lives of his countrymen and the honor and safety of his country.
Douglas MacArthur
#41. We are bound no longer by the straitjacket of the past and nowhere is the change greater than in our profession of arms. What, you may well ask, will be the end of all of this? I would not know! But I would hope that our beloved country will drink deep from the chalice of courage.
Douglas MacArthur
#42. The chickens are coming home to roost, and you happen to have just moved into the chicken house.
Douglas MacArthur
#43. We have known the bitterness of defeat and the exultation of triumph, and from both we have learned there can be no turning back. We must go forward to preserve in peace what we won in war.
Douglas MacArthur
#44. Nine times of ten an army has been destroyed because its supply lines have been severed
Douglas MacArthur
#45. I have just returned from visiting the Marines at the front, and there is not a finer fighting organization in the world!
Douglas MacArthur
#47. Whoever said the pen is mightier than the sword obviously never encountered automatic weapons.
Douglas MacArthur
#50. I stand on this rostrum with a sense of deep humility and great pride - humility in the weight of those great American architects of our history who have stood here before me; pride in the reflection that this home of legislative debate represents human liberty in the purest form yet devised.
Douglas MacArthur
#51. Apart from an innate grasp of tactical concepts, a great coach must possess the essentials attributes of leadership which mold men into a cohesive, fighting team with an invincible will to victory.
Douglas MacArthur
#52. I'll come back as soon as I can with as much as I can. In the meantime, you've got to hold!
Douglas MacArthur
#53. The scale and grandeur of the Russian effort mark it as the greatest military achievement in all history.
Douglas MacArthur
#54. Nothing would please me better than if they would give me three months and then attack here.
Douglas MacArthur
#56. In my dreams I hear again the crash of guns, the rattle of musketry, the strange, mournful mutter of the battlefield.
Douglas MacArthur
#57. Build me a son, O Lord, who will be strong enough to know when he is weak, and brave enough to face himself when he is afraid, one who will be proud and unbending in honest defeat, and humble and gentle in victory.
Douglas MacArthur
#58. The object and practice of liberty lies in the limitation of government power.
Douglas MacArthur
#59. I believe that the entire effort of modern society should be concentrated on the endeavor to outlaw war as a method of the solution of problems between nations.
Douglas MacArthur
#60. The hated system of land tenure, so contributory to general unrest in Asia, has been abolished. Every farmer is now accorded the right and dignity of ownership of the land he long has tilled.
Douglas MacArthur
#61. For those to whom much is given, much is required. It is not whether you get knocked down, it's whether you get up. There is no substitute for victory.
Douglas MacArthur
#62. To dilute the will to win is to destroy the purpose of the game. There is no substitute for victory.
Douglas MacArthur
#63. If we will not devise some greater and more equitable system, Armageddon will be at our door.
Douglas MacArthur
#66. Global war has become Frankenstein's monster, threatening to destroy both sides.
Douglas MacArthur
#69. In war, as it is waged now, with the enormous losses on both sides, both sides will lose. It is a form of mutual suicide.
Douglas MacArthur
#71. Last, but by no means least, courage of one's convictions, the courage to see things through. The world is in a constant conspiracy against the brave. It's the age-old struggle_ the roar of the crowd on one side and the voice of your conscience on the other.
Douglas MacArthur
#72. Believe me, sir, never a night goes by, be I ever so tired, but I read the Word of God before I go to bed.
Douglas MacArthur
#74. Our country is now geared to an arms economy bred in an artificially induced psychosis of war hysteria and an incessant propaganda of fear.
Douglas MacArthur
#75. I am concerned for the security of our great Nation; not so much because of any treat from without, but because of the insidious forces working from within.
Douglas MacArthur
#76. I've looked that old scoundrel death in the eye many times but this time I think he has me on the ropes.
Douglas MacArthur
#77. It is part of the general pattern of misguided policy that our country is now geared to an arms economy which was bred in an artificially induced psychosis of war hysteria and nurtured upon an incessant propaganda of fear.
Douglas MacArthur
#78. For the sentimentalism and emotionalism which have infested our country, we should substitute hard common sense. Pacific habits do not insure peace or immunity from national insult and aggression.
Douglas MacArthur
#79. A good soldier, whether he leads a platoon or an army, is expected to look backward as well as forward; but he must think only forward.
Douglas MacArthur
#81. I have one criticism about the Negro troops who fought under my command in the Korean War. They didn't send me enough of them.
Douglas MacArthur
#83. Once war is forced upon us, there is no alternative than to apply every available means to bring it to a swift end. War's very object is victory-not prolonged indecision.
Douglas MacArthur
#85. While Asia is commonly referred to as the Gateway to Europe, it is no less true that Europe is the Gateway to Asia, and the broad influence of the one cannot fail to have its impact upon the other.
Douglas MacArthur
#86. Old soldiers never die, they just lose their grip on reality after traumatic brain injuries.
Douglas MacArthur
#87. The Puerto Ricans forming the ranks of the gallant 65th Infantry on the battlefields of Korea ... are writing a brilliant record of achievement in battle and I am proud indeed to have them in this command. I wish that we might have many more like them.
Douglas MacArthur
#88. I know that this operation will be sort of helter-skelter. But the First Marine Division is going to win the war by landing at Inchon.
Douglas MacArthur
#89. There is no security on this earth; there is only opportunity.
Douglas MacArthur
#90. I have known war as few men now living know it. It's very destructiveness on both friend and foe has rendered it useless as a means of settling international disputes.
Douglas MacArthur
#92. Expect only 5% of an intelligence report to be accurate.The trick of a good commander is to isolate the 5%.
Douglas MacArthur
#94. I promise to keep on living as though I expected to live forever. Nobody grows old by merely living a number of years. People grow old only be deserting their ideals. Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up interest wrinkles the soul.
Douglas MacArthur
#95. Freemasonry embraces the highest moral laws and will bear the test of
any system of ethics or philosophy ever promulgated for the uplift of man.
Douglas MacArthur
#97. Rules are mostly made to be broken and are too often for the lazy to hide behind.
Douglas MacArthur
#98. The enemy is in front of us, the enemy is behind us, the enemy is to the right and to the left of us. They can't get away this time!
Douglas MacArthur
#99. Duty, Honor, Country. Those three hallowed words reverently dictate what you ought to be, what you can be, what you will be.
Douglas MacArthur
#100. History fails to record a single precedent in which nations subject to moral decay have not passed into political and economic decline. There has been either a spiritual awakening to overcome the moral lapse, or a progressive deterioration leading to ultimate national disaster.
Douglas MacArthur
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