Douglas MacArthur > Quotes

“Whoever said the pen is mightier than the sword obviously never encountered automatic weapons.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“You are remembered for the rules you break.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“It is fatal to enter an war without the will to win it.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“Age wrinkles the body; quitting wrinkles the soul.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“Give me ten thousand Filipino soldiers and I will conquer the world.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up interest wrinkles the soul. You are as young as your faith, as old as your doubt; as young as your self-confidence, as old as your fear; as young as your hope as old as your despair. In the central place of every heart there is a recording chamber. So long as it receives messages of beauty, hope, cheer and courage, so long are you young. When your heart is covered with the snows of pessimism and the ice of cynicism, then, and then only, are you grown old. And then, indeed as the ballad says, you just fade away”
― Douglas MacArthur

“We are not retreating - we are advancing in another Direction”
― Douglas MacArthur

“The soldier above all others prays for peace, for it is the soldier who must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“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

“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

“There is no security on this earth; there is only opportunity.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“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 McArthur

“Old soldiers never die; they just fade away.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“I had learned one of the bitter lessons of life: never try to regain the past, the fire will have become ashes.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“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

“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

“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

“This does not mean that you are warmongers. On the contrary, the soldier above all other people prays for peace, for he must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war. But always in our ears ring the ominous words of Plato, that wisest of all philosophers: "Only the dead have seen the end of war.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“I Shall Return”
― Douglas MacArthur

“On the fields of friendly strife are sown the seeds that on other days, on other fields will bear the fruits of victory.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“I realize that advice is worth what it costs--that is, nothing.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“Americans never quit.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“Rules are mostly made to be broken and are too often for the lazy to hide behind”
― Douglass Macarthur

“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

“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... Always there has been some terrible evil to gobble us up if we did not blindly rally behind it by furnishing the exorbitant sums demanded. Yet, in retrospect, these disasters seem never to have happened, seem never to have been quite real.”
― General Douglas MacArthur 1957

“Today the guns are silent. A great tragedy has ended. A great victory has been won...
A new era is upon us. Even the lesson of victory itself brings with it profound concern, both for our future security and the survival of civilization. The destructiveness of the war potential, through progressive advances in scientific discovery, has in fact now reached a point which revises the traditional concepts of war.
Men since the beginning of time have sought peace... Military alliances, balances of power, leagues of nations, all in turn have failed, leaving the only path to be by way of the crucible of war. We have had our last chance. If we do not now devise some greater and more equitable system, Armageddon will be at our door. The problem basically is theological and involves a spiritual recrudescence and improvement of human character that will synchronize with our matchless advances in science, art, literature and all material and cultural developments of the past two thousand years. It must be of the spirit if we are to save the flesh.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“People of the Philippines: I have returned. By the grace of Almighty God our forces stand again on Philippine soil—soil consecrated in the blood of our two peoples. We have come dedicated and committed to the task of destroying every vestige of enemy control over your daily lives, and of restoring upon a foundation of indestructible strength, the liberties of your people.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“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.

Build me a son whose wishbone will not be where his backbone should be; a son who will know Thee and that to know himself is the foundation stone of knowledge.

Lead him, I pray, not in the path of ease and comfort, but under the stress and spur of difficulties and challenge. Here let him learn to stand up in the storm; here let him learn compassion for those who fail.

Build me a son whose heart will be clean, whose goal will be high; a son who will master himself before he seeks to master other men; one who will learn to laugh, yet never forget how to weep; one who will reach into the future, yet never forget the past.

And after all these things are his, add, I pray, enough of a sense of humor, so that he may always be serious, yet never take himself too seriously. Give him humility, so that he may always remember the simplicity of greatness, the open mind of true wisdom, the meekness of true strength.

Then I, his father, will dare to whisper, "I have not lived in vain.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“The history of the failure of war can almost be summed up in two words: too late.”
― Douglas MacArthur

“Few names have left a firmer imprint upon the pages of the history of American times than has that of Ty Cobb... he seems to have understood that in the competition of baseball, just as in war, defensive strategy never has produced ultimate victory.”
― Douglas MacArthur