The Killing Zone Quotes

“The philosophical arguments in favor of man’s ability to resist the slide into barbarism sound noble and rational in a classroom or at a cocktail party. But when the enemy is bearing down, bent on taking your life away from you, it’s not his country against your country, not his army against your army, not his philosophy against your philosophy-it’s the fact that that son-of-a-bitch is trying to kill you and you’d better kill him first.”
― Frederick Downs, The Killing Zone: My Life in the Vietnam War

“Man’s beginning and man’s end would always be attended by only a few. Those that bore him at birth and those that bore him at death. The only important thing was what he did in between. Good or bad or indifferent, he would touch those around him in some way and then be gone.”
― Frederick Downs Jr., The Killing Zone: My Life in the Vietnam War

“Nobody could have traveled a trail with more caution than yours truly, but I got nailed anyhow, and just when I was beginning to think I was a black Davy Crockett.”
― Frederick Downs Jr., The Killing Zone: My Life in the Vietnam War