The Only Thing Worth Dying For Quotes

“Don’t ever put your life on the line for something you don’t believe in.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“It’s a fucked-up war when you are more worried about fighting your chain of command than the actual enemy.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“the Afghans were well aware of what happened in Iraq during the Gulf War, when the Shiites and Kurds believed the leaflets the Americans dropped urging them to rise up against Saddam Hussein. They did, and the Americans did not come. Saddam’s forces had retaliated by massacring the insurgents. “The Afghans in the south fear the same fate—they need to be assured”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity; but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible. —T. E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia)”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“guess it’s like driving a car, you gotta watch out for the other guy! I”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“There’s a great deal of talk about loyalty from the bottom to the top. Loyalty from the top down is even more necessary and is much less prevalent.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“British General Andrew Skeen, who faced a similar military mission in 1939, wrote, “When planning a military expedition into Pashtun tribal areas, the first thing you must plan is your retreat. All expeditions into this area sooner or later end in retreat under fire.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“There’s a great deal of talk about loyalty from the bottom to the top. Loyalty from the top down is even more necessary and is much less prevalent. One of the most frequently noted characteristics of great men who have remained great is loyalty to their subordinates. —General George S. Patton Jr.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“There is no such thing as a beloved captain in Special Forces,” his mentor Dennis Holloway had told him. “But you can take care of your men, lead from the front, and they’ll respect you for doing what’s right.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“villages were regularly patrolled by the Taliban.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“only a couple of miles east of the Helmand River, where villages were regularly patrolled by the Taliban.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“Chicks dig me because I rarely wear underwear, and when I do, it’s usually something unusual.” Tending”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“But pieces of paper do not stop bullets and rockets. Paper promises that fall from the sky cannot be trusted.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“and following your ideals is the only thing worth dying for.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“Do not trust the Afghans. Do not trust your friends. Do not trust anyone except your enemies.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“War was always here. Before man was, war waited for him. The ultimate trade awaiting the ultimate practitioner. —Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity; but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible. —T. E. Lawrence”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“Our lives are not good—it is not the Afghanistan we remember—but it is still life.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“The Taliban began as a Pashtun movement in Afghanistan, then spread into Pakistan. Now the Pakistani Taliban have earned the reputation as the most cruel in the Afghan villages I visited. In Afghanistan, they are away from their own homes and villages and seem to carry out their atrocities more readily. They are trained to be terrorists in the most fundamental sense of the word: to become legendary for the creativity of the horrors they’re able to commit.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“On July 20, 2000, Karzai testified before the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations about the terrorist organizations flourishing in Afghanistan. He warned that the Clinton administration’s response to the August 7, 1998, suicide car bombings of the U.S. embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania—firing cruise missiles at terrorist training camps—was not enough. “Bombings or the threat of bombings,” he said, “will not remove terrorist bases from Afghanistan. Such actions will only add to the problems and prolong the suffering of our people and, worst of all, solidify the presence of terrorist groups. I call upon the international community, and particularly upon the government of the United States…. [T]he time to watch is over and the responsibility to act is long overdue.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“It makes no difference what men think of war…. War endures. As well ask men what they think of stone. War was always here. Before man was, war waited for him. The ultimate trade awaiting the ultimate practitioner. —Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“Other than hunting down the terrorists responsible for the attacks on September 11, 2001, Amerine suspected that the United States had no comprehensive plan, military or otherwise.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“just programmed into the bomb’s guidance system. “Hey!” the copilot told the Delta operator. “We don’t”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan

“number of terrorists using it as a base of operations. Over the next few years he became more vocal in his denunciations.”
― Eric Blehm, The Only Thing Worth Dying For: How Eleven Green Berets Forged a New Afghanistan