Amusing Military Quotes

[SteamWake]

WISDOM - FROM THE MILITARY



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'If the enemy is in range, so are you.'



- Infantry Journal



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'It is generally inadvisable to eject directly over the area you just bombed.'



-US.Air Force Manual



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'Whoever said the pen is mightier than the sword obviously never encountered20automatic weapons'



- General Mac Arthur



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'You, you, and you ... Panic. The rest of you, come with me.'



- U.S. Marine Corp Gunnery Sgt.



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'Tracers work both ways.'-U.S. Army Ordnance



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'Five second fuses only last three seconds.' - Infantry Journal



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'Any ship can be a minesweeper. Once.'



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'Never tell the Platoon Sergeant you have nothing to do'



- Unknown Marine Recruit



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'If you see a bomb technician running, try to keep up with him.'



-USAFAmmo Troop



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'Though I Fly Through the Valley of Death , I Shall Fear No Evil.



For I am at 50,000 Feet and Climbing.'



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'You've never been lost until you've been lost at Mach 3.'



- Paul F. Crickmore (test pilot)



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'The only time you have too much fuel is when you're on fire.'



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'If the wings are traveling faster than the fuselage, it's probably a helicopter



-- and therefore, unsafe.'



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'When one engine fails on a twin-engine airplane you always have



enough power left to get you to the scene of the crash.'



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'Even withammunition, the USAFis just another expensive flying club.'



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'What is the similarity between air traffic controllers and pilots?



If a pilot screws up, the pilot dies;



If ATC screws up, .... The pilot dies.'



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'Never trade luck for skill.'



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The three most common expressions (or famous last words),



in aviation are:



'Why is it doing that?'



'Where are we?'



And



'Oh S...!'



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'Airspeed, altitude and brains. Two are always needed to successfully complete the flight.'



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'Mankind has a perfect record in aviation;



we have never left one up there!'



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'Flying the airplane is more important than radioing your plight



to a person on the ground incapable of understanding



or doing anything about it.'



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'The Pipe r Cub is the safest airplane in the world;it can just barely kill you.'



- Attributed to Max Stanley(Northrop test pilot)



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Airman, maintain thy air speed lest the earth rise up and smite you!



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'There is no reason to fly through a thunderstorm in peacetime.'



Sign over squadron ops desk atDavis-Monthan AFB, AZ, 1970



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'If something hasn't broken on your helicopter, it's about to.'



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'You know that your landing gear is up and locked when it



takes full power to taxi to the terminal.'



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As the test pilot climbs out of the experimental aircraft, having torn



off the wings and tail in the crash landing, the crash truck arrives;



the rescuer sees a bloodied pilot and asks,'What happened?'



The pilot's reply: 'I don't know, I just got here myself!'



-Attributed to Ray Crandell(Lockheed test pilot)

[Task Force]

Some good quotes in there:rotfl:

[SteamWake]

Some good quotes in there:rotfl:

Yea pretty funny stuff. Sorry about the formatting but Im to lazy to go fix it :rotfl:

[Raptor1]

That quote about 50,000 feet and climbing is actually 80,000 feet and it was written inside an SR-71 base (Or, that's what I heard, at least)

[Arclight]

:haha::har:

Reminds me of the drill-sergeant from Full Metal Jacket barking at the grunts. Some hilarious stuff. :rotfl: :salute:

[sharkbit]

My favorite on your list:


'If the wings are traveling faster than the fuselage, it's probably a helicopter




-- and therefore, unsafe.'



:yeah:

[Sailor Steve]

I've heard some of those before. They're all good ones.

Robert J. Serling, in his book The Probable Cause, quotes the story of an airline captain who is asked by a passenger if he's more careful when carrying a full load than when he only has, as in this case, a handful on board. His reply? "No offense, ma'am, but it doesn't matter if I'm hauling cargo and have no passengers at all. There's only one person I'm interested in getting there in one piece. The rest of you are just along for the ride."

My dad once told me "Passengers never realize that the airliner is designed so the part with the pilot in it hits the ground first."

'Whoever said the pen is mightier than the sword obviously never encountered automatic weapons'- General Mac Arthur
Every time I read that I have to remember that MacArthur's career was ended by the stroke of a pen.

[Max2147]

Some other good ones:

"It is better to be on the ground wishing you were in the air than in the air wishing you were on the ground." - Anonymous

"My center is giving way, my right is in retreat, situation excellent. I attack." - French general Foch at the Battle of the Marne

"We're surrounded. That simplifies our problem of getting to these people and killing them." - US general Chesty Puller during the Korean War

"Don't crash. The paperwork is monumental." - Anonymous

Not a quote, but a story: An F-15 pilot is escorting a C-130 on a long mission. The F-15 pilot gets bored, so he pulls in front of the C-130 and does a couple beautiful slow rolls. He then pulls back into formation and radios the C-130 pilot, "I bet you can't do that in your plane!" The C-130 pilot immediately responds, "Yeah, but I bet you can't do this!"

Curious, the F-15 pilot replies "Go ahead." He pulls back and watches the C-130, but the Hercules keeps flying along straight in level flight. After a couple minutes, the C-130 pilot comes back on the radio and says "There!" The confused F-15 pilot replies "What's so special about flying straight and level? Any plane can do that!" The C-130 pilot replies "Yeah, but I just went to the back and took a dump in the toilet."

[Sailor Steve]

I heard that one too, except when I heard it it was "took a leak and made a cup of coffee."

[Fr8monkey]

Not a famous quote but when I was in basic training for the USAF, the Drill instructor got in my face and asked me,

"You should be in the Army, boy! What the hell are you doing in my Air Force??"

I replied,

"I joined the Air Force because the enemy shoots at the Officers, sir!"

Got me some chuckles and in a lot of trouble!

[Sailor Steve]

That's why the Air Force has the smartest enlisted men. When it all comes down, only in the Air Force do the enlisted men send their officers off to fight and die.

[Raptor1]

I remember one from the Battle of Waterloo when Lord Uxbridge's leg was crushed by a cannonball, he said to Wellington "By God, sir, I've lost my leg!", To which Wellington replied "By God, sir, so you have!".

[SteamWake]

"A soldier brave and not un used to wars alarms, a cannonball took off his legs and he laid down his arms"

[Oberon]

"Do not touch anything unnecessarily. Beware of pretty girls in dance halls and parks who may be spies, as well as bicycles, revolvers, uniforms, arms, dead horses, and men lying on roads -- they are not there accidentally."
Soviet infantry manual, issued in the 1930's

One of the serious problems in planning the fight against American doctrine, is that the Americans do not read their manuals, nor do they feel any obligation to follow their doctrine...
- From a Soviet Junior Lt's Notebook

"The best tank terrain is that without anti-tank weapons."
-Russian military doctrine.


...At a prewar diplomatic conference, the Nazi Foreign Minister Ribbentrop "sniffed" to Eden and Churchill that if there was another war, the Italians would be on Germany's side!
To which Churchill supposedly replied: "that seems only fair, we had them last time!"...


"The reason the American Army does so well in wartime, is that war is chaos, and the American Army practices it on a daily basis."
- from a post-war debriefing of a German General


Pearl Harbour Radio Operator: "Is there anything that we can provide?"
Response from Marine Commander on Wake Island: "Send us more Japs!"
.... Said to be one of the last radio transmissions received from the Marines on Wake Island before it fell to the Japanese, 1941.


In 1836, the Creek and Seminole Indian tribes in Georgia and Florida were waging war against the United States. The U. S. Army had its hands full. The Fifth Commandant of the Marine Corps offered the services of a regiment of Marines for duty with the Army. Henderson placed himself in command and, taking virtually the entire available strength of the Corps, left for the extended campaign after tacking a terse message on his office door which read:
"Have gone to Florida to fight Indians.
Will be back when War is over.
A. Henderson
Col. Commandant"


The best armor is staying out of gun-shot.
-Italian proverb

Funny Quotes From Bumper Stickers There is no problem that cannot be solved by the use of high explosives.
- Bumper Sticker
You can have my gun when you pry it from my paranoid, mentally disturbed, physically-abusive, cold, dead hand.
- Bumper sticker
"Don't tell mom I'm a pilot, she thinks I play piano in a whorehouse"
- Bumper sticker

Funny Uknown Quotes
Always remember to pillage BEFORE you burn
- Unknown
Anything worth fighting for is worth fighting dirty for
- Unknown
A nuclear war can ruin your whole day
- Unknown
Draft beer, not people
- Unknown
"The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step, and a lot of bitching."
-Unknown
"Artillery is the King of battle: the King cannot
swim, however, which is why we need you guys."
(USMC arty specialist to a group of Navy officers in an Amphib
Warfare Indoc course.)

Funny Latin Quotes

Interdum feror cupidine partium magnarum Europae vincendarum
Sometimes I get this urge to conquer large parts of Europe.

Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt.
When catapults are outlawed, only outlaws will have catapults

Catapultam habeo. Nisi pecuniam omnem mihi dabis, ad caput tuum saxum immane mittam.
I have a catapult. Give me all the money, or I will fling an enormous rock at your head

Funny Quotes about Air planes and Aircrafts

"Airplanes can barely keep themselves in the air. How can they then carry any kind of load?"
- William Pickering, Astronomer (1908)

"Airplanes suffers from so many technical faults that it is only a matter of time before any reasonable man realizes that they are useless!"
- Scientific American (1910)

"No flying machine will ever fly from New York to Paris."
- Orville Wright.

"Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value."
- Marshal Ferdinand Foch [Professor of Strategy, Ecole Superieure de Guerre] (circa 1911)
He was Supreme Commander of Allied forces, 1918

"Aviation is good for sport, but for the Army it is useless!"
- Marshal Ferdinand Foch

"To throw bombs from an airplane will do as much damage as throwing bags of flour. It will be my pleasure to stand on the bridge of any ship while it is attacked by airplanes."
- Newton Baker, US minister of defense (1921)

Funny Submarine quotes
"Yes, it is possible!"
-William Bourne, English inventor. (1578) He also points out that submarines can be an effective weapon in wartime.

"The only thing that will happen is that the vessel will sink, and suffocate the crew"
- H. G. Wells, English writer(1902) (Submarines had been used since ca. 1850)

"Even if a submarine should work by a miracle, it will never be used. No country in this world would ever use such a vicious and petty form of warfare!"
- William Henderson, British admiral(1914)

Funny Quotes about Radio Communication
"If two people can't see each other, then it's impossible to communicate"
- Unknown roman warfare expert (63 ad.)

"Samuel Morse most have lost his mind if he believes in this idea himself!"
- Senator Oliver Hampton Smith, (1842)

after having seen a demonstration of Morse's new invention.
"It is only righteous that Joshua Coppersmiths, who has tried to find investors to finance the development of a so-called telephone, is arrested for fraud!"
- An article in the Boston Post (1865)

"The radio has no future!"
- Lord Kelvin, British Mathematician(1897)

"Use your time on something useful. All radios this country will ever need can easily fit on my desk!"
- W.W. Dean, director of the American phone company "W.W. Dean"(1907), to Lee DeForrest (one of radios first pioneers)

"Radio is just a fashion contrivance that will soon die out. It is obvious that there never will be invented a proper receiver!"
- Thomas Edison

"The wireless music box has no imaginable commercial value. Who would pay for a message sent to nobody in particular?"
- David Sarnoff's associates in response to his urgings for investment in the radio in the 1920s

[Letum]

The best I can come up with:

The key to attacking ground targets is to maintain the altitude advantage.

[Raptor1]

When in danger or in doubt, run in circles, scream and shout

[Jimbuna]

"Yes, and they went down very well too."
- A retort from the Duke of Wellington to a comment on how very well French cavalry had come up at Waterloo.

[CastleBravo]

I don't know if this has been profered, but it is true.

There are no athiests in foxholes. Even the most commited atheists will pray when under threat of imminent death. Maybe that is why some are so apposed to war. They would have to admit there is a God.

[Arclight]

When in danger or in doubt, run in circles, scream and shout:rotfl: :salute:

REAR, n. In American military matters, that exposed part of the army that is nearest to Congress.
— Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

"Why does the Air Force need expensive new bombers? Have the people we've been bombing over the years been complaining?"
— George Wallace

"We have women in the military, but they don't put us in the front lines. They don't know if we can fight, if we can kill. I think we can. All the general has to do is walk over to the women and say, 'You see the enemy over there? They say you look fat in those uniforms.'"
— Elayne Boosler

"I had examined myself pretty thoroughly and discovered that I was unfit for military service."
— Joseph Heller, author of Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

"Military justice is to justice what military music is to music."
— Groucho Marx

Army food: the spoils of war
— Unknown

"When I lost my rifle, the Army charged me 85 dollars. That is why in the Navy the Captain goes down with the ship."
— Dick Gregory

"The direct use of force is such a poor solution to any problem, it is generally employed only by small children and large nations."
— David Friedman

"The object of war is not to die for your country, but to make the other bastard die for his."
— General George S. Patton

"It will be a great day when our schools have all the money they need, and our air force has to have a bake-sale to buy a bomber."
— Robert Fulghum

"I am not fond of speaking about politics because I don't have in my possession an army of 200,000 soldiers."
— Frank Liszt

"My fellow Americans. I've signed legislation that will outlaw Russia forever. We begin bombing in five minutes."
— President Reagan, before a scheduled radio broadcast, unaware that the microphone was already on

"Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake."
— Napoleon Bonaparte

"War is God's way of teaching Americans geography."
— Ambrose Bierce

"Our bombs are smarter than the average high school student. At least they can find Kuwait."
— A. Whitney Brown, during First Gulf War


VALOR, n. A soldierly compound of vanity, duty and the gambler's hope.
"Why have you halted?" roared the commander of a division and Chickamauga, who had ordered a charge. "Move forward, sir, at once."
"General," said the commander of the delinquent brigade, "I am persuaded that any further display of valor by my troops will bring them into collision with the enemy."/p> — Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

[ETR3(SS)]

There are two types of ships in the world: Submarines and targets.

All ships are made to sink, it's the submarines that can come back up.

[rubenandthejets]

Not really a quote, but one of favorite annecdotes.

Frederick the Great was marching his men through a town when he saw a cavalryman he had decorated for bravery on the gallows about to be excecuted.

"What did this man do? I personally decorated him for bravery!"
"He was found fornicating with his horse, Your Excellency"
"Well, for God's sake, TRANSFER HIM TO THE INFANTRY!"

[Max2147]

"Now, you must let me have a cup of real, good, hot, strong English tea." - Kaiser Wilhelm II's first words upon arriving in exile in 1918.

[breadcatcher101]

"Don't worry. They can't hit an elephant at this dis--".

(Last words of a union officer during the American Civil War when warned about standing on top of a pile of dirt to get a better view of the confederate positions.)

[TarJak]

Let me see if I've got this straight: in order to be grounded, I've got to be crazy and I must be crazy to keep flying. But if I ask to be grounded, that means I'm not crazy any more and I have to keep flying.

Yossarian - Catch 22

[Raptor1]

"Don't worry. They can't hit an elephant at this dis--".

(Last words of a union officer during the American Civil War when warned about standing on top of a pile of dirt to get a better view of the confederate positions.)

I do believe it was

"What? Men dodging this way for single bullets? What will you do when they open fire along the whole line? I am ashamed of you. They couldn't hit an elephant at this distance." - John Sedgwick, after walking around in the open when the Confederates started firing scattered rifle fire, though the way I heard it they weren't actually his very last words

[Janus]

'You, you, and you ... Panic. The rest of you, come with me.'
- U.S. Marine Corp Gunnery Sgt.
When in danger or in doubt, run in circles, scream and shout
Those two remind me of the one scene in a Spongebob Squarepants episode when a loudspeaker announcment is made: "Please run around in circles and cry" (or something like that) :doh:
Well, I like the quote from the USMC Sergeant. And the one about Churchill and the Italians is hilarious :)

Quote from Stalin:
"The death of a man is a tragedy, the death of a million is only a statistic."
(got this from the quotes of the Operation Flashpoint death screen...)

[Raptor1]

"The idea that cavalry will be replaced by these iron coaches is absurd. It is little short of treasonous" - French Officer on a Tank demonstration, 1916

[antikristuseke]

I don't know if this has been profered, but it is true.

There are no athiests in foxholes. Even the most commited atheists will pray when under threat of imminent death. Maybe that is why some are so apposed to war. They would have to admit there is a God.

No, it is not. Have not been in combat yet, but have been under fire and in threat of imminent death. Did not resort to prayer of any kind, instead tried to find a course of action to get my self out of that situation, praying would have gotten me killed.

[Oberon]

During one of the Swedish army’s annual exercises, a sign on a bridge tells everyone "This bridge is destroyed". The exercise commences, and the Commander in Charge, a Colonel, scans around with his binoculars. Suddenly, he sees a line of soldiers walking over the closed bridge, which is marked with red flags, to simulate that it has been destroyed by an artillery barrage. The Colonel jumps in his TGB11 (Terrängbil 11, Eg. Cross Country Vehicle 11) and races down the hill to the bridge to have a word with the lousy platoon commander that allowed his men to cross a simulated destroyed bridge. As he approaches, he can see that the first soldier in line, a 2nd Lieutenant, carries a poster which says, "Vi simmar (We swim!)"

[Jimbuna]

During one of the Swedish army’s annual exercises, a sign on a bridge tells everyone "This bridge is destroyed". The exercise commences, and the Commander in Charge, a Colonel, scans around with his binoculars. Suddenly, he sees a line of soldiers walking over the closed bridge, which is marked with red flags, to simulate that it has been destroyed by an artillery barrage. The Colonel jumps in his TGB11 (Terrängbil 11, Eg. Cross Country Vehicle 11) and races down the hill to the bridge to have a word with the lousy platoon commander that allowed his men to cross a simulated destroyed bridge. As he approaches, he can see that the first soldier in line, a 2nd Lieutenant, carries a poster which says, "Vi simmar (We swim!)"

Good one :up:

[Biggles]

Let me see if I've got this straight: in order to be grounded, I've got to be crazy and I must be crazy to keep flying. But if I ask to be grounded, that means I'm not crazy any more and I have to keep flying.

Yossarian - Catch 22

You got it, that's Catch-22!

One of my favourite books, funny as hell.

"He had decided to live forever or die in the attempt, and his only mission each time he went up was to come down alive."

"Open your eyes, Clevinger. It doesn't make a damned bit of difference who wins the war to someone who's dead." (how very true).

"Yossarian's heart sank. Something was terribly wrong if everything was all right and they had no excuse for turning back."
(When nothing is wrong with the plane, there is no reason turning back, which is ofcourse terribly wrong...)

"There was a much lower death rate inside the hospital than outside the hospital, and a much healthier death rate. Few people died unnecessarily"

"What is a country? A country is a piece of land surrounded on all sides by boundaries, usually unnatural. Englishmen are dying for England, Americans are dying for America, Germans are dying for Germany, Russians are dying for Russia. There are now fifty or sixty countries fighting in this war. Surely so many countries can't all be worth dying for."

My all time favourite quote from the book:

"Dear Mrs., Mr., Miss, or Mr. And Mrs. Daneeka: Words cannot express the deep personal grief I experienced when your husband, son, father, or brother was killed, wounded, or reported missing in action." :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Also here is a thing I read many years ago.

You probably knew that there were an italian division fighting alongside the germans at Stalingrad. Well the russians did their great push to surround the city and in the process went through the italian/romanian troops at the fontline. An italian reporter then asked one high ranked officer in the italian army:

-Are we taking high casualties?
-None at all, they're all running.

[SteamWake]

You got it, that's Catch-22!

One of my favourite books, funny as hell.
.

Funny I tried to watch the movie just this week and just could not get through it. Im hoping the book was not quite as frenetic.

[Biggles]

The book is a challenge, that's for sure. You can read it again and again (as I have) and you'll always find/understand something that you hadn't before.

[Platapus]

Helicopters don't fly
They just beat the air into submission - bumper sticker

[Platapus]

"Never trade luck for skill."

A corollary

Napoleon , when told the virtues of a new General, eg. the man's heroism, bravery, skill in battle and so on - waved his hand impatiently. "That's all very well," he said, "but is he lucky?"

(although the accuracy of this quote is debated)

[Shearwater]

"War does not determine who is right - only who is left."
- Bertrand Russell

[Stealhead]

I once saw on the wall above each urinal in a U.S. Army barracks latrine over in germany a poster that listed Murphys Laws of Combat I dont recall all of them but here are two:

4.Always remeber that your weapons and gear are made by the lowest bidding contractor.
9.Friendly fire is never friendly.

I have a friend that was a dog handler for the Army over in Vietnam he has a shirt that he got in Saigon it says:
If I die in Vietnam bury me face down so the world can kiss my ass.