Those wars are unjust which are undertaken without provocation. For only a war waged for revenge or defense can be just.

Men should be either treated generously or destroyed, because they take revenge for slight injuries – for heavy ones they cannot.

America will never seek a permission slip to defend the security of our people.

People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.

Morality arose largely as an empirical defence of the individual and society. Ever since intelligent beings began to be in contact, and consequently in friction, they have felt the need to guard themselves against each other’s encroachments.

It seems strange that bears, so fond of all sorts of flesh, running the risks of guns and fires and poison, should never attack men except in defense of their young. How easily and safely a bear could pick us up as we lie asleep! Only wolves and tigers seem to have learned to hunt man for food, and perhaps sharks and crocodiles.

The problem in defense is how far you can go without destroying from within what you are trying to defend from without.

Whoever has provoked men to rage against him has always gained a party in his favor, too.

We, the People, recognize that we have responsibilities as well as rights; that our destinies are bound together; that a freedom which only asks what’s in it for me, a freedom without a commitment to others, a freedom without love or charity or duty or patriotism, is unworthy of our founding ideals, and those who died in their defense.

The great defense against the air menace is to attack the enemy’s aircraft as near as possible to their point of departure.

Their is no defense against criticism except obscurity.

A mother defends herself with a heart filled with love before doing so with words. I wonder whether there is any love for the church in the hearts of those who pay so much attention to the scandals.

A man that studieth revenge keeps his own wounds green.

The military can buy our diplomats some time.

Virtuous people often revenge themselves for the constraints to which they submit by the boredom which they inspire.

Our defense is in the preservation of the spirit which prizes liberty as a heritage of all men, in all lands, everywhere. Destroy this spirit and you have planted the seeds of despotism around your own doors.

If you prick us do we not bleed? If you tickle us do we not laugh? If you poison us do we not die? And if you wrong us shall we not revenge?

I am the commander in chief of the United States armed forces, and Iraq is gonna have to ultimately provide for its own security.

Experience teaches us that it is much easier to prevent an enemy from posting themselves than it is to dislodge them after they have got possession.

The main foundations of every state, new states as well as ancient or composite ones, are good laws and good arms you cannot have good laws without good arms, and where there are good arms, good laws inevitably follow.

God’s first line of defense – and offense – for every situation is prayer.

In our time political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible.

We have to distrust each other. It is our only defense against betrayal.

Revenge is a kind of wild justice, which the more a man’s nature runs to, the more ought law to weed it out.

Every citizen should be a soldier. This was the case with the Greeks and Romans, and must be that of every free state.

Men ought either to be indulged or utterly destroyed, for if you merely offend them they take vengeance, but if you injure them greatly they are unable to retaliate, so that the injury done to a man ought to be such that vengeance cannot be feared.

Nobody ever defended anything successfully, there is only attack and attack and attack some more.

In taking revenge, a man is but even with his enemy; but in passing it over, he is superior.

Wars are caused by undefended wealth.

Today, India is a nuclear weapons state.

The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his.

It is impossible to suffer without making someone pay for it; every complaint already contains revenge.

If we desire to avoid insult, we must be able to repel it; if we desire to secure peace, one of the most powerful instruments of our rising prosperity, it must be known, that we are at all times ready for War.

The power of an air force is terrific when there is nothing to oppose it.

Let my enemies devour each other.

The U.S. military is not war weary. Our military draws strength from confronting our enemies when clear policy objectives are set and we are fully resourced for the fight.

And as a writer, one of the things that I’ve always been interested in doing is actually invading your comfort space. Because that’s what we’re supposed to do. Get under your skin, and make you react.

For a war to be just three conditions are necessary – public authority, just cause, right motive.

If you can’t beat them, arrange to have them beaten.

We sleep safe in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm.

The best revenge is to be unlike him who performed the injury.

I’m not an expert on the arms race.

No matter what cause one defends, it will suffer permanent disgrace if one resorts to blind attacks on crowds of innocent people.

Debt is part of the human condition. Civilization is based on exchanges – on gifts, trades, loans – and the revenges and insults that come when they are not paid back.

To refrain from imitation is the best revenge.

The Marine Corps is the Navy’s police force and as long as I am President that is what it will remain. They have a propaganda machine that is almost equal to Stalin’s.

I’ve never been that much of a money guy. I’m more of a film guy, and most of the money I’ve made is in defense of trying to keep creative control of my movies.

When a nation is surrounded by weaponized nations, she has to equip herself.

There are minds so impatient of inferiority that their gratitude is a species of revenge, and they return benefits, not because recompense is a pleasure, but because obligation is a pain.

Peace can be contributed to by respect for our ability in defense.

Certainly, in taking revenge, a man is but even with his enemy, but in passing it over, he is superior; for it is a prince’s part to pardon.

Revenge, lust, ambition, pride, and self-will are too often exalted as the gods of man’s idolatry; while holiness, peace, contentment, and humility are viewed as unworthy of a serious thought.

The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism.

It is our duty still to endeavor to avoid war; but if it shall actually take place, no matter by whom brought on, we must defend ourselves. If our house be on fire, without inquiring whether it was fired from within or without, we must try to extinguish it.

Iran has little capacity to deploy force. Its strategic doctrines are defensive, designed to deter invasion long enough for diplomacy to set it.

Pop flies, in a sense, are just a diversion for a second baseman. Grounders are his stock trade.

An eye for an eye only leads to more blindness.

If you are not prepared to use force to defend civilization, then be prepared to accept barbarism.

The only defensible war is a war of defense.

Neither the Army nor the Navy is of any protection, or very little protection, against aerial raids.

Pakistan will never be able to match the Indian militarily, and the effort to do so is taking an immense toll on the society.