Best 769 quotes in «soldier quotes» category

A soldier never goes to war without his weapon.

A soldier serves not to take, they don't strive to have something, but rather they strive so that others might one day have something. And a blade isn't a happy friend to a soldier, but a burden, a heavy one, to be used scrupulously and carefully. A good soldier does everything they can so they do not have to kill. That's what training is for. But if we have to, we will. And when we do that we give up some part of ourselves, as we're asked to do.

A soldier is a killer painted hero.

A soldier never leaves his wepon.

A woman's body is a sacred temple. A work of art, and a life-giving vessel. And once she becomes a mother, her body serves as a medicine cabinet for her infant. From her milk she can nourish and heal her own child from a variety of ailments. And though women come in a wide assortment as vast as the many different types of flowers and birds, she is to reflect divinity in her essence, care and wisdom. God created a woman's heart to be a river of love, not to become a killing machine.

Being in war itself is a gallant, awards are mere decorations.

But as much as this is a soldier's reason d'etre, it is not often that you hear a soldier explicitly talk about 'killing'. The k-word as a verb is instead often disguised and supplanted by any number of other euphemisms. In precise and technical military parlance, reflecting the ever more precise and technically removed means of killing, the 'enemy' becomes the 'target'. But for the soldiers who personally 'engage' these 'targets', these objects are colloquially 'slotted', 'dropped', 'hit', 'fragged', 'sawn in half', 'smashed' or just plain 'shot'. Then the soldier will have achieved the noun of a 'kill'. The author's supposition is that such words are used by the soldier in combat as an attempt to mentally dissociate himself from the reality of his actions, so he can continue to operate as a soldier - and perhaps, when all is finally said and done, as a human being back home.

But ironically, now having seen those qualities made incarnate, Lergen realized that the highest form of the Imperial Army's desires was simply another way to describe a monster. And it filled him with fear.

But I was still determined to protect her. It might be the one good thing I would ever do in my life. I wondered if God would even notice.

But the future is uncertain, and he can't get up enough enthusiasm even to masurbate.

Did you ever think it won’t be the undead who kill us, but ordinary people?

Don't let people supervise your life, If you know who you are, you shouldn't be living in that prison of dominance, live by your orders, you are your own soldier.

Do the people in this country approve of this war?" [...]. "Approve? You don't think we'd lie down and let the damned Thuvians walk all over us? Our status as a world power is at stake!" "But I mean the people, not the government. The... the people who must fight." "What's it to them? They're used to mass conscriptions. It's what they're for, my dear fellow! To fight for their country. And let me tell you, there's no better soldier on earth than the Ioti man of the ranks, once he's broken in to taking orders. In peacetime he may spout sentimental pacifism, but the grit's there, underneath. The common soldier hs always been our greatest resource as a nation. It's how we became the leader we are." "By climbing up on a pile of dead children?" [...]. "No,"[...] "you'll find the soul of the people true as steel, when the country's threatened. A few rabble-rousers in Nio and the mill towns make a big noise between wars, but it's grand to see how people close ranks when the flag's in danger. You're unwilling to believe that, I know. The trouble with Odonianism, [...], is that it's womanish. It simply doesn't include the virile side of life. 'Blood and steel, battle's brightness,' as the old poet says. It doesn't understand courage--love of the flag." [...] "That may be true, in part. At least, we have no flags.

[George Everett Macdonald was] a valiant soldier for human liberty.

Graff had isolated Ender to make him struggle. To make him prove, not that he was competent, but that he was far better than everyone else. That was the only way he could win respect and friendship. It made him a better soldier then he would ever have been otherwise. It also made him lonely, afraid, angry, untrusting. And maybe those traits, too, made him a better soldier.

Growing up, I always had a soldier mentality. As a kid I wanted to be a soldier, a fighter pilot, a covert agent, professions that require a great deal of bravery and risk and putting oneself in grave danger in order to complete the mission. Even though I did not become all those things, and unless my predisposition, in its youngest years, already had me leaning towards them, the interest that was there still shaped my philosophies. To this day I honor risk and sacrifice for the good of others - my views on life and love are heavily influenced by this.

Handing me a pen is like handy a madman a knife...at the end of it you know you'll end up with a lot of broken bones, blood, and bodies - but it'll be one hell of a story to tell your friends.

He had wanted to be a soldier and was well suited to be one. But a soldier is a pawn in the hands of the ruler and the rulers of his land were idle and self-serving persons, he had started to convince himself now

A true warrior does not train tirelessly to fight, or to kill. A true warrior trains endlessly that he may return home alive.

‘Can’t you see what they are?’ I said. ‘They’re all dead.’

Colonel Fedmahn Kassad knew only that all the great passions of a passionate life had led him to this place and to this moment, and if death awaited him here, then so be it. And if love and glory and a victory that would make Valhalla quake awaited, then so be it.

Cricket’s voice broke through Thomas’s memory. He was reading a letter, most likely from his mother. He was trying hard to hide it, but he was tearing up. “Captain I don’t want to be here,” was all he could choke out. Thomas reached over and gave Cricket’s shoulder a tight squeeze.

Dear Life, I have been living alone for the last four years. I am familiar with my loneliness. And sometimes I feel like a soldier who can survive without love or poetry too! I am used to leading this hard life! Yours sincerely, Mr. Writer

Drab?" Soldier yelled. "I'll give you drab. Beat her, would you? Beat my wife? I'll feed your head to the vultures, you snotty little hamster with your golden pelt and buttery looks!

Dr. Talbon was struck by another very important thing. It all hung together. The stories Cheryl told — even though it was upsetting to think people could do stuff like that — they were not disjointed They were not repetitive in terms of "I've heard this before". It was not just she'd someone trying consciously or unconsciously to get attention. really processed them out and was done with them. She didn't come up with them again [after telling the story once and dealing with it]. Once it was done, it was done. And I think that was probably the biggest factor for me in her believability. I got no sense that she was using these stories to make herself a really interesting person to me so I'd really want to work with her, or something. Or that she was just living in this stuff like it was her life. Once she dealt with it and processed it, it was gone. We just went on to other things. 'Throughout the whole thing, emotionally Cheryl was getting her life together. Parts of her were integrating where she could say,"I have a sense that some particular alter has folded in with some basic alter", and she didn't bring it up again. She didn't say that this alter has reappeared to cause more problems. That just didn't happen. The therapist had learned from training and experience that when real integration occurs, it is permanent and the patient moves on.

Drive. He’s already dead.

Dude, don’t die out here.

‘Eighth one this week,’ he said.

Ember pressed close, brushing my shoulder with hers, and my pulse spiked. I looked over, saw the fierce determination in her gaze and felt a defiant growl rumble in my throat as a hot, vicious rage spread through my veins. Ember was mine. The other half of me. And i would fight Talon, St. George and the entire damned world to keep her safe

Ember is mine, St. George. You cant have her. This time, I'll fight if i have to.

Even now I can’t describe the fear that contaminated my blood like black ink.

Everyone's a knucklehead at one point or another.

Every war has its martyrs — the unsung heroes who sometimes don’t even know the rationale behind the war they are fighting. They fight because they are trained to, kill because they are told to and die because they are destined to.

Fear the soldier who stammers, for he is very fast at pulling the triger.

For an instant I saw before me the young girl this used to be.

Foreshadowing: Was my challenging Allah to unleash the full weight of his fury upon us, with dark clouds looming in the distance.

For some soldiers, there is a greater war going on behind the gun's shadow of family and friends, than in front of the gun pointing at strange enemies.

For what it’s worth”—he rose from his seat, moved around the table and bent over her, whispering in her ear as he pressed a kiss to her cheek— “I like you better in a pair of worn jeans, and I think you deserve someone who appreciates what he’s got. Not someone out to have a good time.

From this war, I am but a shell lodged in a desert's flesh-- bone on bone on bone.

he had never been meant to be a spy; he was a soldier. a soldier kept his sanity by distancing himself from his enemies, making them something far away and almost inhuman; merely an idea that bled when you stabbed it.

Her voice was small and distant, like she’d already left the room.

He’s like a hero come back from the war, a poor maimed bastard living out the reality of his dreams. Wherever he sits himself the chair collapses; whatever door he enters the room is empty: whatever he puts in his mouth leaves a bad taste. Everything is just the same as it was before; the elements are unchanged, the dream is no different than the reality. Only, between the time he went to sleep and the time he woke up, his body was stolen.

He took a deep breath in, still managing himself as if he were resisting temptation. He was a soldier, his father was in the service, too. Crying wasn't something Morell men did. They just didn't. He hadn't cried at Robbie Morell's funeral. So he wasn't going to now.

He was a real-life soldier playing soldier from his memories of made up soldiers.

He wants me to tell him about the front; he is curious in a way that I find stupid and distressing; I no longer have any real contact with him. There is nothing he likes more than just hearing about it. I realize he does not know that a man cannot talk of such things; I would do it willingly, but it is too dangerous for me to put these things into words. I am afraid they might then become gigantic and I be no longer able to master them. What would become of us if everything that happens out there were quite clear to us?

He wasn't like some of the hippies in England, where the qualification to rebel is planted by the guilt raised from being a spoilt child with a good education. He was a real hippy born from being forced to kill for his army until he was twenty one. He had long hair because the army made him shave his head. The army made him shave every day too. Now he had a beard. His face for a long time was not his own. When this guy said he was all about peace he wasn't talking about peace because his mum never got him the horse he wanted for his eighteenth birthday, he was talking about peace because he’d seen war. He talked about love because he knew hate: hate for those above him, hate for those he had served with, hate for enemies not born his but who became so and, lastly, hate for himself for how his mind had been controlled.

Hey, how are you?" they'd say. And I'd answer, "I feel like I'm being eaten from the inside out and I can't tell anyone what's going on because everyone is so grateful to me all the time and I'll feel like I'm ungrateful or something. Or like I'll give away that I don't deserve anyone's gratitude and really they should all hate me for what I've done but everyone loves me for it and it's driving me crazy." Right. Or should I have said that I wanted to die, not in the sense of wanting to throw myself off of that train bridge over there, but more like wanting to be asleep forever because there isn't any making up for killing women or even watching women get killed, or for that matter killing men and shooting them in the back and shooting them more times than necessary to actually kill them and it was like just trying to kill everything you saw sometimes because it felt like there was acid seeping down into your soul and then your soul is gone and knowing from being taught your whole life that there is no making up for what you are doing, your're taught that your whole life, but then even your mother is so happy and proud because you lined up your sight posts and made people crumple and they were not getting up ever and yeah they might have been trying to kill you too, so you say, What are you gonna do?, but really it doesn't matter because by the end you failed at the one good thing you could have done, the one person you promised would live is dead, and you have seen all things die in more manners than you'd like to recall...

I am thankful once again to strip off an old life, as I so often have during these years. I look back upon a soldier, a murderer, a man almost murdered, a man resurrected, a prisoner, a wanderer.

I cannot tell you that the sacrifice will be light: it is a serious thing to stand against the whole current of an age; it is a serious thing to be despised and hated by the generality of one's fellow men. Yet that is increasingly the lot of the truth Christian today. He will not, indeed, be inclined to complain; for he has something with which all that he has lost is not worthy to be compared; and he knows that despite temporary opposition the ultimate future belongs to him and to His Lord. But for the present he is called upon to endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. It can hardly be said that unworthy motives of self-interest can lead a man to enter into a calling in which he will win nothing but reproach.

I didn’t get it, though. Not at first. Was he training me to be a soldier or trying to kill me? I was pretty sure it was the latter. Then I realized it was both: He really was training me to be a soldier—by trying to kill me.