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Top 25 James D. Hornfischer Quotes (2025 Update)

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “When they get in trouble, they send for the sons-of-bitches.”

1. “When they get in trouble, they send for the sons-of-bitches.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “Legend, tradition, history can drive a commitment to excellence that raises people and has them perform at a level above anything they ever dreamed they could do. And it makes all of us realize the potential that everybody has who serves for you and goes to sea on ships.”

2. “Legend, tradition, history can drive a commitment to excellence that raises people and has them perform at a level above anything they ever dreamed they could do. And it makes all of us realize the potential that everybody has who serves for you and goes to sea on ships.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “It has been written that so much of life is preparation, so much is routine, and so much is retrospect that the purest essence of anyone’s genius contracts itself to a precious few hours.”

3. “It has been written that so much of life is preparation, so much is routine, and so much is retrospect that the purest essence of anyone’s genius contracts itself to a precious few hours.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “Anxieties,” wrote Alfred Thayer Mahan, “are the test and penalty of greatness.”

4. “Anxieties,” wrote Alfred Thayer Mahan, “are the test and penalty of greatness.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “To give advice to a tyrant was to suggest his fallibility and offer oneself as a scapegoat should things go wrong.”

5. “To give advice to a tyrant was to suggest his fallibility and offer oneself as a scapegoat should things go wrong.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “He believed that the quality of experience one has as a member of any team depends on the caliber and motivation of the people one serves with.”

6. “He believed that the quality of experience one has as a member of any team depends on the caliber and motivation of the people one serves with.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “Archer kept his course toward the battleship. He opened his bomb bay doors for show, hoping to persuade the dreadnought to veer from its course. Then, as he began to pull up over the ship, Archer rolled his Avenger over on its back and took his .38-caliber service revolver from its holster. Running on anger born of pain and not a little adrenaline, he squeezed the trigger repeatedly, sending six rounds into the dark superstructure of the battleship.”

7. “Archer kept his course toward the battleship. He opened his bomb bay doors for show, hoping to persuade the dreadnought to veer from its course. Then, as he began to pull up over the ship, Archer rolled his Avenger over on its back and took his .38-caliber service revolver from its holster. Running on anger born of pain and not a little adrenaline, he squeezed the trigger repeatedly, sending six rounds into the dark superstructure of the battleship.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “By any measure the mathematics of the engagement were preposterously against them. The Yamato displaced nearly seventy thousand tons. She alone matched almost exactly in weight all thirteen ships of Taffy 3. Each of her three main gun turrets weighed more than an entire Fletcher-class destroyer.”

8. “By any measure the mathematics of the engagement were preposterously against them. The Yamato displaced nearly seventy thousand tons. She alone matched almost exactly in weight all thirteen ships of Taffy 3. Each of her three main gun turrets weighed more than an entire Fletcher-class destroyer.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “The victory at Leyte Gulf was the product of Allied planning, savvy, and panache, to be sure. But only Samar showed the world something else: how Americans handle having their backs pushed to the wall.”

9. “The victory at Leyte Gulf was the product of Allied planning, savvy, and panache, to be sure. But only Samar showed the world something else: how Americans handle having their backs pushed to the wall.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “Among his innovations was the Liberty ship, a cargo vessel that could be mass-produced virtually like an oceangoing Model T. Using a breakthrough welding technique, submerged arc welding, that could stitch steel plate with molten rivets up to twenty times faster than existing methods, Kaiser’s shipbuilders produced a Liberty ship in an average of only forty-two days.”

10. “Among his innovations was the Liberty ship, a cargo vessel that could be mass-produced virtually like an oceangoing Model T. Using a breakthrough welding technique, submerged arc welding, that could stitch steel plate with molten rivets up to twenty times faster than existing methods, Kaiser’s shipbuilders produced a Liberty ship in an average of only forty-two days.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “As Herman Wouk wrote in War and Remembrance, ‘The vision of Sprague’s three destroyers – the Johnston, the Hoel, and the Hermann – charging out of the smoke and the rain straight toward the main batteries of Kurita’s battleships and cruisers, can endure as a picture of the way Americans fight when they don’t have superiority. Our schoolchildren should know about that incident, and our enemies should ponder it.”

11. “As Herman Wouk wrote in War and Remembrance, ‘The vision of Sprague’s three destroyers – the Johnston, the Hoel, and the Hermann – charging out of the smoke and the rain straight toward the main batteries of Kurita’s battleships and cruisers, can endure as a picture of the way Americans fight when they don’t have superiority. Our schoolchildren should know about that incident, and our enemies should ponder it.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “In combat you have to leave the wounded behind whether they are men or ships and go on your way and fight. Nevertheless, it was something that made every man on our topside feel the same as I did, and it bothered us to leave those men at the mercy of the Japs, but there was no other choice.”

12. “In combat you have to leave the wounded behind whether they are men or ships and go on your way and fight. Nevertheless, it was something that made every man on our topside feel the same as I did, and it bothered us to leave those men at the mercy of the Japs, but there was no other choice.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “The only thing worse than a bad idea that gets implemented is a good one that is never broached.”

13. “The only thing worse than a bad idea that gets implemented is a good one that is never broached.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “But he and his compatriots would soon assess the cost of Taffy 3’s audacious resistance, the effectiveness of which no tactician could ever have foreseen and no statistician could have measured.”

14. “But he and his compatriots would soon assess the cost of Taffy 3’s audacious resistance, the effectiveness of which no tactician could ever have foreseen and no statistician could have measured.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “Although he had a directing hand in everything, he always remained a student at heart.”

15. “Although he had a directing hand in everything, he always remained a student at heart.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “On the cusp of a smashing victory, a commander must keep his nerve or fail altogether.”

16. “On the cusp of a smashing victory, a commander must keep his nerve or fail altogether.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “Paul Henry Carr of Checotah, Oklahoma, proud member of the Future Farmers of America, football and baseball letterman, brother to eight sisters, only son of Thomas and Minnie Mae Carr, died there on the deck of his battered, broken warship.”

17. “Paul Henry Carr of Checotah, Oklahoma, proud member of the Future Farmers of America, football and baseball letterman, brother to eight sisters, only son of Thomas and Minnie Mae Carr, died there on the deck of his battered, broken warship.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “Kurita knew that heavenly influences could be counted upon to trump human planning. In war, events seldom cooperate with expectation. Given.”

18. “Kurita knew that heavenly influences could be counted upon to trump human planning. In war, events seldom cooperate with expectation. Given.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “Like most veterans, they would continue their lives saying that the truest heroes were the men who did not come back.”

19. “Like most veterans, they would continue their lives saying that the truest heroes were the men who did not come back.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “He was a good kid and a good destroyerman for the same reason: he was always looking out for someone else. At one point LeClerq had had the presence of mind to train his forty-millimeter mount on a spread of torpedoes bubbling toward Sprague’s carriers. Johnny LeClerq was the very picture of wholesome blond American innocence, considerate of the enlisted men, devoted to the Navy, and meticulous in his duties.”

20. “He was a good kid and a good destroyerman for the same reason: he was always looking out for someone else. At one point LeClerq had had the presence of mind to train his forty-millimeter mount on a spread of torpedoes bubbling toward Sprague’s carriers. Johnny LeClerq was the very picture of wholesome blond American innocence, considerate of the enlisted men, devoted to the Navy, and meticulous in his duties.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “Communism has no greater ally in this country than the half-baked hysterical charges against leaders of this country by political opponents.”

21. “Communism has no greater ally in this country than the half-baked hysterical charges against leaders of this country by political opponents.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “Earl ‘Blue’ Archer, the Kalinin Bay VC-3 Avenger pilot who suffered a serious back injury amid the brambles of flak over Kurita’s fleet, went home and kept quiet about his infirmity. He soon realized that he had a choice to make: he could take an eighty or ninety percent disability benefit from Uncle Sam and begin a life of inactivity, or he could take three or four aspirin twice a day and continue flying planes in the naval reserve.”

22. “Earl ‘Blue’ Archer, the Kalinin Bay VC-3 Avenger pilot who suffered a serious back injury amid the brambles of flak over Kurita’s fleet, went home and kept quiet about his infirmity. He soon realized that he had a choice to make: he could take an eighty or ninety percent disability benefit from Uncle Sam and begin a life of inactivity, or he could take three or four aspirin twice a day and continue flying planes in the naval reserve.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “Wildcats could carry a light bomb load too. Their pilots, however, found to their dismay that the bombs could be difficult to drop: a pilot had not only to pull the bomb release but also to jerk the plane’s rudder back and forth, shaking the plane in midflight to dislodge the bombs from their notoriously sticky mountings.”

23. “Wildcats could carry a light bomb load too. Their pilots, however, found to their dismay that the bombs could be difficult to drop: a pilot had not only to pull the bomb release but also to jerk the plane’s rudder back and forth, shaking the plane in midflight to dislodge the bombs from their notoriously sticky mountings.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “His dad asked Bud what the decorations meant. All the Samuel B. Roberts survivor could say in reply was they meant that he had not dishonored his mother.”

24. “His dad asked Bud what the decorations meant. All the Samuel B. Roberts survivor could say in reply was they meant that he had not dishonored his mother.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “So many men were dead, yet the ship itself continued to live, as if animated by its own force of will.”

25. “So many men were dead, yet the ship itself continued to live, as if animated by its own force of will.”

— James D. Hornfischer

James D. Hornfischer Quote: “The story, the history, of Navy men in extremis animates the idea that Americans can do anything when it is necessary and when it counts.”

26. “The story, the history, of Navy men in extremis animates the idea that Americans can do anything when it is necessary and when it counts.”

— James D. Hornfischer

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