Top 100 Military Quotes (2024 Update)

1. “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Winning Quotes, Knowledge Quotes, Fighting Quotes

2. “Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Fighting Quotes, Victory Quotes, Competition Quotes

3. “Lead me, follow me, or get out of my way.”

— George S. Patton Jr.

Also featured in: Leadership Quotes, Confidence Quotes, Attitude Quotes, Winning Quotes

4. “When you surround an army, leave an outlet free. Do not press a desperate foe too hard.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Fighting Quotes

5. “Treat your men as you would your own beloved sons. And they will follow you into the deepest valley.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Quotes About War

6. “Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Winning Quotes, Fighting Quotes, Peace Quotes

7. “The opportunity of defeating the enemy is provided by the enemy himself.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Fighting Quotes, Victory Quotes, Competition Quotes

8. “Move swift as the Wind and closely-formed as the Wood. Attack like the Fire and be still as the Mountain.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Fighting Quotes, Victory Quotes

9. “You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word. It is victory, victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory, however long and hard the road may be; for without victory, there is no survival.”

— Winston Churchill

Also featured in: Winning Quotes, Fighting Quotes, Struggle Quotes

10. “When the enemy is relaxed, make them toil. When full, starve them. When settled, make them move.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Fighting Quotes, Competition Quotes

11. “Do not engage an enemy more powerful than you. And if it is unavoidable and you do have to engage, then make sure you engage it on your terms, not on your enemy’s terms.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Fighting Quotes, Quotes About War

12. “The art of war is of vital importance to the State. It is a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin. Hence it is a subject of inquiry which can on no account be neglected.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Fighting Quotes, Quotes About War

13. “What is of supreme importance in war is to attack the enemy’s strategy.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Quotes About War

14. “The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other guy die for his.”

— George S. Patton Jr.

Also featured in: Victory Quotes, Quotes About War

15. “Move not unless you see an advantage; use not your troops unless there is something to be gained; fight not unless the position is critical.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Quotes About War

16. “Humble words and increased preparations are signs that the enemy is about to advance. Violent language and driving forward as if to the attack are signs that he will retreat.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Quotes About War

17. “Without harmony in the State, no military expedition can be undertaken; without harmony in the army, no battle array can be formed.”

— Sun Tzu

18. “Cover and Move, Simple, Prioritize and Execute, and Decentralized Command.”

— Jocko Willink

19. “We will either find a way or make one.”

— Hannibal

Also featured in: Perseverance Quotes, Attitude Quotes, Action Quotes, Effort Quotes

20. “The day the soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help them or concluded that you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership.”

— Colin Powell

Also featured in: Leadership Quotes, Quality Quotes

21. “Accept the challenges so that you can feel the exhilaration of victory.”

— George S. Patton Jr.

Also featured in: Courage Quotes, Goal Quotes, Action Quotes, Winning Quotes

22. “The greatest victory is that which requires no battle.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Victory Quotes, Competition Quotes

23. “Courage is fear holding on a minute longer.”

— George S. Patton Jr.

Also featured in: Courage Quotes, Determination Quotes, Fear Quotes

24. “If you can’t do the little things right, you will never do the big things right.”

— William H. McRaven

Also featured in: Inspirational Career Quotes

25. “Extreme Ownership. Leaders must own everything in their world. There is no one else to blame.”

— Jocko Willink

Also featured in: Leadership Quotes, Responsibility Quotes, Boss Quotes

26. “In preparing for battle I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.”

— Dwight D. Eisenhower

27. “Leadership consists of nothing but taking responsibility for everything that goes wrong and giving your subordinates credit for everything that goes well.”

— Dwight D. Eisenhower

Also featured in: Boss Quotes, Government Quotes

28. “My own definition of leadership is this: The capacity and the will to rally men and women to a common purpose and the character which inspires confidence.”

— Bernard Law Montgomery

Also featured in: Leadership Quotes

29. “Ultimate excellence lies not in winning every battle, but in defeating the enemy without ever fighting.”

— Sun Tzu

30. “You must be single minded. Drive for the one thing on which you have decided.”

— George S. Patton Jr.

Also featured in: Victory Quotes, Quotes for Better Decisions, Vision Quotes

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

— Abdul Kalam

32. “Those whose upper and lower ranks have the same desire are victorious.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Victory Quotes

33. “In case of doubt, attack.”

— George S. Patton Jr.

Also featured in: Competition Quotes, Doubt Quotes

34. “There are routes not to be followed, armies not to be attacked, citadels not to be besieged, territory not to be fought over.”

— Sun Tzu

35. “If, however, you are indulgent, but unable to make your authority felt; kind-hearted, but unable to enforce your commands; and incapable, moreover, of quelling disorder: then your soldiers must be likened to spoilt children; they are useless for any practical purpose.”

— Sun Tzu

36. “A pint of sweat will save a gallon of blood.”

— George S. Patton Jr.

37. “Too frequent rewards indicate that the general is at the end of his resources; too frequent punishments that he is in acute distress.”

— Sun Tzu

38. “No one ever drowned in sweat.”

— United States Marine Corps

Also featured in: Motivational Workout Quotes

39. “Go into emptiness, strike voids, bypass what he defends, hit him where he does not expect you.”

— Sun Tzu

40. “A good battle plan that you act on today can be better than a perfect one tomorrow.”

— George S. Patton Jr.

41. “If we do not wish to fight, we can prevent the enemy from engaging us even though the lines of our encampment be merely traced out on the ground. All we need to do is to throw something odd and unaccountable in his way.”

— Sun Tzu

42. “The most important thing I learned is that soldiers watch what their leaders do. You can give them classes and lecture them forever, but it is your personal example they will follow.”

— Colin Powell

43. “Amateurs study tactics; professionals study logistics.”

— Omar N. Bradley

44. “The rising of birds in their flight is the sign of an ambuscade. Startled beasts indicate that a sudden attack is coming.”

— Sun Tzu

45. “We maintain the peace through our strength; weakness only invites aggression.”

— Ronald Reagan

46. “Without victory there is no survival!”

— Winston Churchill

Also featured in: Victory Quotes

47. “We are forever indebted to those who have given their lives that we might be free.”

— Ronald Reagan

Also featured in: Quotes on Liberty

48. “Logistics comprises the means and arrangements which work out the plans of strategy and tactics. Strategy decides where to act; logistics brings the troops to this point.”

— Antoine-Henri Jomini

49. “To secure peace is to prepare for war.”

— Carl von Clausewitz

50. “If you are situated at a great distance from the enemy, and the strength of the two armies is equal, it is not easy to provoke a battle, and fighting will be to your disadvantage.”

— Sun Tzu

Also featured in: Distance Quotes