Churchill - The Last Lion Roars

Mrs. Braddock : Mr. Churchill, you are drunk!
Mr. Churchill : And you, madam, are ugly. But I shall be sober tomorrow.
- In W. Manchester’s, The Last Lion.

Nancy Astor: "If I were your wife I would put poison in your coffee!"
Winston Churchill: "And if I were your husband I would drink it!"

To paraphrase Winston Churchill, I did not take the oath I’ve just taken, with the intention of presiding over the dissolution of the world’s strongest economy. - Ronald Reagan, Inaugural Address, January 20, 1981.

Things do not get better by being left alone. Unless they are adjusted, they explode with a shattering detonation. - Winston Churchill.

Where every step is fraught with grave consequences and with real peril to the cause, deliberate and measured action is not merely prudent, but decent. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. February 22, 1910.

It is dangerous to meddle with Admirals when they say they can't do things. They have always got the weather or fuel or something to argue about. - Winston Churchill.

In Sir David Beatty we have a Commander-in-Chief who, by his gifts and also by his exceptional training, not only possesses the regular qualifications which admirals of distinction possess, but he has, perhaps, in a greater degree than almost any of the principal officers of the fleet, what may be called the “war mind.” It is not only seamanship or technical attainments or even leadership of men that are required of a Commander-in-Chief, but also that feeling towards the art of war, that deep comprehension of its somber yet simple problems, without which, all other qualifications, however valuable, however laboriously attained, still only receive a limited scope. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. February 21, 1917.

The temptation to tell a chief in a great position the things he most likes to hear is the commonest explanation of mistaken action. - Winston Churchill.

The power of an airforce is terrific when there is nothing to oppose it. - Winston Churchill.

This was indeed an ordeal by fire. In the British and American bombing of Germany and Italy during the Second World War the casualties were 140,000... there were more British and American air-crews casualties than there were killed and wounded in the great operation of crossing the channel. They never flinched or failed. It is to their devotion in no small measure we owe our victory. Let us give them our salute. - Winston Churchill.

In an aerial war the greatest form of defense will undoubtedly be offense. - Winston Churchill. Speech, House of Commons, March 21, 1922.

If all of a sudden two powers with equal forces went to war, and one threw it’s bombs upon cities so as to kill as many women and children as possible, and the other threw its bombs on the aerodromes and air bases and factories and arsenals and dockyards and railway focal points of the other side, can anyone doubt that next morning the one who had committed the greatest crime would not be the one who had reaped the greatest advantage? - Winston Churchill, Speech, House of Commons, March 21, 1922.

It may be that great ordeals are coming to us in this island from the air. We shall do our best to give a good account of ourselves; and we must always remember that command of the seas will enable us to bring the immense resources of Canada and the New World into play as a decisive ultimate air factor, a factor beyond reach of what we have to give and take over here. - Winston Churchill, Speech in London, October 1, 1939.

The great French army was very largely, for the time being, cast back and disturbed by the onrush of a few thousand of armored vehicles. May it not also be that the cause of civilization itself will be defended by the and devotion of a few thousand airmen. There never had been, I suppose, in all the world, in all the history of war, such an opportunity for youth. The Knights of the Round Table, the Crusader, all fall back into the past: not only distant but prosaic; these young men, going forth every morn to guard their native land and all that we stand for, holding in their hands these instruments of colossal and shattering power, of whom it may be said that “Every morn brought forth a noble chance, and every chance brought forth a noble knight,” deserve our gratitude, as do all of the brave men who, in so many ways and on so many occasions, are ready, and continue ready, to give life and all for their native land. - Winston Churchill, Speech, House of Commons, June 4, 1940.

The gratitude of every home in our Island, in our Empire, and indeed throughout the world, except in the abodes of the guilty, goes out to the British Airmen who, undaunted by odds, unwearied in their constant challenge and mortal danger, are turning the tide of the world war by their prowess and by their devotion. Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few. All hearts go out to the fighter pilots, whose brilliant actions we see with our own eyes day after day. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, August 20, 1940.

The conquest of the air and the perfection of the art of flying fulfilled the dream which for thousands of years had glittered in human imagination. Certainly it was a marvelous and romantic event. Whether the bestowal of this gift upon an immature civilization composed of competing nations, whose nationalization grew with every advance of democracy, and who were as yet devoid of international organization, whether this gift was a blessing or a curse has yet to be proved. - Winston Churchill, Speech, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Boston, March 31, 1949.

Silly people, and there were many, not only in enemy countries, might discount the force of the United States. Some said they were soft, others that they would never be United. - Winston Churchill.

Never again let us hear the taunt that money is the ruling thought or power in the hearts of the American democracy. The Lend and Lease Bill must be regarded without question as the most unsordid act in the whole of recorded history. - Winston Churchill, speech, Mansion House, London, November 10, 1941.

The price of Greatness is responsibility. If the people of the United States had continued in a mediocre station, struggling with the wilderness, absorbed in their own affairs and a factor of no consequence in the movement of the world, they might have remained forgotten and undisturbed beyond their own protecting oceans: but one cannot rise to be in many ways the leading community in the civilized world without being involved in its problems, without being convulsed by its agonies and inspired by its causes. - Winston Churchill, speech, Guildhall, London,June 30, 1943.

Nor should it be supposed as you would imagine, to read some of the Left-wing newspaper, that all Americans are multi-millionaires of Wall Street. If they were all multi-millionaires that would be no reason for condemning a system which has produced such material results. - Winston Churchill, speech, Royal Albert Hall, London, April 21, 1948.

Thus ended the great American Civil War, which must upon the whole be considered the noblest and least avoidable of all the great mass conflicts of which till then there was record. - Winston Churchill.

Of all nationalities, Americans are the best in adapting themselves. With them, to see is to know — and to know is to conquer. - Jennie Jerome Churchill, New York World, October 13, 1908.

It cannot be in the interest of Russia to go on irritating the United States. There are no people in the world who are so slow to develop hostile feelings against a foreign country as the Americans, and there are no people who, once estranged, are more difficult to win back. The American eagle sits on his perch, a large, strong bird with formidable beak and claws. There he sits motionless, and M. Gromyko is sent day after day to prod him with a sharp pointed stick — now his neck, now under his wings, now his tail feathers. All the time the eagle keeps quite still. But it would be a great mistake to suppose that nothing is going on inside the breast of the eagle. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. June 5, 1946.

All the world wishes for peace and security. Have we gained it by the sacrifice of the Czechoslovak Republic? Here was the model democratic state of Central Europe, a country where minorities were treated better than anywhere else. It has been deserted, destroyed and devoured. It is now being digested. The question which is of interest to a lot of ordinary, common people is whether this destruction of the Czechoslovak Republic will bring upon the world a blessing or a curse.... - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. October 5, 1938.

Where is it all to end? To try to buy off Nazidom, or any other sign of moral weakness, would only be to bring near the very thing we still hope may be averted. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. June 28, 1939.

All the great countries in this war [WWII] count their armies by millions, but the Indian army has a peculiar characteristic not found in the armies of Britain or the United States or Russia or France or in the armies of our foes, in that it is entirely composed of volunteers. No one has been conscripted or compelled. The same thing is broadly true throughout our great colonial empire. - Winston Churchill, speech, Guildhall, London. June 30, 1943.

There have been many occasions when a powerful state has wished to raise great armies, and with money and time and discipline and loyalty that can be accomplished. Nevertheless the rate at which the small american Army of only a few hundred thousand men, not long before the war, created the mighty force of millions of soldiers, is a wonder in military history. - Winston Churchill, speech, the Pentagon, Washington, DC. March 9, 1946.

There is no greater danger than equal forces. If you wish to bring about war, you bring about such an equipoise that both sides think they have a chance of winning. If you want to stop war, you gather such an aggregation of force on the side of peace that the aggressor, whoever he may be, will not dare to challenge. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. July 13, 1934.

The wholesale massacre by systematized processes of six or seven millions of men, women, and children in the German execution camps exceeds in horror the rough-and-ready butcheries of Genghis Khan, and in scale reduces them to pigmy proportions. - Winston Churchill.

Before Alamein we never had a victory. After Alamein we never had a defeat. - Winston Churchill.

The grass grows green on the battlefield, but never on the scaffold. - Winston Churchill.

I have often thought that it is sometimes unwise of generals to try to foresee with meticulous exactness just what will happen after a battle has been fought. A battle hangs like a curtain across the future. Once that curtain is raised or rent we can all see how the scenery is arranged, what actors are left upon the scene, and how they appear to be related to one another. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, October 31, 1944.

This is no time for ease and comfort. It is the time to dare and endure. - Winston Churchill.

Courage is the first of human qualities because it is the quality which guarantees all others. - Winston Churchill

However tempting it might be to some when much trouble lies ahead to step aside adroitly and put someone else up to take the blows, I do not intend to take that cowardly course, but on the contrary, to stand to my post and persevere in accordance with my duty as I see it. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. February 25, 1942.

Of all races in the world our people would be the last to consent to be governed by a bureaucracy. Freedom is their lifeblood. - Winston Churchill, speech, London, March 21, 1943.

The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent vice of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, October 22, 1945.

When I see the present Socialist Government denouncing capitalism in all its forms, mocking with derision and contempt the tremendous free enterprise capitalist system on which the mighty production of the United States is founded, I cannot help feeling that as a nation we are not acting honorably or even honestly. - Winston Churchill, Woodford Green, July 10, 1948.

I feel sure that our cause will not be suffered to fail among men. - Winston Churchill, speech to the House of Commons, May 13, 1940.

If we are together nothing is impossible. If we are divided all will fail. I therefore preach continually the doctrine of the fraternal association of our two peoples [Britain and America], not for any purpose of gaining material advantages for either of them, not for territorial aggrandizement or the vain pomp of earthly domination, but for the sake of service to mankind and for the honor that comes to those who faithfully serve great causes. - Winston Churchill, Harvard University, September 6, 1943.

With opportunities comes responsibility. Strength is granted to us all when we are needed to serve great causes. - Winston Churchill, speech, New York, March 15, 1946.

In this island we have today achieved in a high degree the blessings of civilization. There is freedom; there is law; there is love of country; there is prosperity. There are unmeasured opportunities of correcting abuses and making further progress. - Winston Churchill, University of Bristol, July 2, 1938.

Civilization will not last, freedom will not survive, peace will not be kept, unless a very large majority of mankind unite together to defend them and show themselves possessed of a constabulary power before which barbaric and atavistic forces will stand in awe. - Winston Churchill, University of Bristol, July 2, 1938.

The future of the whole world, and certainly the future of Europe, perhaps for several generations, depends upon the cordial, trustful and comprehending association of the British Empire, the United States and Soviet Russia, and no pains must be spared and no patience grudged which are necessary to bring that supreme hope to fruition. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, September 28, 1944.

We have one principle about the liberated countries or the repentant satellite countries which we strive for according to the best of our abilities and resources.... Trust the people, make sure they have a fair chance to decide their destiny without being terrorized from either quarter or regimented. There is our policy for Italy, for Yugoslavia and for Greece. What other interests have we than that? For that we shall strive, and for that alone. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, January 18, 1945.

There is not much comfort in looking into a future where you and the countries you dominate, plus the communist parties in many other states, are drawn up on one side, and those who rally to the English-speaking nations and their associates or dominions are on the other. It is quite obvious that their quarrel would tear the world to pieces and that all us leading men on either side who had anything to do with that would be shamed before history. - Winston Churchill, in a telegram to Stalin, April 29, 1945.

From what I have seen of our Russian friends and allies during the war, I am convinced that there is nothing they admire so much as strength, and there is nothing for which they have less respect than weakness, especially military weakness. For that reason the old doctrine of a balance of power is unsound. We cannot afford, if we can help it, to work on narrow margins, offering temptation to a trial of strength. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, November 7, 1945.

If [the Russians] also take Berlin will not their impression that they have been the overwhelming contributor to our common victory be unduly imprinted in their minds.... I therefore consider that from a political standpoint we should march as far east into Germany as possible, and that should Berlin be in our grasp we should certainly take it. This also appears sound on military grounds. - Winston Churchill, in a letter to Roosevelt, 1945.

A shadow has fallen upon the scene so lately lighted by the allied victory. Nobody knows what Soviet Russia and it's communist organization intends to do in the immediate future, or what are the limits, if any, to their expansive and proselytizing tendencies. - Winston Churchill, Speech at Westminster College, Fulton, Missouri, March 5, 1946.

From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the continent. - Winston Churchill, Speech at Westminster College, Fulton, Missouri, March 5, 1946.

I do not believe that Soviet Russia desires war. What they desire is the fruits of war and the indefinite expansion of their power and doctrines. - Winston Churchill, Speech at Westminster College, Fulton, Missouri, March 5, 1946.

It is part of the established technique of the "cold war" the Soviets have begun against us all, that in any country which has fallen into their power, people of character and men of heart and personality outstanding in any walk of life, from the manual worker to the university professor, shall be what is called in their savage jargon, "liquidated." - Winston Churchill, October 9, 1948.

Moralists may find it a melancholy thought that peace can find no nobler foundations than mutual terror. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, March 5, 1952.

We live in a period, happily unique in human history, when the whole world is divided intellectually, and to a large extent geographically, between the creeds of Communist discipline and individual freedom, and when, at the same time, this mental and psychological division is accompanied by the possession by both sides of the obliterating weapons of the nuclear age.... - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, April 14, 1954.

Major wars of the future will differ, therefore, from anything we have known in the past in this one significant respect, that each side, at the outset, will suffer what it dreads the most, the loss of everything that it has ever known of. The deterrents will grow continually in value. In the past, an aggressor has been tempted by the hope of snatching an early advantage. In the future, he may be deterred by the knowledge that the other side has the certain power to inflict swift, inescapable and crushing retaliation. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, March 1, 1955.

As the stark and glaring background to all our cogitations on defence lay man's final possession of the perfected means of human destruction: the atomic weapon and its monstrous child, the hydrogen bomb. - Winston Churchill.

Colonial affairs suffer very much when brought into the arena of British Party politics. - Winston Churchill, Imperial Conference, Downing Street, London, May 7, 1907.

We have got all we want in territory, but our claim to be left in undisputed enjoyment of vast and splendid possessions, largely acquired by war and largely maintained by force, is one which often seems less reasonable to others than to us. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, March 17, 1914.

Nothing is more exciting than to be shot at without result. - Winston Churchill.

A communist is like a crocodile: when it opens its mouth you cannot tell whether it is trying to smile or preparing to eat you up. - Winston Churchill.

The inherent vice of Bolshevism appears to rot simultaneously every part of the social structure of Russia, including even the military tyranny on which alone the Soviet power now depends. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, May 29, 1919.

My hatred of Bolshevism and Bolsheviks is not founded on their silly system of economics or their absurd doctrine of an impossible equality. It arises from the bloody and devastating terrorism which they practice in every land into which they have broken, and by which alone their criminal regime can be maintained. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, July 8, 1920.

No people in the world are really less likely to turn Bolshevik than the Irish. Their strong sense of personal possession, their respect for the position of women, their love of country and their religious convictions constitute them in a peculiar sense the most sure and unyielding opponents of the withering and levelling doctrines of Russia. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, February 16, 1922.

I will not pretend that, if I had to choose between Communism and Nazism, I would choose Communism. I hope not to be called upon to survive in the world under a government of either of those dispensations. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, April 14, 1937.

We are told that we must not involve ourselves in a quarrel about ideologies. If this means that we are not to back Communism against Nazism or vice versa, we all agree. Both doctrines are equally obnoxious to the principles of freedom. Certainly we should not back one against the other. But surely we must have an opinion between Right and Wrong? Surely we must have an opinion between aggressor and victim? - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, March 24, 1938.

Except in the British Commonwealth and in the United States, where communism is in its infancy, the communist parties or fifth columns constitute a growing challenge and peril to Christian civilization. - Winston Churchill, speech, Westminster College, March 5, 1946.

In the communist sect it is a matter of religion to sacrifice one's native land for the sake of the Communist Utopia. People who, in ordinary life, would behave in a quite honorable manner, if they are infected with this disease of the mind will not hesitate a moment to betray their country or its secrets. - Winston Churchill, speech, Westminster College, March 5, 1946.

I think the day will come when it will be recognized without a doubt, not only on one side of the House [of Commons], but throughout the civilized world, that the strangling of Bolshevism at its birth would have been an untold blessing to the human race. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, January 26, 1949.

I tell you — it's no use arguing with a Communist. It's no good trying to convert a Communist or persuade him. You can only deal with him on the following basis... you can only do it by having superior force on your side on the matter in question — and they must also be convinced that you will use — you will not hesitate to use — those forces, if necessary, in the most ruthless manner. You have not only to convince the Soviet Government that you have a superior force — that they are confronted by superior force — but that you are not restrained by any moral consideration, if the case arose, from using that force with complete material ruthlessness. And that is the greatest chance of peace, the surest road to peace. - Winston Churchill, speech, New York, March 25, 1949.

An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile -- hoping it will eat him last. - Winston Churchill.

Man in this moment of his history has emerged in greater supremacy over the forces of nature than has ever been dreamed of before. he has it in his power to solve quite easily the problems of material existence. He has conquered the wild beasts, and he has even conquered the insects and the microbes. There lies before him, as he wishes, a golden age of peace and progress. Al is in his hand. He has only to conquer his worst enemy — himself. With vision, faith and courage, it may be within our power to win a crowning victory for all. - Winston Churchill, speech, house of Commons, March 28, 1950.

Conscience and muddle cannot be reconciled; conscience apart from truth is mere stupidity, regrettable but by no means respectable. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, July 15, 1948.

The British Constitution is mainly British common sense. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. May 17, 1901.

So long as I am acting from duty and conviction, I am indifferent to taunts and jeers. I think they will probably do me more good than harm. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. December 6, 1945.

Come then: let us to the task, to the battle, to the toil — each to our part, each to our station... There is not a week, nor a day, nor an hour to lose. - Winston Churchill, speech, Free Trade Hall, Manchester. January 27, 1940.

I have derived continued benefit from criticism at all periods of my life, and I do not remember any time when I was ever short of it. - Winston Churchill. November 27, 1914.

I am not at all worried about anything that may be said about me. Nobody would attempt to take part in controversial politics and not expect to be attacked. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. December 6, 1945.

We shall not allow the advance of society and economic well-being of the nation to be regulated and curtailed by the pace of the weakest bretheren among us. Proper incentives must be offered and full freedom given to the strong to use their strength in the commonweal. Initiative, enterprise, thrift, domestic foresight, contrivance, good housekeeping and natural ability must reap their just reward. On any other plan the population of this island will sink by disastrous and agonizing stages to a far lower standard of life and two-thirds of its present numbers. - Winston Churchill, speech, Blenheim Palace, August 4, 1947.

The difference between what is seen and what is not seen was often noticed by the old economists. What is not seen is the infinite variety of individual transactions and decisions which, in a civilized society, within the framework of just and well-known laws, insure the advantage not only of the individual concerned, but of the community, and provide that general body of well-being constituting the wealth of nations. All this is blotted out by an over-riding State control, however imposing some of its manifestations may be. It is the vital creative impulse that that I deeply fear the doctrines and policy of the socialist Government have destroyed, or are rapidly destroying, in our national life. Nothing that they can plan and order and rush around enforcing will take its place. They have broken the mainspring, and until we get a new one the watch will not go. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, October 28, 1947.

I am always ready to learn, but I do not always like being taught. - Winston Churchill, statement, House of Commons, November 4, 1952.

It is a good thing for an uneducated man to read books of quotations. - Winston Churchill, My Early Life, 1930.

All these balancings, limitations, and half pledges, these little devices by which an embarrassed Government staved off ruin from day to day would, after the next election, be swept as smooth as the sands of the shore after a flood tide. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, February 10, 1904.

Nothing is so expensive as general elections and new governments. Every new administration, not excluding ourselves, arrives in power with bright and benevolent ideas of using public money to do good. The more frequent the changes of government, the more numerous are the bright ideas, and the more frequent the elections, the more benevolent they become. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, April 11, 1927.

This is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning. - Winston Churchill, concerning the allied victory in Egypt.

London was like some huge prehistoric animal, capable of enduring terrible injuries, mangled and bleeding from many wounds, and yet preserving it's life and movement. - Winston Churchill.

We have to make the enemy burn and bleed in every way that is physically and reasonably possible.... - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, February 11, 1943.

You must look at facts because they look at you. - winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, May 7, 1925.

A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject. - Winston Churchill.

The end of Mussolini's long and severe reign over the Italian people undoubtedly marks the close of an epoch in the life of Italy. The keystone of the Fascist arch has crumbled, and without attempting to prophesy, it does not seem unlikely that the entire Fascist edifice will fall to the ground in ruins, if it has not already so fallen. The totalitarian system of a single party, armed with secret police, engrossing to itself practically all the offices, even the humblest, under the government; with magistrates and courts under the control of the executive, with its whole network of domestic spies and neighborly informants — that system, when applied over a long period of time, leaves the broad masses without any influence upon their country's destinies and without any independent figures apart from the official classes. That I think, is a defence for the people of Italy — one defence — although there can be no really valid defence for any country or any people which allows its freedom and inherent rights to pass out of its own hands. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. July 27, 1943.

Russia fears our friendship more than our enmity. The Soviet dictatorship could not stand free intercourse with the West. We must make Moscow fear our enmity more than our friendship. - Winston Churchill.

If you will not fight for right when you can easily win without bloodshed; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may be even a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than live as slaves. - Winston Churchill.

Never before has the choice of blessings or curses been so plainly, vividly, even brutally offered to mankind. The choice is open. The dreadful balance trembles. It may be that our Island and all the Commonwealths it has gathered around it may, if we are worthy, play an important, perhaps even decisive part in turning the scales of human fortune from bad to good, from fear to confidence, from miseries and crimes immeasurable to blessings and gains abounding. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. March 24, 1938.

I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma; but perhaps there is a key. That key is Russian national interest. - Winston Churchill.

Our first supreme object is not to go to war. To that end we must do our best to prevent others from going to war. But we must be very careful that, in so doing, we do not increase the risk to ourselves of being involved in a war if, unfortunately, our well-meant efforts fail to prevent a quarrel between other powers. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. November 23, 1932.

I say quite frankly, though I may shock the House, that i would rather see another ten twenty years of one-sided armed peace than see a war between equally well-matched powers or combinations of power—and that may be the choice. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. November 23, 1932.

I do not believe you will ever succeed in building up an international force in a vague and general manner, or that it can be created in cold blood. But it might well be that an international force would come into being by an alliance of national forces for a particular emergency or for particular purposes, and once having been started, it might give the security to the world which would avert the approaching curse of war. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. March 21, 1934.

The whole history of the world is summed up in the fact that when nations are strong they are not always just, and when they wish to be just they are often no longer strong. I desire to see the collective forces of the world invested with overwhelming power. If you are going to depend on a slight margin, one way or the other, you will have war. But if you get five or ten to one on one side, all bound rigorously by the covenant and the conventions which they own, then you may have an opportunity of a settlement which will heal the wounds of the world. Let us have this blessed union of power and justice: "Agree with thine adversary quickly, while thou art in the way with him." Let us free the world from the reproach of a catastrophe carrying with it calamity and tribulation beyond the tongue of man to tell. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. March 26, 1936.

We know that for many years past the policy of Japan has been dominated by secret societies of subalterns and junior officers of the army and navy, who have enforced their will upon successive Japanese Cabinets and Parliaments by the assassination of any Japanese statesman who opposed, or who did not sufficiently further, their aggressive policy. it may be that these societies, dazzled and dizzy with their own schemes of aggression and the prospect of early victories, have forced their country against its better judgement into war. They have certainly embarked upon a very considerable undertaking. - Winston Churchill, speech, U.S. Congress, Washington D.C., December 26, 1941.

I am sure that the mistakes of that time [concerning German Reparations] will not be repeated; we shall make another set of mistakes. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. June 8, 1944.

The foundations of British policy must be an ever-closer association with the United States. I have never asked at any time for an alliance. I want something much more than that. We must seek something less precise and far more potent. The whole English-speaking world must move forward together in fraternal association along the lines of destiny. This will be the greatest hope of peace among nations and of the freedom and dignity of ordinary men and women over the largest portion of the globe. - Winston Churchill, Blenheim Palace. August 4, 1947.

It used to be said that armaments depend on policy. It is not always true, but I think that at this juncture it is true to say that policy depends, to a large extent, upon armaments. It is true to say that we have reached a position where the choice of policy is dictated by considerations of defense. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. May 2, 1935.

Twice in my lifetime, the long arm of destiny has reached across the oceans and involved the entire life and manhood of the United States in a deadly struggle. There was no use in saying: "We don't want it: we won't have it; our forebears left Europe to avoid these quarrels; we have founded a new world which has no contact with the old." There was no use in that. The long arm reaches out remorselessly, and everyone's existence, environment, and outlook undergo a swift and irresistible change. - Winston Churchill, Harvard University. September 6, 1943.

For at least two generations we were, as the American writer Walter Lippman has reminded us, a guardian, and almost a guarantor, of the Monroe Doctrine upon which Canning's eye foresaw, the free development of South America was founded. We and the civilized world owe many blessings to the United States, but we have also in later generations made our own contribution to their security and splendour. - Winston Churchill, London. May 7, 1946.

I believe that, generally speaking, given free institutions on a fair basis, the best side of men's nature will in the end surely come uppermost. But this doctrine has its limits. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. February 22, 1906.

Do not suppose that this is the end. This is only the beginning of the reckoning. This is only the first sip, the first foretaste of a bitter cup which will be proffered to us year by year unless by a supreme recovery of moral health and martial vigour we arise again and take our stand for freedom as in the olden time. - Winston Churchill, Bristol University, July 2, 1938.

If the British Empire is fated to pass from life into history, we must hope it will not be by the slow process of dispersion and decay, but in some supreme exertion for freedom, for right and for truth. - Winston Churchill, Canada Club, London. April 20, 1939.

I go about the country whenever I can escape for a few hours or for a day from my duty at headquarters, and I see the damage done by the enemy attacks; but I also see side by side with the devastation and amid the ruins quiet, confident, bright and smiling eyes, beaming with a consciousness of being associated with a cause far higher and wider than any human or personal issue. I see the spirit of an unconquerable people. I see a spirit bred in freedom, nursed in a tradition which has come down to us through the centuries, and which will surely at this moment, this turning-point in the history of the world, enable us to bear our part in such a way that none of our race who come after us will have any reason to cast reproach upon their sires. - Winston Churchill, Bristol University, April 12, 1941.

There can be no really valid defence for any country or any people which allows its freedom and inherent rights to pass out of its own hands. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. July 27, 1943.

Upon Britain fell the proud but awful responsibility of keeping the Flag of Freedom Flying in the Old World till the forces of the New World could arrive. But now the tornado has passed away. The thunder of the cannons has ceased, the terror from the skies is over, the oppressors are cast out a broken, and we find ourselves breathless but still alive, exhausted but free. The future stands before us to make or mar. - Winston Churchill, speech, speech in Brussels. November 16, 1945.

...we must never cease to proclaim in fearless tones the great principles of freedom and the rights of men, which are the joint inheritance of the English-speaking world and which, through Magna Carta, the Bill of Rights, the Habeus Corpus, trial by Jury and the English Common law, find their most famous expression in the American Declaration of Independence. - Winston Churchill, speech, March 5, 1946.

I have no fear of the future. Let us go forward into its mysteries, let us tear aside the veils which hide it from our eyes, and let us move onward with confidence and courage. All the problems of the post-war world, some of which seem baffling now, will be easier of solution once decisive victory has been gained, and once it is clear that victory won in arms has not been cast away by folly or by violence when the moment comes to lay the broad foundations of the future world order, and it is time to speak great words of peace and truth to all. - Winston Churchill, speech, Royal Albert Hall, London. September 29, 1943.

Ireland was governed by neither King nor people. The system of government was not democratic, autocratic or even oligarchic. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, February 20, 1905.

I will only venture to congratulate the great Imperial statesmen who sit upon that bench upon the ease and celerity with which they have exchanged the responsibilities of office for the irresponsibilities of opposition. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, February 22, 1906.

The whole procedure of our Parliament arises primarily from the consideration of finance, and finance is the peg on which nearly all our discussions are hung, and from which many of them arise. That is the historic origin of a great portion of the House of Commons procedure, and there is no more deeply rooted maxim than the maxim of “grievances before supply.” - Winston Churchill, Imperial Conference, London, May 7, 1907.

Governments who have seized upon power by violence and by usurpation have often resorted to terrorism in their desperate efforts to keep what they have stolen; but the august and venerable structure of the British Empire, where lawful authority descends from hand to hand and generation after generation, does not need such aid. Such ideas are absolutely foreign to the British way of doing things. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, July 8, 1920.

The government can not simply make up their minds, or they cannot get the Prime Minister to make up his mind. So they go on in a strange paradox, decided only to be undecided, resolved to be irresolute, adamant for drift, solid for fluidity, all-powerful to be impotent. So we go on preparing more months and years — precious, perhaps vital, to the greatness of Britain — for the locusts to eat. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, November 12, 1936.

There was a custom in ancient China that everyone who wished to criticize the government had the right to memorialize the emperor, and provided he followed that up by committing suicide, very great respect was paid to his words, and no ulterior motive was assigned. That seems to me to have been, from many points of view, a wise custom, but I certainly would be the last to suggest that it should be made retrospective. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, November 12, 1941.

We must also be careful that a pretext is not made of war needs to introduce far-reaching social or political changes by a side wind. Take the question of nationalizing the coal mines. Those words do not terrify me at all. I advocated nationalization of the railways after the last war, but I am bound to say that I was a bit affected by the experience of the national control of the railways after the war, which led to the public getting a very bad service, to the shareholders having very unsatisfactory returns, and to one of the most vicious and hazardous strikes with which I have ever been concerned. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, October 13, 1943.

It is always bad for a government to change its mind, yet it ought to do so from time to time.... But what is still worse is to change your mind and then have to change it again. That is a double disadvantage, and we must certainly avoid that. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, October 6, 1944.

If it be true, as has been said, that every country gets the form of government it deserves, we may certainly flatter ourselves. The wisdom of our ancestors has led us to an envied and enviable situation. We have the oldest, the most famous, the most honored, the most secure and the most serviceable monarchy in the world. King and Parliament both rest safely and solidly upon the will of the people expressed by a free and fair election on the basis of universal suffrage. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, May 15, 1945.

The old Radical campaign against exploitation, monopolies, unfair rake-offs and the like, in which I took a part in my young days, was a healthy and necessary corrective to the system of free enterprise. But this grotesque idea of managing vast enterprises by centralized direction from London can only lead to bankruptcy and ruin. - Winston Churchill, speech in Perth, May 28, 1948.

State management has proved, in every case where it is applied, to be cumbrous, wasteful, and incompetent. Moreover, the wage-earners in all these nationalized industries are rapidly finding out how far more flexible and comprehending compared to the all-powerful, remote and sullen control of the State was the private employer. - Winston Churchill, speech, Woodford Green, July 10, 1948.

It is not the function of the House of Lords to govern the people but to make sure that the people have the right to govern themselves. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, November 16, 1949.

Nationalization of industry is the doom of trade unionism. - Winston Churchill, speech, Blackpool, October 14, 1950.

The concentration of all power over the daily lives of ordinary men and women in what is called “the state,” exercised by what is virtually single-chamber government, is a reactionary step contrary to the whole trend of British history and to the message we have given to the world. - Winston Churchill, speech, Huddersfield, October 15, 1951.

The British oak on which for centuries our navy depended, grows slowly and noiselessly without headlines or sensation, and no one should ever cut one down without planting another. It is very much easier and quicker to cut down trees than to grow them. In cases where bad, oppressive laws warp the free development of human society, much cutting down may be needed, and sometimes the forest itself has to be cleared. Great work was done by the Liberal and Conservative Parties in the nineteenth century, but the twentieth century with its terrible events has brought us problems of a different order, not many of which can be solved merely by passing Acts of Parliament. - Winston Churchill, Woodford, September 6, 1952.

Hate is not a good guide in public or in private life. I am sure that class hatred and class warfare, like national revenge, are the most costly luxeries in which anyone can indulge. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, April 24, 1950.

The whole history of the world is summed up in the fact that, when nations are strong, they are not always just, and when they wish to be just, they are no longer strong. - Winston Churchill.

If the present tries to sit in judgement of the past it will lose the future. - Winston Churchill.

When the situation was manageable it was neglected, and now that it is thoroughly out of hand we apply too late the remedies which then might have effected a cure. There is nothing new to the story. It is as old as the Sibylline Books. It falls into that long, dismal catalogue of the fruitlessness of experience and the confirmed unteachability of mankind. Want of foresight, unwillingness to act when action would be simple and effective, lack of clear thinking, confusion of counsel until the emergency comes, until self-preservation strikes its jarring gong — these are the features which constitute the endlless repetition of history. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, March 19, 1935.

In case of any forthcoming General Election there may be an attempt to revive these former controversies. We are taking steps to have little booklets prepared recording the utterances at different moments, of all the principal figures involved in those baffling times. For my part, I consider that it will be found much better by all Parties to leave the past to history, especially as I purpose to write that history myself. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, January 23, 1948.

One may dislike Hitler's system and yet admire his patriotic achievement. If our country were defeated I hope we should find a champion as admirable to restore our courage and lead us back to our place among the nations. - Winston Churchill, Great Contemporaries. 1935.

This war proceeds along its terrible path by the slaughter of infantry. It is the infantry which is the most difficult to replenish, which is continually worn away on both sides, and though all the other services of the army are necessary to its life, and to its maintenance... it is this fighting part that is the true measure of your military power, and the only true measure. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, May 23, 1916.

The ancient Anglo-Saxon foundation of all our system of criminal justice is trial by jury.... We regard it as fundamental safeguard of our democratic liberties and life and a principle which has been woven into the whole history of our judicial system that the supreme question, “Guilty or Not Guilty?” shall be decided by ordinary folk. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, July 15, 1948.

There is no greater delusion than that low wages mean high profits. No labour is so dear as cheap labor, and labour which costs nothing is the dearest of all. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, June 16, 1906.

What we propose to do for human labour, for the services which one man has to render to another, which is the only thing the majority of human beings have to sell, is to give it the same facilities and advantages which every other trader and merchant in the world has secured for his less important and less sensitive commodity. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, June 16, 1909.

It is in the interest of the wage-earner to have many other alternatives open to him than service under one all-powerful employer called the State. He will be in a better position to bargain collectively and production will be more abundant; there will be more for all and more freedom for all when the wage earner is able, in the large majority of cases, to choose and change his work, and deal with a private employer who, like himself, is subject to the ordinary pressures of life and, like himself, is dependent upon his personal thrift, ingenuity and good-housekeeping. - Winston Churchill, speech, Blackpool, October 5, 1946.

From now on, ending a sentence with a preposition is something up with which I will not put. - Winston Churchill.

I have no objection to a proper use of strong language, but a certain amount of art and a certain amount of selective power is needed, if the effect is to be produced. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, December 9, 1925.

The first maxim of English jurisprudence is that complainers should come into Court with clean hands. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, April 28, 1914.

It must be remembered that the function of Parliament is not only to pass good laws, but to stop bad laws. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, April 4, 1944.

Let me, however, make this clear, in case there should be any mistake about it in any quarter. We mean to hold our own. I have not become the King’s First Minister in order to preside over the liquidation of the British Empire. For that task, if ever it were prescribed, someone else would have to be consulted. - Winston Churchill, speech, Mansion House, London, November 10, 1942.

The nation will find it very hard to look up to the leaders who are keeping their ears to the ground. - Winston Churchill.

I hope that the League of Nations is not going to be asked now to do the impossible. Those who believe, as I do sincerely, that the League of Nations is a priceless instrument of international comity, which may play as great a part as the most daring, hopeful founders ever forecast for it, should be especially carefully not to put upon the League strains which in its present stage it is utterly incapable of bearing....
I have sympathy with, and respect for, the well-meaning, loyal-hearted people who make up the League of Nations Union in this country, but what impresses me most about them is their long-suffering and inexhaustible gullibility. Any scheme of any kind for disarmament put forward by any country, so long as it is surrounded by suitable phraseology, is hailed by them, and the speeches are cheered, and those who speak gain the need of their applause. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, November 23, 1932.

I have been trying to seek out for myself what would be the best way of preventing war, and it has seemed to me that the League of Nations should be the great instrument upon which all those resolves to maintain peace center, and that we should all make our contribution to the League of Nations. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, July 13, 1934.

Some people say: “Put your trust in the League of Nations.” Others say: “Put your trust in British rearmament.” I say we want both. I put my trust in both.... - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, October 24, 1935.

If the League of Nations has been mishandled and broken, we must rebuild it. If a League of peace-seeking people is set at naught, we must convert it into a league of armed peoples, too faithful to molest others, too strong to be molested themselves. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, March 14, 1938.

When you're 20, you're a liberal with a heart, but when you're forty you're a conservative with a brain. - Winston Churchill.

Liberalism supplies at once the higher impulses and practicable path; it appeals to persons by sentiments of generosity and humanity; it proceeds by courses of moderation; by gradual steps, by steady effort from day to day, from year to year. Liberalism enlists hundreds of thousands on the side of progress and popular democratic reform whom militant Socialism would drive into violent Tory reaction. - Winston Churchill, St. Andrews Hall, Glasgow, October 11, 1906.

The first indispensable condition of democratic progress must be the maintenance of European peace. War is fatal to Liberalism. Liberalism is the world-wide antagonist of war. - Winston Churchill, St. Andrews Hall, Glasgow. October 11, 1906.

Liberalism has its own history and its own tradition. Socialism has its own formulas and aims. Socialism seeks to pull down wealth; Liberalism seeks to raise up poverty. Socialism would destroy private interests; Liberalism would preserve private interests in the only way in which they can be safely and justly preserved, namely, by reconciling them with public right. Socialism would kill enterprise; Liberalism would rescue enterprise from the trammels of privilege and preference. Socialism assails the pre-eminence of the individual; Liberalism seeks, and shall seek more in the future, to build up a minimum standard for the mass. Socialism exalts the rule; Liberalism exalts the man. Socialism attacks capital; Liberalism attacks monopoly. - Winston Churchill, Kinnaird Hall, Dundee, May 14, 1908.

Immense surrenders of their hard earned liberties have been voluntarily made by the British people in order in time of war to serve the better the cause of freedom and fair play, to which, keeping nothing back, they have devoted all that they have and all that they are. Parliament stands custodian of these surrendered liberties, and it's most sacred duty will be to restore them in their fullness when victory has crowned our exertions and our perseverance. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, January 18, 1945.

We know that other hearts in millions and scores of millions beat with ours; that other voices proclaim the cause for which we strive; other strong hands wield the hammers and shape the weapons we need; other clear and gleaming eyes are fixed in hard conviction upon tyrannies that must and shall be destroyed. - Winston Churchill, speech in London, March 18, 1941.

The British nation now has to make one of the most momentous choices in its history. That choice is between two ways of life: between individual liberty and State domination: between concentration of ownership in the hands of the State and the extension of a property-owning democracy; between a policy of increasing restraint and a policy of liberating energy and ingenuity: between a policy of levelling down and a policy of finding opportunities for all to rise upwards from a basic standard. - Winston Churchill, speech in Woodford, England, January 28, 1950.

Life is a test and this world a place of trial. Always the problems - or it may be the same problem - will be presented to every generation in different forms. - Winston Churchill.

Life is a whole, and good and ill must be accepted together. - Winston Churchill.

What is the use of living, if it be not to strive for noble causes and to make a muddled world a better place for those who will live in it after we are gone? How else can we put ourselves in harmonious relation with the great verities and consolations of the infinite and the eternal? And I avow my faith that we are marching towards better days. Humanity will not be cast down. We are going on — swinging bravely forward along the grand high road — and already behind the distant mountains is the promise of the sun. - Winston Churchill, speech, Kinnaird Hall, Dundee, October 10, 1908.

It is a very strange thing to reflect that but for the invention of Professor Haber the Germans could not have continued the war after their original stock of nitrates was exhausted. The invention of this single man has enabled them, utilizing the interval in which their accumulations were used up, not only to maintain an almost unlimited supply of explosives for all purposes, but to provide amply for the needs of agriculture in chemical manures. It is a remarkable fact, and it shows on what obscure and accidental incidents the fortunes possibly of the whole world may turn in these days of scientific discovery. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, April 25, 1918.

Let nothing go from the battle that you need for victory. I will not accept denial of this from any quarter, and will back you to the full. - Winston Churchill, in a message to Lord Mountbatten, May, 1944.

I have heard, as everyone has of late years, a great deal of condemnation of the treaties of peace, of the treaties of Versailles and of Trianon. I believe that the denunciation has been very much exaggerated, and in its effect harmful. These treaties, at any rate, were founded upon the strongest principle alive in the world today, the principle of nationalism, or, as President Wilson called it, self-determination. The principle of self-determination or of nationalism was applied to all the defeated powers over the whole area of middle and eastern Europe. Europe today corresponds to its ethnological groupings as it has never corresponded before. You may think that nationalism has been excessively manifested in modern times. That may well be so. It may well be that it has a dangerous side, but we must not fail to recognize that it is the strongest force now at work. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, March 23, 1933.

How truly it has been said that nations and people very often fall by the very means which they have used, and built their hopes upon, for their rising-up. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, July 2, 1942.

Indeed, the more we force ourselves to picture the hideous course of a modern naval engagement, the more one is inclined to believe that it will resemble the contest between Manulius and Herminius at the battle of Lake Regillus, or the still more homely conflict of the Kikenny cats. that is a very satisfactory reflection for the stronger naval power. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, March 18, 1912.

the offensive power of modern battleships is out of all propportion to their defensive power. Never was the disproportion so marked. If you want to make a true picture in your mind of a battle between great modern ironclad ships you must not think of it as if it were two men in armour striking at each other with heavy swords, It is more like a battle between two egg-shells striking each other with hammers. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, March 17, 1914.

We always beieved before the war that battleships couls never be laid down without our knowledge. The Germans were entitled to build 10,000-ton ships according to the Treaty, but they, by a concealment which the Admiralty were utterly unable to penetrate, converted these into 26,000-ton ships. Let us be careful when we see these extremely awkward incidents occurring. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, July 22, 1935.

I am horrified to learn that the Admiralty propose to scrap the five 15-inch battleshipps of the Royal Sovereign class, one in 1942, one in 1943 and the rest, I suppose, in the following year. The House would hardly gather from the euphemistic phrase the Parliamentary Secretary employed — “replacement” — that these two ships are to be destroyed. That does not tell us what one would expect, that until the new ships are in commission the old ones wil be kept in reserve. In other days I used to say that when the ace is out the king is the best card. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, November 17, 1938.

I have always thought that the union of these two great forces [the #British and American navies], not for purposes of aggression or narrow selfish interests, but in an honourable cause, constitutes what I may call the sheet-anchor of human freedom and progress. - Winston Churchill, speech, Corn Exchange, Cambridge, May 19, 1939.

Moralists may find it a melancholy thought that peace can find no nobler foundations than mutual [nuclear] terror. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, March 5, 1952.

The decision to use the atomic bomb was taken by President Truman and myself at Potsdam, and we approved the military plans to unchain the dread, pent-up forces....
The Bomb brought peace, but men alone can keep that peace, and henceforward they will keep it under penalties which threaten the survival, not only of civilization but of humanity itself. I may say that I am in entire agreement with the president that the secrets of the atomic bomb should so far as possible not be imparted at the present time to any other country in the world. This is in no design or wish for arbitrary power, but for the common safety of the world. Nothing can stop the progress of research and experiment in every country, but although research wil no doubt proceed in many places, the construction of the immense plants necessary to transform theory into action cannot be improvised in any country. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, August 16, 1945.

This revelation of the secrets of nature, long mercifully withheld from man, should arouse the most solemn reflections in the mind and conscience of every human being capable of comprehension. We must indeed pray that these awful agencies will be made to conduce to peace among the nations, and that instead of wreaking measureless havoc upon the entire globe, may become a perennial fountain of world prosperity. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, August 16, 1945.

It is arguable whether the human race have been gainers by the march of science beyond the steam engine. Electricity opens a field of infinite conveniences to ever greater numbers, but they may well have to pay dearly for them. But anyhow in my thought I stop short of the internal combustion engine which has made the world so much smaller. Still more must we fear the consequences of entrusting to a human race so little different from their predecessors of the so-called barbarous ages such awful agencies as the atomic bomb. give me the horse. - Winston Churchill, speech, Royal College of Physicians, July 10, 1951.

In my experience... officers with high athletic qualifications are not usually successful in the higher ranks. - Winston Churchill.

It is curious that, while in the days of my youth I was much reproached with inconsistency and being changeable, I am now scolded for adhering to the same views I had early in life and even of repeating passages from speeches which I made long before most of you were born. Of course the world moves on and we dwell in a constantly changing climate of opinion. But the broad principles and truths of wise and sane political actions do not necessarily alter with the changing moods of a democratic electorate. Not everything changes. Two and two still make four, and I could give you many other instances which go to prove that all wisdom is not new wisdom. - Winston Churchill, speech, Bele vue, Manchester, December 6, 1947.

With opportunities comes responsibility. Strength is granted to us all when we are needed to serve great causes. - Winston Churchill, speech, New York, March 15, 1946.

When you embark on a course of restriction or oppressioin, caution and hesitancy should rightly impose themselves upon you; but when you are embarked upon a course of relief and liberation, advance with courage. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, June 7, 1928.

We must be on our guard equally against pessimism and against optimism. There are, no doubt, temptations to optimism. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, July 29, 1941.

I have always been against the pacifists during the war, and against the jingoists at the end. - Winston Churchill.

France, though armed to the teeth, is pacifist to the core. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. December 23, 1932.

When I hear extreme pacifists denouncing this act of the League of Nations I am left wondering what foundations these gentlemen offer to countries for abandoning national armaments. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. May 2, 1935.

Let us therefore brace ourselves that, if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say: "This was their finest hour." - Winston Churchill, speech. June 18, 1940.

When I am abroad I always make it a rule never to criticize or attack the Government of my own country. I make up for lost time when I come home. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. April 18, 1947.

I admire men who stand up for their country in defeat, even though I am on the other side. - Winston Churchill, The Gathering Storm, 1948.

When war is itself fenced about with mutual extermination, it seems likely that it will be increasingly postponed. - Winston Churchill.

We are the trustee's for the peace of the world. If we fail there will be perhaps a hundred years of chaos. If we are strong we can carry out our trusteeship. - Winston Churchill, at the Teheran conference.

In war, resolution; in defeat, defiance; in victory, magnanimity; in peace, goodwill. - Winston Churchill.

If the dangers of war and tyranny are removed, there is no doubt that science and co-operation can bring in the next few years to the world, certainly in the next few decades newly taught in the sharpening school of war, an expansion of material well-being beyond anything that has yet occurred in human experience. - Winston Churchill.

Putting the preservation of peace in the first place, what is the next great object that we must have in view? It is to secure our national freedom of choice to remain outside a European war, if one should break out. That I put as the more direct and more practical issue, subordinate to, but not less important than, the preservation of peace. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. March 8, 1934.

Moralists may find it a melancholy thought that peace can find no nobler foundations than mutual [nuclear] terror. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, March 5, 1952.

If I stay on for the time being, bearing the burden of my age, it is not because of love for power of office. I have had an ample feast of both. If I stay, it is because I have the feeling that I may, through things that have happened, have an influence on what I care about above all else — the building of a sure and lasting peace. - Winston Churchill, Margate. October 10, 1953.

Patience and perserverance must never be grudged when the peace of the world is at stake. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. February 25, 1954.

It is not Parliament that should rule; it is the people who should rule through Parliament. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. November 11, 1947.

No doubt at the beginning we shall have to suffer, because of having too long wished to lead a peaceful life. Our reluctance to fight was mocked at as cowardice. Our desire to see an unarmed world was proclaimed as the proof of our decay. Now we have begun. Now we are going on. Now, with the help of God, and with the conviction that we are the defenders of civilization and freedom, we are going to persevere to the end. - Winston Churchill, speech, London.

If by any chance unexpected good tidings came to us, that would be a matter which we could rejoice at, but we must not count upon. We count upon our strong right arms, upon our honest, hard-working hearts; we count upon our courage, which has not been found wanting either in domestic or foreign stresses during the whole course of the war. These are the simple virtues which our island race has cultured and nurtured during many generations, and these are the virtues which will bear us through all struggles and in which we must put our faith.- Winston Churchill, speech, London. November 29, 1942.

This is just the moment not to slacken. All the races which the calendar holds, or nearly all of them, are won in the last lap; and it is then, when it is most hard, when one is most tired, when the sense of boredom seems to weigh upon one, when... the end seems to recede before us — like climbing a hill when there is another peak beyond — it is at that very moment that we in this Island have have to give that extra sense of exertion, of boundless, inexhaustable, dynamic energy that we have shown.... Tirelessness is what we have to show now. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, November 29, 1944.

I suppose we are all in this House admirers of the Party system of government, but do not think that we should any of us carry our admiration of that system so far as to say that the nation is unfit to enjoy the privilege of managing its own affairs unless it can find someone to quarrel with and plenty of things to quarrel about. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. December 17, 1906.

Much might be said for and against the two-party system. But no one can doubt that it adds to the stability and cohesion of the State. The alternation of Parties in power, like the rotation of crops, has beneficial results. Each of the two Parties has services to render in the development of the national life; and the succession of new and different points of view is a real benefit to the country. - Winston Churchill, Imperial Conference, Downing Street, London. May 7, 1907.

Party government is an outstanding feature of our political systems of all branches of the English-speaking race all over the world. I know of no equal force which assumes the stability of democratic institutions. I know of no other method by which the enfranchised millions can be continuously attracted to practical things. I know of no other method by which small intrigues, small combinations and petty personal rivalries can be prevented from swaying unevenly the course of public affairs. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. March 31, 1910.

The spectacle of a number of middle-aged gentlemen who are my political opponents being in a state of uproar and fury is really quite exhilarating to me. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. May 21, 1952.

When one is in office one has no idea how damnable things can feel to the ordinary rank and file of the public. - Sir Winston Churchill.

Office at any price was his [A.J. Balfour’s] motto, at the sacrifice of any friend or colleague, at the sacrifice of any principle, by the adoption of any manuever, however miserable or contemptible. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. April 5, 1905.

In my experience and interior knowledge of the working of governments which extends over nearly a quarter century, I cannot recall any time when the gap between the kind of words statemen used and what was actually happening in the countries was as great as it is now. The habit of saying smooth things and uttering pious platitudes and sentiments to gain applause, without relation to the underlying facts, is more pronounced now than it has ever been in my experience. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. November 23, 1932.

I owe advancement entirely to the House of Commons, whose servant I am. In my country, as in yours, public men are proud to be the servants of the State and would be ashamed to be its masters. On any day, if they thought the people wanted it, the House of Commons could by a simple vote remove me from my office. But I am not worrying about it at all. - Winston Churchill, speech, to U.S. congress. December 26, 1941.

It is a deplorable thing that, when persons are engaged in acute political controversey, they sometimes allow their language to be rather the means of giving relief to their feelings than an actual description of the facts. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. March 23, 1908.

Politics is not a game. It is an earnest business. - Winston Churchill, National Liberal Club, London. October 9, 1909.

Criticism in the body politic is like pain in the human body. It is not pleasant, but where would the body be without it? No health or sensibility would be possible without continued correctives and warnings of pain. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. January 27, 1840.

It is hard enough to understand the politics of one’s own country; it is almost impossible to understand those of foreign countries. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. February 22, 1944.

It would be a great reform in politics if wisdom could be made to spread as easily and as rapidly as folly. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. August 16, 1947.

The finest combination in the world is power and mercy. The worst combination in the world is weakness and strife. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. March 3, 1919.

No government has ever combined so passionate a lust for power with such incurable impotence in its exercise. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. November 11, 1947.

A prisoner of war is a man who tries to kill you and fails, and then asks you not to kill him. - Winston Churchill.

There were about five acres of officers and two hundred acres of other ranks. - Message sent by the Coldstream Bn., when asked the number of Italians they had captured. History of WWII, BY Winston Churchill.

The vital prcesses of civilization require, and the combined interests of millions guarantee, the security of property. A society in which property was insecure would speedily degenerate into barbarism; a society in which property was absolutely secure, irrespective of all conceptions of justice in regard to the manner of its acquisition, would degenerate, not into barbarism, but death. - Winston Churchill, speech in Abernethy. July 7, 1909.

The best way to make private property secure and respected is to bring the processes by which it is gained into harmony with the general interests of the public. When and where property is associated with the idea of reward for services rendered, with the idea of recompense for high gifts and special aptitudes displayed or for faithful labor done, then property will be honored. When it is associated with processes which are beneficial, or which at the worst are not actually injurious to the commonwealth, then property will be unmolested; but when it is associated with ideas of wrong and of unfairness, with processes of restriction and monopoly, and other forms of injury to the community, then I think that you will find that property will be assailed and will be endangered. - Winston Churchill, speech in Edinburgh. July 17, 1909.

It is a good thing for an uneducated man to read books of quotations. - Winston Churchill, My Early Life, 1930.

I have always noticed that whenever a radical takes to Imperialism he catches it in a very acute form. - Winston Churchill.

Germany is already well on her way to become, and must become, incomparably the most heavily armed nation in the world and the nation most completely ready for war. There is the dominant factor; there is the factor which dwarfs all others, and affects the movements of politics and diplomacy in every country throughout Europe; and it is a melancholy reflection in the last hours of this Parliament that we have been the helpless, perhaps even the supine, spectators of this vast transformation, to the acute distress of Europe and to our own grievous disadvantage. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, October 24, 1935.

Wars do not always wait until all the combatants are ready. sometimes they come before they are ready, sometimes when one nation thinks itself less unready than another, or when one nation thinks it is likely to become not stronger, but weaker, as time passes. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, March 10, 1936.

Let it be very clearly understood that all direction emanating from me are made in writing, or should be immediately afterwards confirmed in writing, and that I do not accept any responsibility for matters relating to National Defense on which I am alleged to have given decisions unless they are recorded in writing. - Churchill, July, 1940.

It is better to be both right and consistent. But if you have to choose — you must choose to be right. - Winston Churchill, Scarborough, October 11, 1952.

We have a very daring and skillful opponent against us, and, may I say across the havoc of war, a great general. - Winston Churchill.

Here we have a state whose subjects are so happy that they have to be forbidden to quit its bounds under the direct penalties; whose diplomatists and agents sent on foreign missions have often to leave their wives and children at home as hostages to ensure their eventual return. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, July 29, 1919.

Lenin was sent into Russia by the Germans in the Same way that you might send a phial containing a culture of typhoid or cholera to be poured into the water supply of a great city, and it worked with amazing accuracy. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, July 29, 1919.

In Russia a man is called a reactionary if he objects to having his property stolen and his wife and children murderd. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, November 5, 1919.

I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma; but perhaps there is a key. That key is Russian national interest. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, April 14, 1937.

They [the Russians] will bang and rattle on every window until they find one open, then they will invite themselves to dinner. - Winston Churchill.

From what I have seen of our Russian friends and allies during the war, I am convinced that there is nothing they admire so much as strength, and there is nothing for which they have less respect than for weakness, especially military weakness. For that reason the old doctrine of a balance of power is unsound. We cannot afford, if we can help it, to work on narrow margins, offering temptations to a trial of strength. - Winston Churchill, speech at Westminster College, March 5, 1946.

We have to combat the wolf of socialism, and we shall be able to do it far more effectively as a pack of hounds than as a flock of sheep. - Winston Churchill, speech, 1937.

Athough it is now put forward in the main by people who have a good grounding in the Liberalism and Radicalism of the early part of this century, there can be no doubt that Socialism is inseparably interwoven with Totalitarianism and the abject worship of the State. It is not alone that property, in all its forms, is struck at, but that liberty, in all its forms, is challenged by the fundamental conceptions of Socialism. - Winston Churchill, B.B.C radio address, June 4, 1945.

The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent vice of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, October 22, 1945.

When the Socialist Government, in their clumsy arrogance, imposed upon us wartime controls for five more long years, they had not got a majority of the electorate behind them. Together with the Liberals and Independents who voted, we represented a larger tota of votes against the five years' restricition than those who voted for it. The Socialists have no majority in the nation; even with al the adventitious aid they got at the last election, they are a minority. They have a right to govern and administer the country but they have no right to ride rough-shod oer the majority of their fellow countrymen. - Winston Churchill, Friends House, London, November 28, 1945.

The German U-boats intheir worst endeavor never made bread rationing necessary in war. It took a Sociaist Government and Sociaist planners to fasten it on us in time of peace when the seas are open and the world harests good. At no time in the two world wars have our people had so little bread, meat, butter, cheese and fruit to eat. - Winston Churchill, Conservative Party Conference, Blackpool, October 5, 1946.

Socialism is the philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy. - Winston Churchill, Perth, May 28, 1948.

I do not wonder that British youth is in revolt against the morbid doctrine that nothing matters but the equal sharing of miseries: that what used to be called the submerged tenth can only be rescued by bringing the other nine-tenths down to their level; against the folly that it is better that everyone should have half rations rather than that any by their exertions, or ability, should earn a second helping. - Winston Churchill, London, June 22, 1948.

Socialism is based on the idea of an all-powerful State which owns everything, which plans everything, which distributes everything, and thus through its politicians and officials decides the daily life of the individual citizen. - Winston Churchill, London, January 21, 1950.

I am very sorry that we have had to debar so many miners from going in the armed forces. I respect their feelings, but we cannot afford it; we cannot allow it. Besides the need for their services is in the pits, there is danger in the pits too, and where there is danger there is honour. "Act well thy part, there all the honor lies, " and that is the motto I want to give out to all those who in an infinite variety of ways are playing an equaly worthy part in the consummation of our high purpose. - Winston Churchill, speech, Westminster Central Hall, London. October 31, 1942.

Let me have the best solutions worked out. Don't argue the matter. The difficulties will argue for themselves. - Winston Churchill.

Of course, neither of the two Spanish sides can afford to say that it would tolerate the idea of a settlement. They are fighting for life; they are desperate men, and all their lives are at stake. They dare not show the slightest sign of weakness, but they have their seconds, they have their friends in these great powers who are in close touch with them. Is it not time when this horrible duel might for the moment be considered by the seconds and not necessarily only by the principal parties, and when the seconds could decide, as they often did in private duels, that honour is satisfied, or if you like to put it more truthfully, that dishonour is gorged? - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. April 14, 1937.

One always has to be very careful about speeches one makes in other peoples countries. - Winston Churchill.

Better that people should wonder why you said nothing than why you said what you did. - Winston Churchill.

He [Lord Chares Beresford, M.P.] is one of those orators of whom it was well said, "Before they get up, they do not know what they are going to say; when they are speaking, they do not know what they are saying; and, when they sit down, they do not know what they have said." - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. December 20, 1912.

I would turn aside for a moment to emphasize how perfect is the co-operation between the commanders of the British and American Armies. Nothing like it has ever been seen before among allies. No doubt language is a great help, but there is more in it than that. In all previous alliances the staffs have worked with opposite numbers in each department and liason officers, but in Africa General Eisenhower built up a uniform staff, in which every place was filled with whoever was thought to be the best man, and they all ordered each other about according to their rank, without the slightest regard to what country they belonged to. The same unity and brotherhood is being instituted here throughout the Forces which are gathering in this country, and I cannot doubt that it will be found most serviceable, and unique also in all the history of alliances. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. February 22, 1944.

In war, if you are not able to beat your enemy at his own game, it is nearly always better to adopt some striking variant, and not to be content merely with doing the same thing as your enemy is doing, only not doing it quite so well or on quite so large a scale. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. May 12, 1916.

It often happens in war that an operation which is successful on a small scale becomes vicious if it is multiplied by three, four or five times. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, May 8, 1940.

Military operations must be judged by the success which attends them rather than by the sentiments which inspired them, though these, too, may play their part in the verdict of history and in the survival of races. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. May 7, 1941.

The term “unconditional surrender” does not mean that the German people will be enslaved or destroyed. It means, however, that the allies will not be bound to them at the moment of surrender by any pact or obligation. There will be, for instance, no question of the Atlantic Charter applying to Germany as a matter of right and barring territorial transferences or adjustments in enemy countries. No such arguments will be admitted by us as were used by Germany after the last war, saying that they surrendered in consequence of President Wilson’s fourteen points. Unconditional surrender means that the victors have a free hand. It does not mean that they are entitled to behave in a barbarous manner, nor that they wish to blot out Germany from among the nations of Europe. If we are bound, we are bound by our own consciences to civilization. We are not to be bound to the Germans as the result of a bargain struck. - Winston Churchill.

Control over taxation and revenues of the state has always been the foundation on which Parliamentary Government has rested, and indeed there is no other foundation upon which it can rest. Once the state acquires sources of revenue independent of Parliament, then the power of Parliamnent to curb and check maladministration is seriously diminished. - Winston Churchill, Usher Hall, Edinburgh. May 18, 1950.

Germany is ruled by a handful of autocrats who are the absolute masters of that gifted nation. They are men who have neither the long interests of a dynasty to consider, nor those very important restraints which a democratic Parliament and constitutional system impose upon any executive government. Nor have they the restraint of public opinion, which public opinion, indeed, they control by every means which modern apparatus renders possible. They are men who owe their power to, and are, indeed, the expression of the bitterness of defeat, and of the resolved and giant strength of that mighty German Empire. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. March 8, 1934.

No one has been a more consistent opponent of Communism than I have for the last twenty-five years. But all this fades away before the spectacle which is now unfolding. We shall give whatever help we can to Russia and the Russian people. - Winston Churchill.

Man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of the time he will pick himself up and continue on. - Winston Churchill.

A river of blood has flowed between the German race and the peoples of nearly all Europe. It is not the hot blood of battle, where good blows are given and returned. It is the cold blood of the execution yard and the scaffold, which leaves a stain indelible for generations and for centuries. - Winston Churchill, speech, Mansion House, London. November 10, 1941.

The British and Americans do not war with races or governments as such. Tyranny, external or internal, is our foe whatever trappings and disguises it wears, whatever language it speaks, or perverts. - Winston Churchill, Speech, Dorchester Hotel, London, July 4, 1953.

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.

Once you are so unfortunate as to be drawn into a war, no price is too great to pay for an early and victorious peace. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, May 12, 1901.

I ask you to witness, Mr. Speaker, that I have never promised anything or offered anything but blood, tears, toil and sweat, to which I will now add our fair share of mistakes, shortcommings and disappointments, and also that this may go on for a very long time, at the end of which I firmly believe — though it is not a promise or gaurantee, only a profession of faith — that there will be complete, absolute and final victory. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, May 7, 1941.

There is danger in wishful that victory will come by internal collapse of the Axis. Victory depends on force of arms. I stand pat on a knockout, but any windfalls in the way of internal collapse will be gratefully accepted. - Winston Churchill, speech, Washington, D.C., May 25, 1943.

Great wars come when both sides believe they are more or less equal, when each thinks it has a good chance of victory. - Winston Churchill, speech, New York. October 14, 1947.

I have the strong view that voting should be compulsory as it is in Australia and in Holland and that there should be a small fine for people who do not choose to exercise their civic duty. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, June 23, 1948.

We must not forget what votes are. Votes are the means by which the poorest people in the country, can make sure that they get their vital needs attended to. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, November 6, 1950.

In war, Resolution; in defeat, Defiance; in victory, Magnanimity. - Winston Churchill.

When you are winning a war almost everything that happens can be claimed to be right and wise. - Winston Churchill.

War is a game with a good deal of chance in it, and, from the little I have seen of it, I should say that nothing in war ever goes right except occasionally by accident. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. March 12, 1901.

A European war can end only in the ruin of the vanquished and the scarcely less fatal commercial dislocation and exhaustion of the conquerors. Democracy is more vindictive than cabinets. The wars of peoples will be more terrible than those of kings. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. May 12, 1901.

Once you are so unfortunate as to be drawn into a war, no price is too great to pay for an early and victorious peace. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. May 12, 1901.

The utility of war even to the victor may in most cases be an illusion. Certainly all wars of every kind will be destitute of any positive advantage to the British Empire, but war itself, if it ever comes, will not be an illusion — even a single bullet will be found rea enough. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. May 12, 1901.

It is the same in politics as it is in war. When one crest has been left, it is necessary to go to the next. To halt half-way in the valley between is to court swift and certain destruction. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. April 5, 1906.

We cannot go on treating the war as if it were an emergency which can be met by makeshifts. It is, until it is ended, the one vast, all-embracing industry of the nation, and it is until it is ended the sole aim and purpose of all our lives. Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. August 22, 1916.

This nation at war is an army; it must be looked upon as an army; it must be organized like an army; it must be directed like an army; and it ought to be rationed and provided and supplied like an army. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. September 16, 1916.

Wars do not always wait until all the combatants are ready. Sometimes they come before they are ready, sometimes when one nation thinks itself less unready than another, or when one nation thinks it is likely to become not stronger, but weaker, as time passes. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. March 10, 1936.

When Herr Geobbels' Nazi propaganda blares and blethers upon the ether that Britaiin and France have lost the capacity to make war if it is forced upon them, we do not get angry because we know it is not true. We know that our sufferings will be very hard and we are determined not to be guilty of bringing about a crash, the consequences of which no man can measure. We know also that we could only throw ourselves into such a struggle if our consciences were clear. - Winston Churchill, City Carlton Club, London. June 28, 1939.

There is bound to be both extravagance and waste in time of war. In our country, accustomed to strict Parliamentary supervision, this waste arises very rarely from fraud or corruption. it arises sometimes from inefficiency, and is capable of correction. It arises most of all, I think, from excessive zeal in preparing against dangers which often change, and sometimes fade as soon as they are faced; and still more from the well-intentioned desire of every branch and section to reach a 100 percent standard of safety, which, of course, is never attainable in war. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. February 27, 1940.

There is only one thing certain about war, that it is full of disapointments and also full of mistakes. - Winston Churchill, speech, London. April 27, 1941.

The two gaunt marauders--war and tyranny.... - Winston Churchill, speech, Westminster College. March 5, 1946.

The Nuremburg trials are over, and the guilty leaders of the Nazi regime have been hanged by the conquerers. We are told that thousands yet remain to be tried, and that vast categories of Germans are classed as potentially guity becasue of their association with the Nazi regime. After all, in a country which is handled as Germany was, the ordinary people have very little choice about what to do. I think some consideration should always be given to ordinary people. Everyone is not Pastor Niemoller or a martyr, and when ordinary people are hurled this way and that, when the cruel hands of tyrants are laid upon them and vile systems of regimentation are imposed and enforced by espionage and other forms of cruelty, there are great numbers of people who will succumb. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. November 12, 1946.

Great wars come when both sides believe they are more or less equal, when each thinks it has a good chance of victory. - Winston Churchill, speech, New York. October 14, 1947.

Little did we guess that what has been called "The Century of the Common Man" would witness as its outstanding feature more common men killing each other with greater facilities than any other five centuries put together in the history of the world. - Winston Churchill, speech, Boston, Massachusettes. March 31, 1949.

The penalties have grown to an extent undreamed of; and at the same time, many of the old incentives which were the cause of the beginning of so many wars, or features in their beginning, have lost their significance. The desire for glory, booty, territory, dynastic or national aggrandizement; hopes of a speedy and splendid victory with all its excitement — and they are temptations from which even those who only fight for righteous causes are not always exempt — are now superceded by a preliminary stage of measureless agony from which neither side could at present protect itself. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. March 5, 1952.

It is very easy for rich people to preach the virtues of self-reliance to the poor, It is also very foolish, because, as a matter of fact, the wealthy, so far from being self-reliant, are dependent on the constant attention of scores, and sometimes even hundreds, of persons who are employed in waiting upon them and ministering to their wants. - Winston Churchill, speech, Norwich. July 26, 1909.

You may try to destroy wealth, and find that all you have done is to increase poverty. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. March 12, 1947.

Rich men, although valuable to the revenue, are not vital to a healthy state of society, but a society in which rich men are got rid of, from motives of jealousy, is not a healthy state. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, April 24, 1950.

Confusion will be caused if we start calling the Sherman tank the "M-3", as the best class of German tank is similarly named. The following names in particular are to be taken into universal and permanent use: Sherman, Grant, Lee, Stuart. It is not necessary to add the prefix "general," as this only causes confusion with live generals. - Winston Churchill.

The whole business of war is beyond al words horrible, and the nations are filled with the deepest loathing of it, but if wars are going to take place, it is byno means certain that the introduction of chemical warfare is bound to make them more horrible than they have been. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. May 13, 1932.

Those who win a war can rarely make a good peace and those who could make a good peace would never have won the war. - Winston Churchill.

All wisdom is not new wisdom. - Winston Churchill, speech, Bele vue, Manchester, December 6, 1947.

During the war [1914-1918] we repeatedly asked ourselves the question: How are we going to win? and no one was able to answer it with much precision, until at the end, quite suddenly, quite unexpectedly, our terrible foe collapsed before us, and we were so glutted with victory that in our folly we threw it away. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. June 18, 1940.

In the last war [1914-1918] millions of men fought by hurling enormous masses of steel at one another. "Men and shells" was the cry, and prodigious slaughter was the consequence. In this war nothing of this kind has yet appeared. It is a conflict of strategy, of organization, of technical apparatus, of science, mechanics and morale. The British casualties in the first 12 months of the Great War amounted to 365,000. In this war, I am thankful to say, British killed, wounded, prisoners and missing, including civilians, do not exceed 92,000 , and of these a large proportion are alive as prisoners of war. Looking more widely around, one may say that throughout Europe for one man killed or wounded in the first year perhaps five were killed or wounded in 1914-1915. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. August 20, 1940.

As soldiers we looked naively on the British inclination to complicate the war with political foresight and non-military objectives. - General Omar Bradley.

There was never a war more easy to prevent than that which has wrecked what was left of the world from the previous struggle. - Winston Churchill.

Any man or state who fights against Nazidom will have our aid. Any man or state who marches with Hitler is our foe.... The Russian Danger is therefore our danger. - Winston Churchill.

It was well understood by everyone that Berlin, Prague, and Vienna could be taken by whoever got there first. - Winston Churchill.

Now the demand is that Germany should be allowed to rearm. Do not delude yourselves. Do not let His Majesty's Government believe — I am sure they do not believe — that all that Germany is asking for is equal status. I believe the refined term now is equal qualitative status, or, as an alternative, equal quantitative status by indefinitely deferred stages. That is not what Germany is seeking. All these bands of sturdy Teutonic youths, marching through the streets and roads of Germany, with the light of desire in their eyes to suffer for their Fatherland, when they have the weapons, believe me they will then ask for the return of lost territories and lost colonies, and when that demand is made it cannot fail to shake and possiby shatter to their foundations every one of the countries I have mentioned, and some other countries I have not mentioned. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, November 23, 1932.

It is extremely dangerous for people to tak lightly about German rearmament and say that, if the Germans choose to do it, no one can stop them. I am very doubtful if Germany would rearm in defiance of the Treaty if there were a solidarity of European and world opinion that the Treaty could only be altered by discussion, and could not be altered by a violent one-sided breach. I, therefore, do not subscribe to the doctrine that we should throw up our hands and recognize the fact that Germany is going to be armed up to an equality with the neighbouring states in any period which we can immediately foresee. There may be other periods, but certainly we ought not to admit it at the moment. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, March 23, 1933.

I bear no grudge; I have no prejudice against the German people. I have many German friends, and I have a lively admiration for their splendid qualities of intellect and valour and for their achievements in science and art. The re-entry into the European circle of a Germany at peace with itself, with a heart devoid of hate, would be the most precious benefit for which we could strive, and a supreme advantage which alone would liberate europe from its peril and its fear, and I believe that the British and French democracies would go a long way in extending the hand of friendship to realize such a hope. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, May 31, 1935.

What is the real problem, the real peril? it is not reoccupation of the Rhineland, but this enormous process of the rearmament of Germany. There is the peril. Mr. lansbury says that in the Election I seemed to haunted by this thought. i confess that I have been occupied with this idea of the great wheels revolving and the great hammers descending day and night in Germany, making the whole of its population into one disciplined war machine. There is the problem that lies before you. There is what is bringing war nearer. This rhineland episode is but a step, a stage, an incident in this process. There is fear in every country, all round. Even here, in this island, with some protection from distance, there is fear, deep fear. What is the fear and what is the question which arises from that fear? It is, “How are we going to stop this war which seems to be moving towards us in so many ways.” - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, March 26, 1936.

Germany is now fortifying the Rhine zone, or is about to fortify it. No doubt it will take some time. We are told that in the first instance only field entrrenchments will be erected, but those who know to what perfection the Germans can carry field entrenchments like the Hindenburg Line, with all the masses of concrete and the underground chambers included — those who remember that will realize that field entrenchments differ only in degree from permanent fortifications, and work steadily up from the first cutting of the sods to their final and perfect form. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, April 6, 1936.

However we may differ in political opinion, however divergent our Party interests, however diverse our callings and stations, we have this in common. We mean to defend our Island from tyranny and aggression, and so far as we can, we mean to hold out a helping hand to others who may be in an even more immediate danger than at this moment we are ourselves. - Winston Churchill, speech, Free Trade Hall, Manchester. May 9, 1938.

They [Hitler and Mussolini] cannot pursue their course of aggression without bringing about a general war of measureless devastation. To submit to their encroachments would be to condemn a large portion of mankind to their rule; to resist, either in peace or war, will be dangerous, painful and hard. There is no use at this stage in concealing these blunt facts from anyone. No one should go forward in this business without realizing plainly both what the cost may be, and what are the issues at stake. - Winston Churchill, speech, Corn Exchange, Cambridge, May 19, 1939.

Field-Marshall Goering — who is one of the few Germans who has been having a pretty good time for the last few years — says that we have been spared so far because Nazi Germany is so humane. They cannot bear to do anything to hurt anybody. All they ask is to be let alone to conquer and kill the weak. Their humanity forbids them to apply severities to the strong. It may be true: but when we remember the bestial atrocities they have committed in Poland, we do not feel we wish to ask for any favours to be shown us. We shall do our duty as long as we have life and strength. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, November 8, 1939.

Only Finland — superb, nay sublime — in the jaws of peril — Finland shows what free men can do. The service rendered by Finland to mankind is magnificent. They have exposed, for all the world to see, the military incapacity of the Red Army and of the Red Air Force. Many illusions about Soviet Russia have been dispelled in these few fierce weeks of fighting in the Arctic Circle. - Winston Churchill, speech, London. January 20, 1940.

Come then: let us to the task, to the battle, to the toil — each to our part, each to our station. Fill the armies, rule the air, pour out the munitions, strangle the U-boats, sweep the mines, plough the land, build the ships, guard the streets, succour the wounded, uplift the downcast and honour the brave. Let us go forward together in all parts of the Empire, in all parts of the Island. There is not a week, nor a day, nor an hour to lose. - Winston Churchill, speech, Free Trade Hall, Manchester. January 27, 1940.

More than a million German soldiers, including all their active divisions and armoured divisions, are drawn up ready for the attack, at a few hours notice, all along the frontiers of Luxembourg, of Belgium and of Holland. At any moment these nuetral countries may be subjected to an avalanche of steel and fire; and the decision rests in the hands of a haunted, morbid being, who, to their eternal shame, the German peoples in their bewilderment have worshipped as a god. - Winston Churchill, speech, London. March 30, 1940.

While we will not prophesy or boast about battles still to be fought, we feel ourselves ready to encounter the utmost malice of the enemy and to devote all our life strength to achieve the victory in what is a world cause. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, April 11, 1940.

What General Weygand called the battle of France is over. I Expect that the battle of Britain is about to begin. Upon this battle depends the survival of Christian civilization. Upon it depends our own British life, and long continuity of our institutions and our Empire. The whole fury and might of the enemy must very soon be turned on us. Hitler knows that he will have to break us in this island or lose the war. If we can stand up to him, all Europe may stand free and the life of the world may move forward into broad, sunlit uplands. But if we fail, then the whole world, including the United State, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age made more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of perverted science. Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties, and so bear ourselves that, if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will say, “This was their finest hour.” - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, June 18, 1940.

When you have a friend and comrade at whose side you have faced tremendous struggles, and your friend is smitten down by a stunning blow, it may be necessary to make sure that the weapon that has fallen from his hands shall not be added to the resources of your common enemy. But you need not bear malice because of your friend's cries of delirium and gestures of agony. You must not add to his pain; you must work for his recovery. The association of interest between Britain and France remains. The Cause remains. Duty inescapable remains. - Winston Churchill, speech concerning the disposition of the French fleet, House of Commons. June 25, 1940.

There is another more obvious difference from 1914. The whole of the warring nations are engaged, not only the soldiers, but the entire population, men, women and children. The fronts are everywhere. The trenches are dug in towns and streets. Every village is fortified. Every road is barred. The front line runs through factories. The workmen are soldiers with different weapons but the same courage. These are great and distinctive changes from what many of us saw in the struggle of a quarter of a century ago. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons. August 20, 1940.

No one can say how far Herr Hitler’s empire will extend before this war is over, but I have no doubt that it wil pass away as swiftly as, and perhaps more swiftly than, did Napoleon’s empire, although, of course, without any of its glitter or its glory. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, September 5, 1940.

Little does he [Hitler] know the spirit of the British nation, or the tough fibre of the Londoners, whose forebears played a leading part in the establishment of Parliamentary institutions and who have been bred to value freedom far above their lives. This wicked man, the repository and embodiment of many forms of soul-destroying hatred, this monstrous product of former wrongs and shame, has now resolved to try to break our famous island race by a process of indiscriminat slaughter and destruction. What he has done is to kindle a fire in British hearts, here and all over the world, which will glow long after all traces of the conflagration he has caused in London have been removed. He has lighted a fire which will burn with a steady and consumming flame until the last vestiges of Nazi tyranny have been burnt out of Europe, and until the Old world — and the New — can join hands to rebuild the temples of man’s freedom and man’s honour, upon foundations which will not soon or easily be overthrown.- Winston Churchill, speech, London, September 11, 1940.

The President and Congress of the United States, having newly fortified themselves by contact with their electors, have solemnly pledged their aid to Britain in this war because they deem our cause just, and because they know their own interests and safety would be endangered if we were destroyed. They are taxing themselves heavily. They have passed great legislation. They have turned a large part of their gigantic industry to making munitions which we need. They have even given us or lent us valuable weapons of their own. - Winston Churchill, speech, London, April 27, 1941.

A wonderful story is unfolding before our eyes. How it will end we are not allowed to know. but on both sides of the Atlantic we all feel, I repeat, all, that we are a part of it, that our future and that of many generations is at stake. We are sure that the character of human society will be shaped by the resolves we take and the deeds we do. We need not bewail the fact that we have been called upon to face such solemn responsibilities. We may be proud, and even rejoice amid our tribulations, that we have been born at this cardinal time for so great an age and so splendid an opportunity of service here below. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, June 10, 1941.

The Russian armies and all the peoples of the Russian Republic have rallied to the defense of their hearths and homes. For the first time Nazi blood has flowed in a fearful torrent. Certainly a million-and-a-half, perhaps two millions, of Nazi cannon-fodder have bit the dust of the endless plains of Russia. The tremendous battle rages along nearly two thousand miles of front. The Russians fight with magnificent devotion; not only that, our generals who have visited the Russian front line report with admiration the efficiency of their military organization and the excellence of their equipment. The aggressor is surprised, startled, staggered. For the first time in his experience mass murder has become unprofitable. He retaliates by the most frightful cruelties. As his armies advance, whole districts are being exterminated. Scores of thousands — literally scores of thousands — of executions in cold blood are being perpetrated by the German police-troops upon the Russian patriots who defend their native soil. Since the Mongol invasions of Europe in the sixteenth century, there has never been methodical, merciless butchery on such a scale or approachning such a scale. And this is but the beginning. Famine and pestilence have yet to follow in the bloody ruts of Hiter’s tanks. We are in the presence of a crime without name. - Winston Churchill, speech, London, August, 1941.

We know that for many years past the policy of Japan has been dominated by secret societies of subalterns and junior officers of the army and navy, who have enforced their will upon successive Japanese Cabinets and Parliaments by the assassination of any Japanese statesman who opposed, or who did not sufficiently further, their aggressive policy. It may be that these societies, dazzled and dizzy with their own schemes of aggression and the prospect of early victories, have forced their country against its better judgement into war. They have certainly embarked upon a very considerable undertaking. - Winston Churchill, speech, U.S. Congress, Washington D.C., December 26, 1941.

It is difficult to make the Russians comprehend all the problems of the sea and of the ocean. We are sea animals, and the United States are to a large extent ocean animals. The Russians are land animals. Happily, we are all three air animals. it is difficult to explain fully all the different characteristics of the war effort of various countries, but I am sure that we made their leaders feel confidence in our loyal and sincere resolve to come to their aid as quickly as possible and in the most effective manner, without regard to the losses or sacrifices involved so long as the contribution was towards victory. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, September 8, 1942.

All the great countries in this war [WWII] count their armies by millions, but the Indian army has a peculiar characteristic not found in the armies of Britain or the United States or Russia or France or in the armies of our foes, in that it is entirely composed of voluteers. No one has been conscripted or compelled. The same thing is broadly true throughout our great colonial empire. - Winston Churchill, speech, Guildhall, London. June 30, 1943.

When Herr Hitler escaped his bomb on July 20th he described his survival as providential; I think that from a purely military point of view we can all agree with him, for certainly it would be most unfortunate if the allies were deprived, in the closing phases of the struggle, of that form of warlike genius by which Corporal Schickelgruber has so notably contributed to our victory....
He has lost, or will lose when the tally is complete, nearly a million men in France and the Low Countries. Other large armies may well be cut off in the Baltic States, in Finland and in Norway. Less than a year ago, when the relative weakness of Germany was already becoming apparant, he was ordering further aggressive action in the Aegean, and the re-occupation of the islands which the Italians had surrendered, or wished to surrender. He has scattered and squandered a very large army in the Balkan Peninsula, whose escape will be very difficult; 27 divisions, many of them battered, are fighting General Alexander in Northern Italy. Many of these will not be able to recross the Alps to defend the German Fatherland. Such a vast frittering-away and dispersal of forces has never been seen, and is, of course, a prime cause of the impending ruin of Germany. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, February 22, 1944.

The fate of Italy is indeed terrible, and I personally find it very difficult to nourish animosity against the Italian people. The overwhelming mass of the nation rejoiced in the idea of being delivered from the subtle tyranny of the Fascists, and they wished, when Mussolini was overthrown, to take their place as speedily as possible byb the side of the British and American armies who, it was expected, would quickly rid the country of the Germans. - Winston Churchill, speech, House of Commons, May 24, 1944.

Japan, with all her treachery and greed, remains unsubdued. The injury she has inflicted... and her detestable cruelties call for justice and retribution... - Winston Churchill, speech, London, May 8, 1945.

There never was a war in all history easier to prevent by timely action than the one which has just desolated such great areas of the globe. It could have been prevented in my belief without firing a single shot, and Germany might be powerful, prosperous and honored today, but no one would listen and one by one we were all sucked into the awful whirlpool. - Winston Churchill, speech, Westminster College. March 5, 1946.

I wrote my name at the top of the page. I wrote down the number of the question "1". After much reflection I put a bracket round it thus "(1)". But thereafter I could not think of anything connected with it that was either relevent or true. - Winston Churchill, My Early Life, 1930.

France, though armed to the teeth, is pacifist to the core. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. December 23, 1932.

It is still true today> The third largest nuclear power in the world, and look at them...

To: psyops; Colorado Tanker; Libertina; pissed off janitor; happygrl;Dennisw;sjackson;Proudeagle...

To: betty boop;scan58;Libertina;Musket;Dengar01;Vigilant1;Salvation; geezerette;grlfrnd;section9...

France, though armed to the teeth, is pacifist to the core. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. December 23, 1932.

It is still true today. The third largest nuclear power in the world, and look at them...

PING!

It is still true today?

A continuous stomping upon by the Germans has been known to have that effect.

Churchill on Clement Atlee after he deafeated Churchill in 1945. "A modest man with much to be modest about".

I suppose that could describe a lot of our mediocrities that have ruled this nation such as Carter and Klinton.

A well-spring of wisdom...

"To be fond of learning is near to wisdom." - Confucius, Analects. c.400 BC.

I can stake no claim on wisdom, but I am fond of learning.

such as Carter and Klinton.

One far too modest, and one not at all.

A somewhat decent biography of Churchill for all them young Freepers born after the Reagan age and victims of our decrepit education system.
http://www.britannia.com/gov/primes/prime47.html

France, though armed to the teeth, is pacifist to the core. - Winston Churchill, House of Commons. December 23, 1932.

Very, very true. It is remarkable how true Churchill's observations remain in our times.

If that is a roundabout way of expressing the established FACT that X42 has NO redeeming qualities at all...

Well...

Nothing round about it at all. The man would have dropped his pants in a presidential debate if he thought it would win him the election. I think the only reason he didn't is becasue he was aware of how much he would suffer once everyone saw he had such a teenie... well you know what I mean.

Welcome back! Missed you! &;-)

Churchill is one of my faves! Check your FRmail.

The American eagle sits on his perch, a large, strong bird with formidable beak and claws. There he sits motionless, and ~~M. Gromyko~~ Saddam Hussein is sent day after day to prod him with a sharp pointed stick — now his neck, now under his wings, now his tail feathers. All the time the eagle keeps quite still. But it would be a great mistake to suppose that nothing is going on inside the breast of the eagle.

Thanks for all your great work!

Churchill is one of my faves!

Can't quote the great ones and leave Churchill out of the mix!

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.