John Keegan
John Keegan
Sir John Desmond Patrick Keegan OBE FRSLwas a British military historian, lecturer, writer and journalist. He was the author of many published works on the nature of combat between the 14th and 21st centuries concerning land, air, maritime, and intelligence warfare, as well as the psychology of battle...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionHistorian
Date of Birth15 May 1934
men people terrible
The great men of power who seek to change the nations they belong to usually are pretty terrible people.
clever fighting men
The great Chinese classics have always said that it's better not to fight; that the clever man achieves his ends without violence; that a battle delayed is better than a battle fought.
years should teach
Nobody should teach anywhere for 25 years, but I did.
school government sea
We forget today that Britain still depends for its livelihood and, indeed, its day-to-day survival, on the sea. But the Royal Navy is now pitifully small and has been reduced in size by the current Government, seeking economies to finance its social programmes. Fine while there is no threat to our security. But what use would schools and hospitals be if we could not protect our imports?
gentleman natural wellington
If Wellington epitomizes the English gentleman, Eisenhower epitomizes the natural American gentleman.
baby children thinking
We saw the children and the women with their babies and then I heard the poouff — the flame had broken through the thatched roof and there was a yellow- brown smoke column going up into the air. It didn't hit me all that much then, but when I think of it now — I slaughtered those people. I murdered them.
people trying wells
Well, if they are trying to kill you, on the whole they're the people you have to kill, aren't they?
people terrorist
Some people are more terrorist than others
people wicked world
There are certain wicked people in the world that you can't deal with except by force
quality diplomats compromise
It's a necessary quality of a diplomat or a politician that he will compromise. Uncompromising politicians or diplomats get you into the most terrible trouble.
war ocean heart
The Second World War is the largest single event in human history, fought across six of the world's seven continents and all it oceans. It killed 50 million human beings, left hundreds of millions of others wounded in mind or body and materially devastated much of the heartland of civilization.
thinking black world
I think that black Africa is extremely terrifying. Black Africa can become a maelstrom of warring tribes without the outside world needing to feel the need to do anything about it.
war struggle independence
The written history of the world is largely a history of warfare, because the states within which we live came into existence largely through conquest, civil strife, or struggles for independence.
people islam middle-east
The Islam of the 18th, 19th and first half of the 20th century was a poor thing. Nobody bothered about it. Islam was that funny sort of pure system of beliefs that depressed people in the Middle East held as their religion.