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Some people are more terrorist than others
John Keegan / Historian
People
Terrorist
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Some people are more terrorist than others.
John Keegan / Historian
Terrorist
People More Others
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Even a pacifist should admire the military virtues.
John Keegan / Historian
Military
Pacifist
Should
Virtue
Virtues
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Nobody should teach anywhere for 25 years, but I did.
John Keegan / Historian
Should
Teach
Years
Anywhere
Nobody
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Good men who exercise power are really the most fascinating of all people.
John Keegan / Historian
Men
Exercise
Fascinating
People
Good Men Power
All People
Power Good Men
Good Men
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I can't visualize the situation in which we nuke ourselves into extinction.
John Keegan / Historian
Extinction
Nukes
Situation
Visualize
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A civilised man is someone who has discovered something more satisfying than combat.
John Keegan / Historian
Men
Combat
Satisfying
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There are certain wicked people in the world that you can't deal with except by force
John Keegan / Historian
People
Wicked
World
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There are certain wicked people in the world that you can't deal with except by force.
John Keegan / Historian
Certain
Force
Wicked
Deal
Except
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Well, if they are trying to kill you, on the whole they're the people you have to kill, aren't they?
John Keegan / Historian
People
Trying
Wells
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If Wellington epitomizes the English gentleman, Eisenhower epitomizes the natural American gentleman.
John Keegan / Historian
Gentleman
Hair
Natural
Wellington
Eisenhower
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The great men of power who seek to change the nations they belong to usually are pretty terrible people.
John Keegan / Historian
Men
Great Men
Nations
People
Terrible
Belong
Change Power Men
Seek
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I don't think that what's going on in Bosnia is political activity. It's partly political, but it's partly atavistic as well.
John Keegan / Historian
Activity
Bosnia
Political
Thinking
Partly
Political Activity
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I think to be shot in a mountain valley somewhere or other is altogether less glorious than crashing an airliner into a skyscraper.
John Keegan / Historian
Glorious
Hiking
Mountain
Skyscraper
Thinking
Altogether
Somewhere
Shot
Crashing
Valley
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I think Americans like the practical; they like the human. And I like both those things myself, and I try and put them into my books.
John Keegan / Historian
Book
Thinking
Trying
Practical
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Men killing other men really is an extraordinary phenomenon. Why does it happen? And how long has it gone on? And have the motives changed?
John Keegan / Historian
Men
Extraordinary
Killing Others
Long
Phenomenon
Motives
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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.
John Keegan / Historian
Quality
Compromise
Diplomats
Politician
Terrible
Trouble
Uncompromising
Diplomat
Politicians
Necessary
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I don't look to find an educated person in the ranks of university graduates, necessarily. Some of the most educated people I know have never been near a university.
John Keegan / Historian
Funny
Graduation
Inspirational
Educated
Graduates
People
University
Look People Find
Educated People
Near
Ranks
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The revival of Islam dates from the early years of the 20th century. It was brought about by their humiliation, by their sense of how low they'd fallen compared with the West.
John Keegan / Historian
Century
Fallen
Humiliation
Islam
Revival
West
Years
Brought
Compared
Dates
Early
Early Years
Low
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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.
John Keegan / Historian
Black
Maelstrom
Outside World
Scary
Thinking
Tribes
Africa
Extremely
Needing
Outside
Terrifying
Warring
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The historian ought to be an educated person, writing for other educated people about something which they don't know about, but wish to know about in a way that they can understand.
John Keegan / Historian
History
People
Writing
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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.
John Keegan / Historian
Men
Battle
Chinese
Clever
Delayed
Fighting
Violence
Great Always Man
Achieves
Great Man Better
Great Better Man
Classics
Fought
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Soldiers, when committed to a task, can't compromise. It's unrelenting devotion to the standards of duty and courage, absolute loyalty to others, not letting the task go until it's been done.
John Keegan / Historian
Courage
Loyalty
Veterans Day
Committed
Compromise
Devotion
Done
Duty
Letting Go
Soldier
Standards
Tasks
Unrelenting
Go
Been
Letting
Soldiers
Task
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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.
John Keegan / Historian
Independence
War
Struggle
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Hitler ... lacked the [inclination] for anything more than the occasional sensational display of emotion, in particular the great set-piece speech which mesmerized the mob and left him drained of ... energy.
John Keegan / Historian
Energy
Pieces
Speech
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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.
John Keegan / Historian
Funny
Religion
Bothered
Century
East
Half
Islam
Middle
Middle East
People
Poor
Pure
Nobody
Beliefs
Depressed
Held
System
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The leader of men in warfare can show himself to his followers only through a mask, a mask that he must make for himself, but a mask made in such form as will mark him to men of his time and place as the leader they want and need.
John Keegan / Historian
Men
Followers
Leader
Mark
Mask
Warfare
Time Men Will
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Visually Agincourt is a pre-Raphaelite, perhaps better a Medici Gallery print battle - a composition of strong verticals and horizontals and a conflict of rich dark reds and Lincoln greens against fishscale greys and arctic blues.
John Keegan / Historian
Battle
Dark
Strong
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It's commonly said that people who've been ill in childhood and who've had an upset education never really regret that they do. It means that you don't look at the world in the way that other people do, and if you were inclined to be a writer, that's a help.
John Keegan / Historian
Childhood
Ill
Mean
People
Regret
Upset
Commonly
Inclined
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Slavery in the modern world implies the absolute deprivation of the individual's liberty, while possession of weapons and mastery of their use are means to the individual's liberation. We do not perceive how a man may be armed and at the same time bereft of his freedom.
John Keegan / Historian
Men
Liberty
Mean
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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.
John Keegan / Historian
Ocean
War
Civilization
Heart
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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.
John Keegan / Historian
Baby
Children
Thinking
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Of whatever class or nation, however, all successful participants in the repetitive and unrelenting stress of aerial fighting came eventually to display its characteristic physiognomy: skeletal hands, sharpened noses, tight-drawn cheek bones, the bared teeth of a rictus smile and the fixed, narrowed gaze of men in a state of controlled fear.
John Keegan / Historian
Fighting
Stress
Successful
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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?
John Keegan / Historian
Government
School
Sea
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