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Ferdinand Foch quotes
The most powerful weapon on earth is the human soul on fire.
Ferdinand Foch
My centre is giving way, my right is retreating, excellent situation, I am attacking.
Ferdinand Foch
The will to conquer is the first condition of victory.
Ferdinand Foch
There is but one means to extenuate the effects of enemy fire: it is to develop a more violent fire oneself.
Ferdinand Foch
Every manoeuvre must be the development of a scheme; it must aim at a goal.
Ferdinand Foch
The truth is, no study is possible on the battle-field; one does there simply what one can in order to apply what one knows . Therefore, in order to do even a little, one has already to know a great deal and to know it well.
Ferdinand Foch
In war there are none but particular cases; everything has there an individual nature; nothing ever repeats itself. In the first place, the data of a military problem are but seldom certain; they are never final . Everything is in a constant state of change and reshaping.
Ferdinand Foch
In tactics, action is the governing rule of war.
Ferdinand Foch
Far from being a sum of distinct and partial results, victory is the consequence of efforts, some of which are victorious while others appear to be fruitless, which nevertheless all aim at a common goal, all drive at a common result: namely, at a decision, a conclusion which alone can provide victory.
Ferdinand Foch
The distribution of troops devoted to the defence of a place includes a garrison, an occupying force, numerically as weak as possible; a reserve as strong as possible, designed for counterattacking and for providing itself, at the moment it goes into action, with a security service which will guard it from any possible surprise.
Ferdinand Foch
None but a coward dares to boast that he has never known fear.
Ferdinand Foch
This absence of similarity among military questions naturally brings out the inability of memory to solve them; also the sterility of invariable forms, such as figures, geometrical drawings (épures), plans (schémas), etc. One only right solution imposes itself : namely, the application, varying according to circumstances, of fixed principles.
Ferdinand Foch
One does simply what one can in order to apply what one knows.
Ferdinand Foch
This is not a peace. It is an armistice for 20 years.
Ferdinand Foch
The unknown is the governing condition of war.
Ferdinand Foch
To inform, and, therefore to reconnoitre, this is the first and constant duty of the advanced guard.
Ferdinand Foch
A battle won is a battle which we will not acknowledge to be lost.
Ferdinand Foch
The power to command has never meant the power to remain mysterious.
Ferdinand Foch
Men called to the conduct of troops should prepare themselves to deal with cases more and more varied upon an ever-increasing horizon of experience. They can only be given the capacity to arrive at a prompt and judicious position by developing in them through study their power of analysis and of synthesis; that is, of conclusion in a purely objective sense, conclusion upon problems which have been actually lived and taken from real history. Thus also can they be founded through the conviction that comes from knowledge in a confidence sufficient to enable them to take such decisions upon the field of action.
Ferdinand Foch
When the moment arrives for taking decisions, facing responsibilities, entering upon sacrifices - decisions which ought to be taken before they are imposed, responsibilities which ought to be welcomed, for the initiative must be secured and the offensive launched - where should we find a man equal to these uncertain and dangerous tasks were it not among men of a superior stamp, men eager for responsibilities? He must indeed be a man who, being deeply imbued with a will to conquer, shall derive from that will (as well as from a clear perception of the only means that lead to victory) the strength to make an unwavering use of the most formidable rights, to approach with courage all difficulties and all sacrifices, to risk everything; even honour - for a beaten general is disgraced for ever.
Ferdinand Foch
What you did was the greatest thing accomplished by any private soldier of all of the armies of Europe.
Ferdinand Foch
An army is to a chief what a sword is to a soldier. It is only worth anything in so far as it receives from him a certain impulsion (direction and vigour).
Ferdinand Foch
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