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“In a conflict doesn't win who has more weapons but who knows best use for them”
― Michelangelo Saez, Zori 2ª Parte

“An Army wife is probably the only woman in the world who
knows and readily accepts that she is the mistress, because, let’s
face it, the Army is the wife and the wife gets all the damn
attention!”
― Aditi Mathur Kumar, Soldier and Spice - An Army Wife's Life

“The FRG â€� was the closest thing any of them had to family, this simulacrum of friendship, women suddenly thrown together in a time of duress, with no one to depend on but each other, all of them bereft and left behind in this dry expanse of central Texas, walled in by strip malls, chain restaurants, and highways that led to better places. Most of them had gotten used to making life for themselves without a husband, finding doctors and dentists and playgrounds, filling their cell phones with numbers and their calendars with playdates, and then the husbands would return and the Army would toss them all at some other base in the middle of nowhere to begin again.”
― Siobhan Fallon, You Know When the Men Are Gone

“I stepped forward as commanded, wondering which of the many rules I had broken now.”
― Georg Rauch, An Unlikely Warrior: A Jewish Soldier in Hitler's Army

“Trees talk if you care to listen. I know that now but back then, I had only heard the old oak tree outside my window back home. I’d heard it breathe. Yes, breathe. On the cold nights when I sat up prepping for my exams, when the rest of the world fell into a deep slumber, I heard the Old Oak: a bit eerie, like an old man, its breathing, laboured and arrhythmic.
I wasn’t hallucinating; Picking up my stopwatch, I checked if there was a pattern and there was one. A clear and loud inhalation and exhalation, almost human-like. I wondered if the Old Oak was trying to communicate with me. Tell me its story?”
― Nidhie Sharma, INVICTUS

“El ejército inculcó el sentimiento de la responsabilidad absoluta y fomentó también el espíritu de decisión. Contrariamente a lo que ocurría en la vida corriente, saturada de codicia y de materialismo, el ejército educó al pueblo hacia el ideal y hacia la devoción por la patria y por su grandeza. El ejército fue una escuela de educación del pueblo, unido frente a la división de clases y quizá su único defecto fue el de haber instituido el sistema del servicio voluntario de un año; defecto decimos, porque debido a ese sistema se dañaba el principio de la igualdad absoluta, colocando al individuo de mayor preparación intelectual fuera del marco común, lo contrario de lo cual es lo que precisamente habría sido lo provechoso. Ante la carencia del sentido real de la vida que dominaba en nuestras clases elevadas y su alejamiento de su mismo pueblo, habría sido el ejército precisamente el único capaz de influir benéficamente, evitando, por lo menos dentro de sus filas, todo aislamiento de la clase llamada intelectual”
― Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf

“Fake it till you make it, he reminds himself. This is how he’s survived Army life so far.”
― Ben Fountain, Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk

“Somehow whether or not the war is winnable is beyond our scope, an irrelevant detail. We don’t do it to win anymore; we do it because it’s what we know how to do. Get ready to go. Get ready to come back. And the moments in between we mark on the calendar. It’s our battle rhythm.”
― Angela Ricketts, No Man's War: Irreverent Confessions of an Infantry Wife

“[…] Bravo can laugh and feel somewhat superior because they know they’re being used. Of course they do, manipulation is their air and element, for what is a soldier’s job but to be the pawn of higher?”
― Ben Fountain, Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk

“Leading your Soldiers with the safety on as a condition of your own personal complacency is no different than running into battle with your firearm on safe yelling BANG BANG BANG!!! An Army leaders unlimited source of ammo are the Army Values and the Warrior Ethos.”
― Donavan Nelson Butler, Master Sergeant US Army

“War, on the other hand, was the result of failure; failure of diplomacy, failure of intelligence, failure to prepare, failure to act decisively when appropriate action became apparent, failure to call a bluff and failure to prevent open conflict which resulted in the decimation of a generation of high-principled young men and women.”
― Col Don Wilson

“A good platoon sergeant, in the lieutenant’s mind, ought act like Kato on 'The Green Hornet' and not a disapproving uncle with a taste for the strap.”
― Miles Watson, Sinner's Cross

“Army Brat: an acronym for Born, raised and transferred. Brats, irreverent, sometimes more reckless than courageous and unabashedly basking in the reflected glory and adoration our fathers deservedly received. But mostly we were gypsies--agile quick-witted and tough bunch of youngsters growing up in a world that barricaded the rest of the universe out and kept us cocooned within ours.
The brats moved every two years across the country, from one cantonment to another, inadvertently learning to adapt and engage faster than their 'civilian' counterparts changed their iphones.
Resilience was a byproduct of this lifestyle.
Our wings were our roots. And those wings had brought my father to Tawang, a sensitive military base near out border with China.”
― Nidhie Sharma, INVICTUS

“Anyway, the MI-17 made for one hell of a ride. It
was a monstrous chopper, more like an armoured tank in
the sky. Th e insides had a few metal seats on either side.
First-come-fi rst-served, you sat wherever you found space.
The mothers took the seats and the brats sat on the cold metal floor, among camouflage-green nets, wooden boxes and miscellaneous military cargo.
As the chopper rose, I peered at my
father waving from the small helipad made by plateauing a
mountain top with the Army’s engineering expertise. Some
moments stay with you forever. Th is particular one has
stood the test of time.
As we fl ew off to the safest military base, I stuck my nose
against the tiny window and kept waving back till my father became an olive-hued speck on the concrete helipad.”
― Nidhie Sharma, INVICTUS

“The other gem was Tawang’s gift to us: A tiny purebred
Apso, whom we called Mickey. A beautiful ball of white fur, a hopping rabbit, with heart-melting puppy eyes hidden behind shaggy Apso hair, perfect in all ways, well almost. Except Mickey farted. Farts so potent and loud, it was hard to believe a pintsized
dog was capable of generating such toxic fumes. Strangely, he saved his best ones for the weekly ladies� get-together at home. ‘Your dog is dangerous,� one of the ladies said laughingly to my mother. ‘This fellow will break wind and run off and we’ll be left wondering which one of us did it.� The modus operandi
was simple. He would come hopping into the living room for tasty treats and while the ladies were fawning over him, Mickey broke wind. There was a hushed silence as the fumes spread quickly, and the ladies silently wondered which one of them was the uncouth culprit. It took them a few visits to figure this
out, by which time Mickey the Fartonator had been confined to the veranda.
My poor mother was always at the receiving end courtesy our dogs and, well, me!”
― Nidhie Sharma, INVICTUS

“Bhalu looked like an unkempt, wild version of the most majestic dog I had ever laid eyes on â€� her name was Grace.
My Grace. A German shepherd, a monster puppy who grew up to be a lady. Forever remembered fondly (by me) for taking regular puppy-sized dumps in Neha’s slippers and shoes, for being the reason Neha and I would have to figure innovative ways to save ourselves and run for cover if she were in the
vicinity, for chewing up our toes like her life depended on it, for shredding curtains, socks, shoes and anything she could get a hold of with rare delight, for a bark so fierce yet feminine that people feared pressing the bell at our gates.”
― Nidhie Sharma, INVICTUS

“As we continued walking, the pebbles by the bank made a pleasant crunching sound under our feet. Their edges were polished to perfection by the continual friction of the water â€� revealing their innermost colours like polished diamonds.
A particular stone caught my attention. It was shining
among a sea of smooth grey ones. Picking it up, I gaped at it. This one was grey in colour like all the others except it had bands of iridescent blue running across its width. The
bands were the same magnifi cent hue of blue as the skies above. Did it break and fall from the skies and soak up the grey from its common companions? Was this some kind of fall from grace, because it really didn’t seem to belong where I found it.
I smiled at the treasure I had chanced upon and popped it in the bag on my shoulder. This was going back with me.
A forever memory of this day.”
― Nidhie Sharma, INVICTUS

“Neha’s walk across the river felt excruciatingly long. Like a rubber band stretched to its limits.
It is peculiar how moments of happiness and euphoria seem to pass over like greased lightning when compared to the ones filled with pain or anxiety. I often ask myself if happiness is genuinely fleeting or if we are hardwired to believe that human beings are born to suffer, and for that very reason tend to sadistically amplify and stretch our anxieties? Could our age old conditioning be in cahoots with Loki? Maybe, maybe not. I am still debating this, internally...”
― Nidhie Sharma, INVICTUS

“So, tell me, have you ever paused for a moment to contemplate the amount of blood spilt, the volume of tears shed, and the degree of pain endured by soldiers and their families?”
― Qamar Rafiq

“First, you find out that you can lie straight faced to get out of some forced march or run or something. Then, you find out that you can steal, as long as it's not from your own platoon. Finally, you end up like Jinji, wearing dead man's boots and not thinking too much about it."
Dead Man's Boots”
― Oren Shafir, Small Truths and Other Lies -ebook

“Ciena needed a superior officer she could respect. Someone who would take charge, someone in whom she could put her trust.”
― Claudia Gray, Lost Stars

“There were so many times during my career when, after leaning of another fatality, I’d hear the words: ‘And he only had a couple of days left tilâ€� leaveâ€�”
― Jason Fox, Battle Scars