War is the unfolding of miscalculations.
Interpretation
War often results from a series of errors in judgment and decision-making.
This quote by Barbara Tuchman suggests that war does not arise spontaneously or merely from conflict, but is instead the product of a chain of miscalculations made by leaders and nations. These miscalculations can encompass poor strategic decisions, misunderstandings, and failures to foresee consequences, highlighting the complexity and the tragic nature of human conflict.
In practice
Using this quote during a history lecture on World War I to illustrate the complexities of historical decisions.
In a country where misery and want were the foundation of the social structure, famine was periodic, death from starvation common, disease pervasive, thievery normal, and graft and corruption taken for granted, the elimination of these conditions in Communist China is so striking that negative aspects of the new rule fade in relative importance.
When every autumn people said it could not last through the winter, and when every spring there was still no end in sight, only the hope that out of it all some good would accrue to mankind kept men and nations fighting. When at last it was over, the war had many diverse results and one dominant one transcending all others: disillusion.
One constant among the elements of 1914—as of any era—was the disposition of everyone on all sides not to prepare for the harder alternative, not to act upon what they suspected to be true.
Nothing is more satisfying than to write a good sentence. It is no fun to write lumpishly, dully, in prose the reader must plod through like wet sand. But it is a pleasure to achieve, if one can, a clear running prose that is simple yet full of surprises. This does not just happen. It requires skill, hard work, a good ear, and continued practice.
The unrecorded past is none other than our old friend, the tree in the primeval forest which fell without being heard
Theology being the work of males, original sin was traced to the female.
If you find life absurd, shouldn’t you find death precisely meaningful?
I am Envy...I cannot read and therefore wish all books burned.
All personality traits have their good side and their bad side. But for a long time, we've seen introversion only through its negative side and extroversion mostly through its positive side.
I am not like a pebble on the beach - a grain of sand on the seashore or just one of millions of human beings past, present and future. No, I am a unique human being loved by God as if I were an only child - the only fruit of his creative powers.
All things are inconstant except the faith in the soul, which changes all things and fills their inconstancy with light.
(M)aybe we too busy being flowers or fairies or strawberries instead of something honest and worthy of respect . . . you know . . . like being people.
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