Verified Quotes
Every quote on this page is verified against the named source work.
Carl von Clausewitz, Prussian soldier and theorist who watched elegant strategies die on contact with reality and built a, gets quoted everywhere and sourced almost nowhere. The 7 quotes below are different: each one is checked word for word against the cited work, starting with On War, not copied from aggregator sites that pass misattributions along. The source is named under every line, so you can trace each quote back to the page it came from.
Read Carl von Clausewitz's full profile and how they reason →7 verified quotes
On escalating a workplace conflict:
War is merely the continuation of politics by other means.Carl von Clausewitz, On War
On when confrontation is justified:
War is an act of force to compel our enemy to do our will.Carl von Clausewitz, On War
On why basic execution is the hardest part of a plan:
Everything in war is very simple, but the simplest thing is difficult.Carl von Clausewitz, On War
On starting a high-stakes negotiation:
No one starts a war, or rather, no one in his senses ought to do so, without first being clear in his mind what he intends to achieve by that war and how he intends to conduct it.Carl von Clausewitz, On War
On deciding without full information:
Three-quarters of the factors on which action in war is based are wrapped in a fog of a greater or lesser uncertainty.Carl von Clausewitz, On War
On accepting a setback is not the end:
In war the result is never final.Carl von Clausewitz, On War
On where to focus limited resources:
The best strategy is always to be very strong, first in general, then at the decisive point.Carl von Clausewitz, On War