174 Quotes by Sebastian Junger

...much of modern military tactics is geared toward maneuvering the enemy into a position where they can essentially be massacred from safety. (pg. 140)

The army consists of the first infantry division and eight million replacements.

Given the profound alienation of modern society, when combat vets say that they miss the war, they might be having an entirely healthy response to life back home. Iroquois warriors did not have to struggle with that sort of alienation because warfare and society existed in such close proximity that there was effectively no transition from one to the other.

The problem with fear, though, is that it isn’t any one thing. Fear has a whole taxonomy—anxiety, dread, panic, foreboding—and you could be braced for one form and completely fall apart facing another.

Combat isn't where you might die -- though that does happen -- it's where you find out whether you get to keep on living. Don't underestimate the power of that revelation. Don't underestimate the things young men will wager in order to play that game one more time.

He'd been generous, yes, but lots of people are generous; what made him different was the fact that he'd taken responsibility for me.

Modern society has perfected the art of making people not feel necessary.

To make matters worse, politicians occasionally accuse rivals of deliberately trying to harm their own country—a charge so destructive to group unity that most past societies would probably have just punished it as a form of treason.

Today's veterans often come home to find that, although they're willing to die for their country, they're not sure how to live for it.