Peace?' said Vetinari. 'Ah, yes, defined as period of time to allow for preparation for the next war.

Do you think it's possible for an entire nation to be insane?

Historians have pointed out that it is in times of plenty that people feel like going to war. In times of famine they're simply trying to find enough to eat. When they've just enough to go round they tend to be polite. But when a banquet is spread before them, it's time to argue over the place settings.

And now I demand that you do what the ignorant might feel is the easier thing. You must refrain from dying in battle. Revenge is not redress. Revenge is a wheel, and it turns backwards. The dead are not your masters.

Revenge is not redress. Revenge is a wheel, and it turns backwards.

Afterward, there was that long, crowded pause in which everyone decides that although they are very shaken, and possibly upside down, they are, to their surprise, still alive.

It was so much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. If it was Them, then nothing was anyone's fault. If it was us, what did that make Me? After all, I'm one of Us. I must be. I've certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We're always one of Us. It's Them that do the bad things.

It is always useful to face an enemy who is prepared to die for his country," he read. "This means that both you and he have exactly the same aim in mind.

It is a long-cherished tradition among a certain type of military thinker that huge casualties are the main thing. If they are on the other side then this is a valuable bonus.