Archive

"Welcome to hell" - message by Chechen fighters heard on Russian radios during the First Battle of Grosny moments before the 131st Separate Motor Rifle Brigade was wiped out.

"In many cases rent control appears to be the most efficient technique presently known to destroy a city - except for bombing," - Assar Lindbeck, economist on rent control, May 2019

"We were wrong, terribly wrong, and we owe it to future generations to explain why." - Robert McNamara, architect of the Vietnam war, 1995.

“They are having a revolution. We have to get my polo ponies out.” - Porfirio Rubirosa, Dominican, diplomat, playboy, suspected assassin and alleged rapist responding to the Cuban revolution.

"Boredom is always counter-revolutionary. Always." - Guy Debord, 1963, French radical, prankster and "national treasure"

"To those who do not know that the world is on fire, I have nothing to say," - Bertolt Brecht, German poet, director and political exile

"Education is a weapon whose effects depend on who holds it in his hands and at whom it is aimed," - Joseph Stalin, Soviet Dictator, Revolutionary, Bank Robber and Poet.

"That's not really a number I'm terribly interested in." - Colin Powell, responding to Iraqi civilian casualty numbers during the first Gulf War, New York Times, 23 March 1991.

"If he refuses to correct his behavior the easy way, then we’ll just have to do things the hard way. It’s as simple as that.” - Monte Melkonian, Armenian revolutionary, letter, 25 April 1988

"I behaved unethically, for ethical reasons.” - Adnan Khashoggi, Arms Dealer.