Top 139 Quotes & Sayings by Tom Clancy - Page 3

I'm a spy. It's not really... I worked for the CIA 15 years. The cover was I worked for the insurance business.

If you don't write the book, the book ain't gonna get written.

I think it's going to be remembered as the last major war on planet Earth, if we're lucky, if we maintain our foreign policy properly. It will be remembered as the last time major countries had to put people in the field and put them in harm's way. It may be the last of all human nature wars, which is a nice way to remember any kind of a war, as the last one.

Most things in here don't react well to bullets.

It is a principle of diplomacy that one must know something of the truth in order to lie convincingly.

Wars are begun by frightened men. They fear war, but more than that, they fear what will happen if they don't start one or take equivalent action, I suppose.

I'd rather talk to people who do things than complain about other people who do things. I say they're idiots.

Two questions form the foundation of all novels: "What if?" and "What next?" (A third question, "What now?", is one the author asks himself every 10 minutes or so; but it's more a cry than a question.) Every novel begins with the speculative question, What if "X" happened? That's how you start.

If a hero must have an unmarked grave, it should at least be close to where his comrades fell." "Comrades?" "One way or another we all fight for the things we believe in. Doesn't that give us some common ground?

For over two weeks, the defenders of Wake Island held off a vastly superior force of Japanese ships and troops, inspiring the whole nation with their plucky spirit and sacrifice. Unfortunately, Navy leaders at Pearl Harbor, struggling to protect what was left of the shattered Pacific Fleet, canceled a relief mission, allowing the island and its defenders to fall without support. Wake damaged the long-standing trust between the Corps and the Navy, a memory that still rankles Marines and shames sailors.

There is a long and honorable tradition of citizens in service to their nation that goes back at least as far as Cincinnatus, the Roman citizen who, more than once answered his country's call, then returned to his farm and his family and his work.

Civilians listened to officers, which said a lot about the intelligence of civilians.

Sunday was the normal day for the political awareness session at sea. Ordinarily Putin would have officiated, reading some Pravada editorials, followed by selected quotations from the works of Lenin and a discussion of the lessons to be learned from the readings. It is very much like a church service.

Surviving is much more painful than death.

What do I know about sex? I’m a married man.

The first rumors about Zenith came from the Czechoslovakians.

I write strictly for fun... as long as it stays fun I'll continue to do it.

People, I am actually fairly smart. Why has this not occurred to anyone? The information is all out there, if you go looking for it, and the classified stuff just comes from analyzing the unclassified stuff and connecting the dots.

All field agents have some cowboy in them – even the ones from New York.