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About this quote

What does it mean?
Nations fall when they stop willing to sacrifice their best people.
In plain terms
Losing the courage to sacrifice youth leads to national decline.
What can you take from it?
A nation needs courage to protect its future.

Where it applies

  • policy making
  • historical analysis
  • national security

Putting it to work

  • assess national risks
  • prepare for future threats

Questions to consider

  • What does a nation owe its people?
  • Is sacrifice necessary for survival?

Another view

Some sacrifices may not prevent decline.

More from Frederick Russell Burnham

  1. Under the administration of Rhodes, there were the fewest laws, the widest freedom, the least crime, and the turest justice, that I have ever seen in any part …

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  2. I am more afraid of an army of a hundred sheep led by a lion than an army of a hundred lions led by a sheep.

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  3. There is nothing that sharpens a man's senses so acutely as to know that bitter and determined enemies are in pursuit of him night and day.

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