Nick Irving’s Reviews > The Tragedy of Patton: A Soldier's Date With Destiny: Could World War II's Greatest General Have Stopped the Cold War? > Status Update

With Patton, there was no middle ground. If he was your friend, he was the most loyal friend you would ever have. If he was your enemy, there was no hell deep enough to satiate his condemnation.

Patton's endearing traits, which might have been valued at the beginning of the war as fresh and innovative, were, by the end of the war, simply regarded as antagonistic, rebellious... even dangerous.

By 1945, the winds of war had shifted, and they were not blowing in Patton's favor. The qualities that made Patton the right man at the right time at the beginning of the war were now viewed as a hindrance at its conclusion.

"The more I see of the so-calles greats the less they impress me - I am better."

On and off the battlefield, Patton was a force to be reckoned with. Yet the very qualities that made Patton a successful battlefield general - unflinching nerve, audacity, and fearless candor - were the same characteristics that made him a nuisance when the fighting was over. The paradox, of course, is the tragic certainty of any antihero.

"Oh, what a tangled web we weave when we first practice to deceive."

"If you want an army to fight and risk death, you've got to get up there and lead it. An army is like spaghetti. You can't push a piece of spaghetti, you've got to pull it."

I feel like death but will survive -- I always have.

"I may have saved his soul if he had one."