He had tried to stop it, tried to bargain, from the beginning, but neither side wanted peace on anything except its own terms, and he had no real political power, and so had had to fight." - Meaning and context.">
QuotesCosmos
Chapter I (p. 443).
“

He had to give orders that meant men died, and sometimes sacrifice hundreds, thousands of them, knowingly sending them to their near-certain deaths, just to secure some important position or goal, or protect some vital position. And always, whether they liked it or not, the civilians suffered too; the very people they both claimed to be fighting for made up perhaps the bulk of the casualties in their bloody struggle.
He had tried to stop it, tried to bargain, from the beginning, but neither side wanted peace on anything except its own terms, and he had no real political power, and so had had to fight.

— Iain Banks

What It Means

This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "He had to give orders that meant men died, and sometimes sacrifice hundreds, thousands of them, knowingly sending them to their near-certain deaths, just to secure some important position or goal, or protect some vital position. And always, whether they liked it or not, the civilians suffered too; the very people they both claimed to be fighting for made up perhaps the bulk of the casualties in their bloody struggle.
He had tried to stop it, tried to bargain, from the beginning, but neither side wanted peace on anything except its own terms, and he had no real political power, and so had had to fight." in the context of "Chapter I (p. 443)." to mean that wisdom is timeless.

Source: Wikiquote: "Iain Banks" (Quotes, Culture series, Use of Weapons (1990): All page numbers from the trade paperback edition published by Orbit Books Note: there are two alternating sets of chapter numbering in this book. The first is indicated by English words, and counts up from One to Fourteen. The second is indicated by Roman numerals, and counts down from XIII to I. ) The 'What it means' explanation text was generated by Google Gemini Flash (accessed January 18, 2026). https://gemini.google.com/app

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#Iain Banks#position#tried#nearcertain#casualties#strugglehe#sometimes#sacrifice#thousands#knowingly#important#civilians
Iain Banks

About Iain Banks

Iain Menzies Banks (February 16, 1954 – June 9, 2013), officially Iain Banks, was a Scottish writer. As Iain M. Banks he wrote science fiction; as Iain Banks he wrote literary fiction.