Anyone who has ever looked into the glazed eyes of a soldier dying on the battlefield will think hard before starting a war.

The line is a stark, experiential warning: abstract talk of strategy, honor, or national destiny collapses when confronted with the physical reality of a person dying. By focusing on the “glazed eyes” of a soldier, the quote insists that war’s true cost is borne in individual bodies, not in maps or speeches. Its implied moral test is proximity—those who have witnessed death at close range are less likely to romanticize or initiate conflict. Attributed to Bismarck, it also fits the broader image of hard-nosed statecraft tempered by caution about the unpredictable, irreversible consequences of war.