# Quote — Max Brooks, World War Z

> Sure, we were unprepared, our tools, our training, everything I just talked about, all one class-A, gold-standard clusterfuck, but the weapon that really failed wasn’t something that rolled off an assembly line. It’s as old as…I don’t know, I guess as old as war. It’s fear, dude, just fear and you don’t have to be Sun freakin Tzu to know that real fighting isn’t about killing or even hurting the other guy, it’s about scaring him enough to call it a day... “Shock and Awe”? Perfect name, “Shock and Awe”! But what if the enemy can’t be shocked and awed? Not just won’t, but biologically can’t! That’s what happened that day outside New York City, that’s the failure that almost lost us the whole damn war. The fact that we couldn’t shock and awe Zack boomeranged right back in our faces and actually allowed Zack to shock and awe us! They’re not afraid! No matter what we do, no matter how many we kill, they will never, ever be afraid!

- Author: [Max Brooks](https://www.leafyquotes.com/max-brooks.md)
- Book: [World War Z](https://www.leafyquotes.com/max-brooks/world-war-z.md)
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/World_War_Z#Part_III:_The_Great_Panic) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/max-brooks/world-war-z/sure-we-were

## More from this book

> We were in Hammond, Indiana, scouting defenses for the siege of Chicago. He spied a house at the end of a deserted street, completely intact except for boarded up windows and a crashed-in front door. He got a look on his face, a grin. We should have known way before he dropped out of formation, before we heard the shot. He was sitting in the living room, in this worn, old easy chair, SIR between his knees, that smile still on his face. I looked up at the pictures on the mantlepiece. It was his home.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/max-brooks/world-war-z/we-were-in-hammond.md)

> For the first time in history, we faced an enemy that was actively waging total war. They had no limits of endurance. They would never negotiate, never surrender. They would fight until the very end because, unlike us, every single one of them, every second of every day, was devoted to consuming all life on Earth. That's the kind of enemy we had waiting for us beyond the Rockies. That's the kind of war we had to fight.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/max-brooks/world-war-z/for-the-first.md)

> The Hospital.. that was our shining moment... the Hospital. [...] An advance team broke through without realizing what was on the other side. They could have withdrawn, blown the tunnel, sealed them in again... One squad against three hundred zombies. One squad led by my baby brother. His voice was the last thing we heard before their radio went silent. His last words: "On ne passe pas!"

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/max-brooks/world-war-z/the-hospital-that.md)