When envoys are sent with compliments in their mouths, it is a sign that the enemy wishes for a truce.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Negotiation in the classic diplomatic sense assumes parties more anxious to agree than to disagree.
Diplomacy in a sense is the opposite of writing. You have to disperse yourself so much: the lady who comes in crying because she's had a fight with the secretary; exports and imports; students in trouble; thumbtacks for the embassy.
History is filled with tragic examples of wars that result from diplomatic impasse. Whether in our local communities or in international relations, the skillful use of our communicative capacities to negotiate and resolve differences is the first evidence of human wisdom.
Negotiating in the classic diplomatic sense assumes parties more anxious to agree than to disagree.
When they are preparing for war, those who rule by force speak most copiously about peace until they have completed the mobilization process.
Diplomats are just as essential to starting a war as soldiers are for finishing it... You take diplomacy out of war, and the thing would fall flat in a week.
The idea that if people are just friendly and demonstrate they want peace, that will be answered with good will - that is really naive.
An enemy generally says and believes what he wishes.
Abatement in the hostility of one's enemies must never be thought to signify they have been won over. It only means that one has ceased to constitute a threat.
We are not diplomats but prophets, and our message is not a compromise but an ultimatum.