A war hawk, or simply hawk for short, is a term used in politics for someone favoring war in a debate over whether to go to war, or whether to continue or escalate an existing war. War hawks are the opposite of war doves. The terms are derived through analogy with the birds of the same name: hawks are predators which attack and feed on other animals, whereas doves mostly eat seeds and fruit, and are historically a symbol of peace.
Read more about War Hawk: Historical Group, Variations of The Term
Famous quotes containing the words war and/or hawk:
“The war is dreadful. It is the business of the artist to follow it home to the heart of the individual fighters—not to talk in armies and nations and numbers—but to track it home.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)
“He will not go,
But wait through fish scale, shale dust, bone
of hawk and marmot,
caught leaves in ice,
Til flung on a new net of atoms:”
—Gary Snyder (b. 1930)