Commander Anderson Quotes in The Rock (1996)

General Hummel: Major Anderson, if you have any concern for the lives of your men, you will order them to safety their weapons and place them on the deck.

Agent Paxton: This is not happening...

Commander Anderson: Sir, we know why you're out here. God knows, I agree with you. But like you, I swore to defend this country against all enemies, foreign, sir... and domestic. General, we've spilled the same blood in the same mud. And you know god damn well I can't give that order.

Navy SEAL: We're dead!

General Hummel: Your unit is covered from an elevated position, Commander. I'm not gonna ask you again. Don't do anything stupid. No-one has to die here.

Commander Anderson: [raising his voice] You men following the General: you're under oath as United States Marines, have you forgotten that? We all have shipmates we remember, some of them were shit on and pissed on by the Pentagon. But that doesn't give you the right to mutiny!

General Hummel: You call it what you want! You're down there, we're up here! You walked into the wrong goddamn room, Commander!

Commander Anderson: [to the Navy Seals] Make no mistake, gentlemen. We are in the fight of our lives, against one of the greatest battalion commanders of the Vietnam War, I shit you not.

Commander Anderson: Thank you very fucking much Mr. Mason, you've led us into a room with no exit.

Commander Anderson: Have you ever been in a combat situation before?

Stanley Goodspeed: Define combat, sir.

Commander Anderson: Shep?

Lt. Shephard: An incursion underwater to re-take an impregnable fortress held by an elite team of U.S. Marines, in possession of eighty-one hostages and fifteen guided rockets loaded with V.X. poison gas.

Stanley Goodspeed: Oh. In that case, no sir. Excuse me...

Commander Anderson: A night time air-drop incursion is out, due to the full moon. Likewise a frontal seaside attack. If we're compromised and shots are fired, Hummel might launch. Our only alternative is an attack from within the prison. We'll penetrate the island through the tunnels under the prison buildings undetected and emerge in its center. That way we can jump the Marines from behind, and, if we're lucky, take the rocket positions without a shot fired.

General Al Kramer: Have you studied the architectural plans?

Commander Anderson: They're useless. Alcatraz has been ripped up and rebuilt for years. Underneath is a maze of shit.