Sun Tzu The Art Of War 9/10

III. ATTACK BY STRATAGEM


1. Sun Tzu said: In the practical art of war, the best thing of all is to take the enemy's country whole and intact; to shatter and destroy it is not so good. So, too, it is better to recapture an army entire than to destroy it, to capture a regiment, a detachment or a company entire than to destroy them.

2. Hence to fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting.

3. Thus the highest form of generalship is to balk the enemy's plans; the next best is to prevent the junction of the enemy's forces; the next in order is to attack the enemy's army in the field; and the worst policy of all is to besiege walled cities.

4. The rule is, not to besiege walled cities if it can possibly be avoided. The preparation of mantlets, movable shelters, and various implements of war, will take up three whole months; and the piling up of mounds over against the walls will take three months more.

5. The general, unable to control his irritation, will launch his men to the assault like swarming ants, with the result that one-third of his men are slain, while the town still remains untaken. Such are the disastrous effects of a siege.

6. Therefore the skillful leader subdues the enemy's troops without any fighting; he captures their cities without laying siege to them; he overthrows their kingdom without lengthy operations in the field.

7. With his forces intact he will dispute the mastery of the Empire, and thus, without losing a man, his triumph will be complete. This is the method of attacking by stratagem.

8. It is the rule in war, if our forces are ten to the enemy's one, to surround him; if five to one, to attack him; if twice as numerous, to divide our army into two.

9. If equally matched, we can offer battle; if slightly inferior in numbers, we can avoid the enemy; if quite unequal in every way, we can flee from him.

10. Hence, though an obstinate fight may be made by a small force, in the end it must be captured by the larger force.

11. Now the general is the bulwark of the State; if the bulwark is complete at all points; the State will be strong; if the bulwark is defective, the State will be weak.

12. There are three ways in which a ruler can bring misfortune upon his army:--

13. (1) By commanding the army to advance or to retreat, being ignorant of the fact that it cannot obey. This is called hobbling the army.

14. (2) By attempting to govern an army in the same way as he administers a kingdom, being ignorant of the conditions which obtain in an army. This causes restlessness in the soldier's minds.

15. (3) By employing the officers of his army without discrimination, through ignorance of the military principle of adaptation to circumstances. This shakes the confidence of the soldiers.

16. But when the army is restless and distrustful, trouble is sure to come from the other feudal princes. This is simply bringing anarchy into the army, and flinging victory away.

17. Thus we may know that there are five essentials for victory: (1) He will win who knows when to fight and when not to fight. (2) He will win who knows how to handle both superior and inferior forces. (3) He will win whose army is animated by the same spirit throughout all its ranks. (4) He will win who, prepared himself, waits to take the enemy unprepared. (5) He will win who has military capacity and is not interfered with by the sovereign.

18. Hence the saying: If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.

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[baugergroup]

Lee was a fool!

[MilitiaHQ]

@baugergroup He certainly had his chance to end the war, all his successes prior to Gettysburg meant nothing compared to that monumental fuck up, he should have listened to Longstreet. Better yet Jackson or Longstreet should have led the Confederate army.

[noserrub]

@MilitiaHQ Jackson had died before the battle of Gettysburg, in fact Lee was a genius of war, Lincoln personally wanted Lee to lead the Union army at the start of the war. Lee made the mistakes that cost him the war ant Gettysburg because his best friend (Jackson) had recently died and also cause he got a little cocky about his army thinking they were invincibly (it happens quite a bit in history) so ya Lee did fail Catastrophically at Gettysburg but he was still a Genius of war

[MilitiaHQ]

@noserrub Very true my friend, its easy for us to judge history, and say what we should have and should not have done. Yes Lee was the obvious choice to lead the confederate army, its just a great pity that the one mistake was his biggest and ultimately cost the confederacy the war.

[rza884]

@baugergroup nah his ego and arrogance overtake his intelegence

[1125sherburn]

History moo guy@ your a total racist and douche! Feel sorry for you and your family.

[HistoryHmoobGuy]

POOR REDNECKS !!!

Climbing up an hill during a gun fight is not easy !!!

I play paintball, and its already hard to advance up a hill will several guys blasting you !

[ConstantineJoseph]

@PatrickEngSU

Well, if General Jackson was wiser not to conduct recon missions at night into enemy territory in Chancellorsville, he would have lived to see Gettysburg.

Its important that great generals themselves must understand and analyze risks before they conduct any operation. Moreover, if I were to scout enemy positions at night, I would prefer to be on foot.

There are many factors in winning a battle, such as Gettysburg where there will be "what ifs".

[PatrickEngSU]

@ConstantineJoseph I'm sick of the harshness toward Lee too. Had Jackson had not died the CSA would have certainly won at Gettysburg: Jackson would have overran those dismounted cav and flooded onto the highground, plus Jackson would not have missed Little Round Top- indeed he probably would have occupied it on the first day. Considering Mead's cautiousness, there probably wouldn't have even been a battle and Lee's footsore army would have gotten the shoes they wanted

[PatrickEngSU]

@MilitiaHQ Thanks

[pugilist102]

@MilitiaHQ Really? This guy has been criticizing Sun Tzu through out the whole series without giving him any credit. I was going to reply to him to stuff it but decided it wasn't worth it.

[rustyschackleford100]

Lee changed his mind about his cause and did it on purpose because he realized how retarded his side was. Good thing he decided to do so because without that victory the Union could have lost.

[MilitiaHQ]

@PatrickEngSU Excellent comments you have made through out the whole SunTzu series, thanks for the intelligent input which is a ray of lay for me compared to reading rants about "Chuck Norris" and "im gonna use Sun Tzu's tactics in star craft" etc. Keep it up sir.

[PatrickEngSU]

@HistoryHmoobGuy No, the pacific war was essentially a contest between the united states and japan. Brittain was occupied in the pacific and the soviet union signed a nonaggression pact with japan and didn't invade manchuria until 1945 when nagasaki was bombed. It's painful to read your comments- I would be embarrassed to have written testaments of such ignorance.