sun tzu for the modern strategist: free sample chapter

8/14/2019 Sun Tzu for the Modern Strategist: Free Sample Chapter

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Sun Tzu for the Modern Strategist, by Jeremiah Bourque

The Sun Tzu Blog: http://suntzublog.wordpress.com/
http://suntzublog.wordpress.com/http://suntzublog.wordpress.com/


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Preface from the Author

This book is an exploration of the writings of Sun Tzu. It is not aretranslation; it is not even a new interpretation. It is, rather, an

explanation: a gentle effort to bring the deep meaning contained in

Sun Tzus concise, classical writing to the modern mind with the

context and elaboration required to absorb his ideas.

At its core, Sun Tzus The Art of War is about excellence:

excellence in the self, excellence in strategy, and excellence in

execution of that strategy. It is not about excellence for its own sake;rather, the modern strategist should emulate Sun Tzu and keep ones

eyes on the prize.

For Sun Tzu, strategy was a means to victory. Good strategy was

never a goal in and of itself. Through smarter war-making, came

victory; through victory, peace. Through peace, the nightmare of war

came to an end. This is why Sun Tzu applied his entire intellectual

being to mastering its secrets.

The modern strategist is someone trying to apply reason to

accomplish goals in the modern era. Though Sun Tzu is studied by

militaries around the world, most strategy is now exercised in the

world of business. Where Sun Tzu sought to bring value to his

sovereign, his army, and his people, modern strategists have a

different set of stakeholders. Even so, the core principle is quite

similar.

To borrow a parable from another strategist, legendary samurai

Miyamoto Musashi: by learning about success in a different

profession, one can learn about success in ones own. Success has its

own flow and pattern, and these can be learned. Musashi himself

studied carpentry at the foreman level and later, painting; these skills

gave him greater insights into swordsmanship and strategy, two

things he combined with peerless excellence in his own era. So it is

that non-generals can learn a great deal from Sun Tzu.



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Strategy: What Is Of Vital Importance?

Even though Sun Tzu himself was a general, he was also a manager.

Even though Sun Tzu was not a sovereign, he was also a leader. Not a

single word in The Art of War reflects a selfish view of himself; Sun

Tzu wrote for the benefit of others, that others might benefit from his

wisdom and bring benefit to their own sovereigns. Those worthy of

this knowledge would grasp it; those unworthy would find these

lessons as meaningless as slapstick comedy. Whatever benefits Sun

Tzu gained personally from this knowledge were obtained solely as a

result of bringing value to others.

Sun Tzu wrote,

War is of vital importance to the state; hence it is a subject

of inquiry which can on no account be neglected.

These words were written during the Spring and Autumn Period ofChina, thought of as a long transitional period between eras of

dynastic unity and stability. In Sun Tzus time, he was of one of seven

states vying for supremacy, dancing on the bones of what had once

been a unified Chinese Empire. War was not simply a matter of

defending the Han people against foreign invasion; Chinese fought

Chinese in wars over land, wealth, and influence. Indeed, the rise of

the great Chinese philosophies was as a result of brilliant men seeking

to escape from the shackles of what they viewed as a sort of

permanent quasi-anarchy.

In this period, lasting for centuries, war became an inevitability

rather than an occasional plague. Previously, armies were led by the

retainer thought by the sovereign to be the best suited for the job,

strictly on a temporary basis. Thus, with war becoming more regular,

an incentive was created for a small class of professional

commanders generals who would lead the mass conscript armies

into battle and increase their odds of success.



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Even as the men themselves were conscripts, Chinese warfare

already featured the chariot mentioned in Sun Tzus writings but

soon abandoned in favor of more conventional cavalry andcrossbows, even at a time centuries before the birth of Julius Caesar,

even before the army of Alexander the Great brought the Persian

Empire low and advanced as far as India before turning back. Armies

were highly sensitive to morale; desertion was a constant fear which

Sun Tzu spent a significant number of words addressing, seeking to

use generalship and circumstances to reduce this ill as much as

possible rather than simply crack the whip more.

This is the context in which Sun Tzu wrote the above introduction. To

him, war was not the health of the state; war was the potential death

of the state, a cataclysm similar to a national heart attack that

needed a general to perform CPR and save the nation from defeat and

collapse. Even in victory, survival usually meant a massive

expenditure of men and materiel that impoverished the entire society,

making observations better suited to Adam Smith than Napoleon.

Thus, in modern terms, Sun Tzu was wholly motivated by a singleobjective encompassing his entire strategy: delivering value to his

stakeholders. To Sun Tzu, this meant to bring victory in the quickest,

least bloody, least expensive, least ruinous manner possible.

However, recognizing that ideals of victory that he held, such as

winning without fighting, were most difficult to achieve in the real

world, Sun Tzu devoted himself to understanding the variables of

warfare (in this sense, his constants are not things that remain

unchanged; they are rather, things that vary enormously, but whichmust be examined without fail or exception), the strategies that bring

about victory, the fallibility of man, the blending of offensive and

defensive tactics, adaptability to an infinite variety of circumstances

with an infinite variety of tactics, and best practices for managing a

large organization of human beings.

Sun Tzus stakeholders were:



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His sovereign;

His army;

And the public at large of his nation.

This view of stakeholders was then, and is now, remarkable in its

breadth.

Many believed then, and a good many believe now, that someone

serving a particular leader should absolutely never regard this as

public service; the individual serves that specific leader as a

retainer, serving at his pleasure and leaving at his whim. Judging the

public to be an amorphous mass with no single will that cannot and

must not be valued anywhere nearly as high as the interests of the

sovereign, this manner of retainer seeks to please his sovereign

alone, only caring for the public to the extent that this is convenient

for the sovereigns interests. By the same token, the army is viewed

as a tool; and if a tool is not used, what good is it? Therefore, the

army must be used, period. Furthermore, the army must be used for

the maximum advantage of the sovereign without any concern for the

public at large.

Sun Tzu recognized this view as short-sighted, politically motivated

nonsense. The inter-connectivity of all things as consistent with his

Taoist philosophy makes plain that the sovereign may be the ruler of

the people, but he is dependent upon them; the army may be a tool

of the sovereign, yet it is dependent on both the sovereign and the

people. Even in an autocratic, monarchical system, to act without the

interests of the people in mind is to act with disregard for the self,

even when viewed in an entirely selfish manner. Indeed, even the

much-maligned Machiavelli wrote about the good of the people,

abandoning notions of republicanism to try and shape good behavior

by appealing to the base selfish interests of political princes. (Not that

he really succeeded in this.)

Thus, by keeping wars short, by eschewing glory-hound behavior in

himself and counseling against it in others, and even by seeking to



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forage on enemy territory and capture chariots and re-purpose them

for his own force, Sun Tzu acted in a manner narrowly tailored to

helping those he viewed himself as having an obligation to hold dearto him, even though this assuredly meant delivering death,

destruction and plunder to neighboring states. Even here, Sun Tzu

sought to end wars quickly and with a minimum of fighting so as to

minimize the damage to neighboring states, for what is the point of

destroying the village to save it? Particularly if its your sovereign

whos going to rule that village. Its more like, If you buy it, make

sure not to break it.

When Sun Tzu narrowed The Art of War to, well, the art of war, he

knew exactly who his stakeholders were; he did not over-extend

himself in trying to speak as to philosophy, economics, or other

things. He dealt narrowly with what his specialty was, and in that

supposedly narrow niche, discovered and propagated knowledge that

can only be considered vast, flowing like a vast river rich in natural

bounty. In doing so, Sun Tzu was not simple, but rather, concise; his

writings contained vast knowledge boiled down to the minimum

number of strokes on papyrus or cuts into a bamboo strip as required

to convey it to those capable of absorbing the knowledge.

In seeking to learn from Sun Tzus The Art of War, you should ask

yourselves the following questions.

Who are your stakeholders?

Which stakeholders take top priority?

How inter-connected are your stakeholders?

This will assist you in assessing what is of vital importance to your

stakeholders. After all, if you are managing a corporation, you would

clearly regard your shareholders as those you are directly responsible

to; yet your shareholders are indirectly dependent upon your

relationship with your customers. Hence, to paraphrase Sun Tzu,

customer relations are of vital importance to the modern corporation;

on no account must they be neglected. When you understand how the



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idea works, this phrasing not only sounds good it actually means

something to you.

Or, to use my old adage from my time as a Japanese to English

translator: Context is King. Really, all strategy is about putting things

in proper perspective.

Like all good Asian ideas, its short and concise, it sounds simple, and

its a lot harder than it sounds. It is also, like all good Asian ideas,

richly rewarding, a river full of life and bounty, drawn from many

tributaries but flowing with the force of a single unifying idea.

This is the essence of all strategy.



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The Importance of Planning

Sun Tzu wrote,

Now, the general who wins a battle makes many calculations

in his temple ere the battle is fought.

Note that in Sun Tzus time, temples, being large buildings full of

noble purpose, were employed as military headquarters on the eve of

marching out to campaign, so this is where plans were formed or at

least, finalized.

The general who loses a battle makes but few calculations

beforehand.

This principle is easily summarized as: winners plan ahead. Even if

winners are prepared to alter their plans according to circumstances,

they nonetheless make plans to begin with; and all making of plans

begins with a careful assessment of all the circumstances forming the

background of a conflict.

To wit:

The Moral Law: The motivating factor behind unified

collective action; the strength of overall leadershp.

Heaven: The times and seasons, the weather factors, the

broad, over-arching environmental factors.

Earth: The specifics of the terrain as they apply to field

operations.

The Commander: Who leads what force? What is his or her

nature, or adaptability to circumstances?



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Method and Discipline: Which side is more organized and

better supplied? How strong is the organization?

These are the Five Constants of warfare as judged by Sun Tzu,

being factors which must be assessed at the outset of any conflict to

shed light on the relative strengths of both sides. After all, only a fool

plans against an opponent with strength clearly superior to his own in

the exact same manner as an opponent with strength weaker than his

own. Also, its not just about the aggregate level of strength; its who

is responsible for these strengths and weaknesses, what they are in

detail, where those strengths and weaknesses lie, when those

strengths are in effect, and thus, as a result of the preceding,why

advantages or disadvantages exist. Only with this knowledge can

strengths be evaded and weaknesses exploited in an intelligent,

systematic manner.

A higher level of wisdom is to understand that the point of planning is

not the formation of the plan. (I realize this will seem highly counter-

intuitive.) The point of planning is to assess the strengths and

weaknesses of both sides in this level of detail. This being done, thestrategist can depart from the plan on the basis of knowledge, not

ignorance.

Knowing yourself and knowing your enemy was not some sort of

abstract Taoist mysticism to Sun Tzu; he was a general, not a

philosopher. He wanted to know himself, and his enemy, in concrete

terms of direct relevance to planning for victory in the most effective

and efficient manners possible. Only by rationally assessing reality as

it is, not as one wishes for it to be, can a person develop a strategy

that has a firm basis. In this way, even if the means are not part of

philosophy themselves, the end result feels like an extension of

natural law.

After all, Sun Tzu counseled to be like water, following the path of

least resistance, yet striking with the force of a raging torrent. This is



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the result of not so much the plan, as the depth of the knowledge that

was obtained in the formation of one.



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The Moral Law: The First Constant

One of the more fundamental concepts in Sun Tzu is The Moral Law,

one of the Five Constants of warfare, as translated by Lionel Giles in

1910. Regardless of the label we use for it, Sun Tzus definition serves

well:

The Moral Law causes the people to be in complete accord

with their ruler, so that they will follow him regardless of their

lives, undismayed by any danger.

Thus, The Moral Law is the unifying cause that unites a nation, an

army, or a corporation; it is, in a more military sense, the mission. In

business, this is what constitutes the content of the mission

statement to all stakeholders.

Sun Tzus concept of generalship is public service, albeit for a ruler

who, in his day, was a king, and thus a law unto himself. Nonetheless,the same core principle holds: a nation with a stronger reason to fight

and more vibrant leadership has an advantage in war. This advantage

is far from absolute; it is merely one of five constants Sun Tzu writes

of. However, its importance cannot be dismissed.

In American history, various self-appointed missions have come and

gone. One of the more notable ones in war was that expressed by

President Franklin D. Roosevelt in his Day of Infamy speech; he laid

out to the nation a great cause justified any hardship and any

sacrifice in obtaining what was considered to be righteous vengeance

against Japan, in addition to full war against Japans ally, Germany, in

ending further threats to American soil. What matters here is that the

American people were heavily motivated by the idea behind American

involvement in the war, now that the war had been brought to

America (from their laymans perspective).



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The Moral Law is unity of purpose. Unity of purpose, in turn, provides

the motivation for those participating in the organization to act, to

follow orders, to obey regulations, and to further the interests of theleader. It is the foundation of organized action. Its importance must

not be dismissed.



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Heaven: The Second Constant

Heaven signifies day and night, cold and heat, times and

seasons.Thus, Heaven signifies the broader environment of a

conflict, regardless of the nature of that conflict.

Some say that Napoleon studied Sun Tzus The Art of War

extensively in developing his military strategies. However, if this is so,

Napoleon blinded himself to the constant of Heaven when he invaded

Russia in ignorance of the seasons, and was thus defeated by the

Russian winter far more than any battlefield setback up to that point.

This is one aspect of Heaven.

However, for the modern American businessman, the fiscal year,

S.E.C. filing schedules, the filing of taxes, and public disclosure laws,

are every bit as important and ever-present as the seasons and the

phases of the moon. This is the broader legal environment within

which a corporation exists. Ignorance of Heaven is simply notacceptable.

Each strategist is responsible for understanding the context of his or

her battlefield. Let each of us meditate on what constitutes our

broader environment, and how we may take this into account as we

conduct our business.



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Earth: The Third Constant

Earth comprises distances, great and small; danger and

security; open ground and narrow passes; the chances of life

and death.

And so, Earth represents the terrain.

Earth represents the details of the environment that may change

greatly, even over a short distance. Ignorance of these details courts

disaster.

When real estate agents speak of the three factors affecting the value

of a piece of land as location, location, location, they are speaking

of the Earth. When Chinese house hunters recoil in horror at a

property because a street is aimed directly at the front of the house

perpendicular to that which runs in front of the house, thus bringing

evil directly to the front door according to feng shui, this is aconsideration of the Earth. However, this does not mean physical

terrain alone.

There is a different kind of terrain: the human terrain. Humans vary

greatly from place to place, and even from individual to individual; it

is in-depth knowledge of the differentiations between people, their

thinking processes, their actions, and their deeper human nature, that

provides the strategist with a great advantage. Everyone can see

what is on the surface; the strategist looks deeper to see what is

intangible, invisible to the naked eye.

This is how the strategist finds advantage where others do not.



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The Commander: The Fourth Constant

The Commander stands for the virtues of wisdom, sincerity,

benevolence, courage, and strictness.

Those accustomed to believing Machiavellis The Prince was the

only work on strategy read in older times may find these words

surprising; worse, they may assume such words to be hypocritical

nonsense. However, Sun Tzu was quite serious: how a Commander, or

one acting in a similar capacity, treats his enemies, should not have

any bearing on how he treats those he counts as subordinates, peers,

allies, and sovereigns.

To be wise is not to constantly seek to impress others with ones

wisdom; it is to speak with the words that are necessary. To be sincere

is not to reveal all of ones secrets; it is to be truthful with what one

does say. To be benevolent is not to be soft; it is to act in the best

interests of others in the long run, rather than for short-term gain. Tobe brave is not to be reckless; it is to discard useless fear and

hesitation to take advantage of the critical moment. To be strict is not

to be cruel; it is to ensure that ones instructions are obeyed, so that

the Commanders words are treated with respect and not contempt,

and for the organization to function effectively.

Those who are deficient in these virtues are not guaranteed to fail.

However, they are making implementing their strategies more

difficult by sowing doubt and dissent. Only by building trust,

communicating effectively, and having a well-founded reputation that

inspires respect, can a leader truly use his organization in a dynamic

and effective manner.

Above all, the Commander should separate war from peace and never

conflate the two. His enemies should know how he treats his friends,

and his friends should know how he treats his enemies; in this



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manner, his friends will not want to become his enemies, yet his

enemies, will wish to become his friends.



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Method and Discipline: The Fifth Constant

Sun Tzu refers to method and discipline as the fifth constant, which

refers to two separate things.

First, there is the process by which the organization is managed; this

includes logistics, the science of getting resources from where they

are gathered to where they are needed most, in addition to the

process of communicating instructions and receiving feedback to

manage the organization effectively.

Second, there is discipline, which is how the people are managed. For

this, I will proceed directly to the passage that follows.

In which army is there greater constancy, both in reward and

punishment?

Our modern world holds a common saying that reads: No good deed

shall go unpunished. When an organization not only lets good

behavior go unrewarded, but in effect, rewards bad behavior by its

employees and managers, the effect is cancerous, crippling

operations by removing the incentive for the rank and file to report

problems up the chain of command, act on their own initiative to

mitigate or eliminate problems before they become critical, and

creating long-term resentment against the commander or executives

leadership. This is a poor way to handle an organization.

As with taxes, punishing good behavior will result in less of it;

rewarding good behavior will result in more of it. However, both

rewards and punishments must be seen as consistent, or they will not

be considered fair. A leader who is strict, but fair, will be respected

where one who is indulgent or biased will not be. Even if a leader is

loved, because he is liberal with rewards, a lack of consistency in

enforcing his rules and punishing violations thereof will lead to



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contempt, and the organization can then be compared to a group of

spoiled children, unfit for any practical purpose.

However, should a leader treat his subordinates with respect,

rewarding the behavior he wishes to encourage with benevolence,

sincerity, wisdom, and above all, consistency, he will not only be

respected, but trusted and admired. This is a certain path to victory.



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Sun Tzu and his Greatest Caveat

Sun Tzu wrote,

According as circumstances are favorable, one should modify

ones plans.

Consider that this phrase emerges in a chapter on the laying of

favorable plans for victory. Consider that generals throughout history,

in times both modern and ancient, are reluctant to change their plans

after having committed to them. Furthermore, changing ones plans is

usually interpreted by others as a sign of weakness, lack of

preparation, and even laziness and stupidity. To alter the direction of a

large organization is to encourage disorder in the ranks, lack of faith

in the leadership at the top, and presents a muddled picture to

stakeholders large and small.

Such considerations were not invented in modern times. If a generalaltered his plans, word of it would surely get back to the advisers of

the sovereign; the generals political enemies would pounce upon the

change as a sign of unsteady leadership, hinting or perhaps

lobbying that a change in command should take place so that

someone else can have a turn at either implementing the original

plan, or at forming a new plan without the taint of unsteadiness.

Why, then, does Sun Tzu write this?

Sun Tzus primary focus and overriding goal was to deliver value to

his stakeholders: his sovereign, his soldiers, and the civilian

population that sustained both his sovereign and his soldiers through

taxation, which is simply a word for appropriating the labor and hard-

earned money of the public. He was not in public service as a military

professional for glory or the sake of history. He did not put blinders



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over his eyes. He saw, through the experiences of others as well and

his own, a simple, salient fact:

Reality must intrude.

Even if one can be said to have a perfect plan, there can still be

imperfect circumstances. To be so devoted to ones plan as to never

change it; so in love with it, so wedded to it that it must never be

altered in any way: this is to flagrantly ignore reality. War, among

other activities, takes place in the real world, not on a chessboard. To

lose a match at chess is to temporarily lose a few pawns until thenext game. To lose in war means for many soldiers to die. To lose may

even result in an entire state perishing. As Sun Tzu was well aware of,

the dead cannot be brought back to life.

Sun Tzus message is to never be so committed to your plan that you

are unprepared and unwilling to depart from your plan to take

advantage of a genuine opportunity for victory that you did not, or

could not, anticipate. Nor should the leader be unwilling to depart

from his plan to avoid some great disaster that otherwise awaits him.

To do otherwise is to allow stubbornness and recklessness to rule the

self and condemn others to misery and loss. That is the opposite of

delivering value to ones stakeholders.

This also applies to The Art of War itself: never be so mesmerized

by even this wonderful, rich book into thinking that it shall help you

form plans that cannot and should not ever be altered according to

circumstance. That would be wasting an important message from the

original author.

Reality must intrude upon all plans. The wise strategist sees this not

as a menace, but as an opportunity.



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All Warfare Is Based Upon Deception

Some would call the title of this post the most quoted quote of Sun

Tzus entire book. However, I dislike the emphasis many place on

learning The Art of War through disjointed quotations. Chapter I has

a significant section on deception, but readers of this isolated quote

might never learn the context associated with it. Allow me to explain.

When Sun Tzu elaborates on deception, he begins:

Hence, when able to attack, we must seem unable;

When using our forces, we must seem inactive;

When we are near, we must make the enemy believe we are

far away;

When far away, we must make him believe we are near.

A reader might glance over this and be tempted to remark, Well, that

sounds easy. It most assuredly is not.

When in a conflict against fellow human beings, the opponent is a

fellow man; being a fellow man, he is familiar with the patterns that

accompany readiness to attack, signs of inactivity, and indications of

proximity or lack thereof. These are signs that armies and other large

organizations give off without conscious thought or effort. While not

every leader or strategist is well versed with the subtleties that

accompany them, they are all familiar with the bold strokes that

accompany an armored cavalry thrust from a General Patton, as one

example. These are things that are hard to conceal, yet easy to

detect.

Thus, something more is required. This is the role of deception.



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Unable to simply show the enemy nothing, the strategist instead

shows his opponent something that the opponent wishes to see and

wishes to believe. Having shown something, but having shown thissomething in a way that creates a false impression, the enemy is

seduced into deceiving himself.

I should point out right now that Sun Tzu, a man who strenuously

preached the importance of benevolence and sincerity in a

commanders personal dealings not only with his peers and his

sovereign, but spies and others in uniquely vulnerable positions

where trust is a greater commodity than money in no way supported

deception as a way of life in general. He supported the use of

deception in war. This is a critical distinction.

Sun Tzu continued,

Hold out baits to entice the enemy. Feign disorder, and crush

him.

Why feign disorder? Feigning disorder works because of a simple,time-honored principle: if you look like a sucker, someone is going to

try and sucker punch you. This is also true in martial arts. A skilled

martial artist who deliberately puts up a false front, pretending to be

slow mentally as well as physically and to be quiet and passive,

can lure an aggressive, careless opponent into making a first move in

a careless manner that leads to a thorough beating. Such things have

been known to happen. This reaction seeing weakness, and

pouncing on it is deeply ingrained alpha male behavior.

If the opponent attempts to exploit a false opening, it is he who

becomes exposed.

If he is secure at all points, be prepared for him. If he is

superior in strength, evade him.

Against an opponent who is secure in defense, the best strategy may

well be to await the opponents attack. When the opponent leaves his



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secure position to do battle, he may then be assaulted. However, if

the opponent is superior in strength to you, you are not obligated to

do him any favors and fight him on terms favorable to him; indeed,much of Sun Tzus strategy is devoted to not fighting on terms

favorable to the enemy, but to fight on terms favorable to you. Thus,

an enemy superior in strength can be evaded.

As we can see, Sun Tzu constantly sees delivering value to his

stakeholders as the objective of his strategy. SunT zu does not seek

fame or fortune via courage that brings battlefield defeat. Every

thought and every action is devoted to fighting war in the most

efficient, effective manner possible, seeking to bring it to an end as

quicky as possible.

If your opponent is of choleric temper, seek to irritate him.

Pretend to be weak, that he may grow arrogant.

Another deeply ingrained alpha male behavior is to take advantage of

the weak. If an opponent is weak, he may be treated lightly and with

arrogance. Like a cat playing with a mouse, the man in a position ofadvantage may seek to not only defeat his opponent, but to

thoroughly humiliate his enemy in every respect. This search for a

more satisfying victory leads directly to carelessness.

Humans naturally do a sort of triage when dealing with threats. If one

opponent seems to be weak, that opponent is left aside while the

measures are taken against the stronger opponent. (This is a strategy

made famous on the reality television series Survivor.) When the

only opponent on a field of battle seems weak, the tendency of an

already prideful man is to boast, I have no enemy here! I am

peerless! This foe is no match of mine! I can defeat him any time I

wish!

By the same token, a man who is attempting to behave in a rational

way, but who is prone to bursts of anger, can be provoked into highly

aggressive actions (as befit his core nature) if he is sufficiently



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provoked. Not everyone with a temper can be lured in quite so easily,

but those that can be will frequently make careless mistakes.

If he is taking his ease, give him no rest.

In the late stages of the Battle of Leyte Gulf, commanders were

making decisions when having remained awake constantly over the

course of three days. Fatigue individual and organizational is one

of the leading causes of critical mistakes. Giving the enemy any

unnecessary chance to rest and recover his mental strength is

unwise. When able to deny the enemy rest, one should do so, for

fatigue only makes his job much harder.

Attack him where he is unprepared; appear where you are

not expected.

Now we get to the crux of the matter.

Someone learning The Art of War as a grouping of isolated

quotations and passages would be tempted to read this and believe

that it stands wholly on its own. It does not.

Your opponent is unprepared because you have deceived him.

He does not expect you because you have irritated him, made

him arrogant, and denied him the rest required for him to

regain his senses and reconsider his vulnerable position.

When engaged in warfare, every large deception you make is built on

every smaller deception you have already made. Having seduced theopponent into deceiving himself as to your strength, disposition,

intention, activity, and location, you lead him around calmly and

effortlessly as if leading a donkey via a dangling carrot. You show your

opponent what he wishes to see, and he decides, purely by himself,

that it is so; in this way, you deceive without ever having spoken a

word to him, without ever having lied in the conventional sense. You

have assisted him in lying to himself. Thus, believing his own

overconfident conclusions, he is completely at your mercy.



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Thus can superiority in numbers and other measurements of strength

be brought low, purely due to recognizing that an army is led by a

falliable human being.

Finally

These military devices, leading to victory, must not be

divulged beforehand.

I summarize this passage with a simple quote: Do not tip your

hand.

Having entered through all this trouble to deceive ones opponent, to

tip ones hand and announce ones tactics to the enemy via word,

deed, or spy, is not only fatal to deception, but ruinous because this

allows the enemy to develop successful countermeasures. One does

not have to lie to not tip ones hand; the leader merely requires

discipline to keep his cards close to the vest rather than flaunt them

for all to see. Thus is secrecy preserved.

Thus is victory won where defeat would otherwise be certain. By the

same measure, thus is a crushing victory won obtained, routing the

enemy with less loss to ones own side, rather than a narrow, hard-

fought victory that could have been obtained through brute force

alone.

This is how maximum value is delivered to stakeholders via the most

efficient use of resources possible.



26/27




27/27


Afterword

This concludes the Free Sample Chapter. To express interestin a full version of the eBook, please contact me and grace

my blogs with your patronage.

E-mail:[email protected]


The Modern Strategist:

http://modernstrategist.wordpress.com/

Thank you for reading. Comments, critique, and discussion

of any kind are highly welcome.

By the way, this book evolved from an eight-session course

on the content of the book originally delivered via

eduFire.com using Adobe Connect Pro, PowerPoint

presentations, and my own charming voice. I thought you

might like to know.

Best wishes. Jeremiah Bourque
mailto:[email protected]://suntzublog.wordpress.com/http://modernstrategist.wordpress.com/mailto:[email protected]://suntzublog.wordpress.com/http://modernstrategist.wordpress.com/

sun tzu for the modern strategist: free sample chapter

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