The Art of War

Sun Tzu · c. 5th century BCE

Thesis

War is a matter of life and death for a state and must be approached through careful calculation rather than courage or passion: the best victory is won without fighting, by knowing the enemy and oneself, deceiving the opponent, avoiding strength and striking weakness, and ending conflict quickly, since prolonged war ruins even the victor.

The main ideas

War is too important to begin without calculating, in advance, who is likely to win.
The supreme achievement is to defeat the enemy without fighting, by thwarting plans and alliances.
All warfare is based on deception.
Make yourself invulnerable first, then wait for the enemy to give you the chance to win.
Avoid the enemy's strength and strike at weakness, adapting like water to the shape of the ground.
Know the enemy and know yourself, and use spies to learn what cannot be seen.
Long wars exhaust the state. Speed and economy matter more than brilliance.

The text and its author

The Art of War is a short Chinese treatise in thirteen chapters, traditionally attributed to Sun Wu, known as Sun Tzu or Master Sun, a general said to have served the state of Wu around the end of the sixth century BCE. The historian Sima Qian, writing about four centuries later, tells the story that the king of Wu tested Sun Tzu by asking him to drill the palace women. When they laughed at his orders a second time, after he had explained them, Sun Tzu had the king's two favorite concubines, who led them, executed, and the rest obeyed perfectly.

Many scholars believe the text took shape later, during the Warring States period, and may combine the work of several hands. A copy written on bamboo slips, found in a tomb at Yinqueshan in 1972, shows it was circulating by the second century BCE. Lionel Giles's English translation of 1910 remains widely read.

Implication: read the book as a distilled tradition of strategic thought rather than as one general's memoir.

Calculation before battle

The book opens with the claim that war is of vital importance to the state, a matter of life and death, and must be studied thoroughly. Sun Tzu sets out five constant factors to weigh before any campaign: the moral law, meaning whether the people are united with their ruler; heaven, meaning weather and seasons; earth, meaning terrain and distance; the commander's qualities; and method and discipline.

A general who compares their own side with the enemy's on each factor, in the temple before the war begins, can predict who will win. The side that makes more calculations, Sun Tzu says, wins; the side that makes fewer loses.

The mechanism is that most outcomes are decided by conditions that exist before the fighting starts, so the decisive work is done in assessment, not on the battlefield.

Implication: before any contest, compare your position honestly against your opponent's on each factor that matters, and do not begin if the comparison is against you.

Winning without fighting

Sun Tzu argues that to fight and win every battle is not the highest skill. The supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting. The best policy is to attack the enemy's strategy, then its alliances, then its army in the field; the worst is to besiege walled cities.

He is equally concerned with cost. An army in the field drains the state's treasury and exhausts its people, and there is no instance of a country benefiting from prolonged warfare. He has heard of clumsy haste in war, but never of cleverness joined to long delay: a quick war, even clumsily fought, is better than a long one.

The mechanism is that fighting destroys resources on both sides, so the victor who wins by maneuver keeps what the victor who wins by battle loses.

Implication: in any conflict, look first for ways to make the opponent's plan fail before contemplating a direct fight, and count the cost of a long struggle even if you expect to win.

Deception

"All warfare is based on deception," Sun Tzu writes. When able to attack, appear unable; when near, appear far away; when far, appear near. Offer bait to lure the enemy; feign disorder and strike; if the enemy is strong, evade; if your opponent is hot-tempered, seek to irritate them.

The aim is to make the enemy misjudge where, when and how you will act, so that the enemy prepares in the wrong place and is caught unready.

The mechanism is that an opponent can defend only against what they anticipate, so controlling their perception controls where they are weak.

Implication: in competition, treat what you reveal of your intentions as a choice, and assume your opponent does the same.

Shape and energy

Sun Tzu advises that good fighters first make themselves invulnerable and then wait for an opportunity to defeat the enemy. Invulnerability depends on oneself; the opportunity is provided by the enemy.

He compares military tactics to water. Water flows away from high places and toward low ones; so an army should avoid what is strong and strike at what is weak. Just as water has no constant shape, an army should have no fixed form, adapting to the enemy and the ground.

He distinguishes direct and indirect forces: the direct engages the enemy, the indirect wins the victory. Their combinations, like musical notes or colors, are endless.

The mechanism is that strength concentrated against weakness wins at little cost, while strength thrown against strength wastes itself.

Implication: secure your own position first, then look for where your opponent is weakest, rather than meeting them where they are prepared.

Knowing the enemy

"If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles," Sun Tzu writes. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory you will suffer a defeat. If you know neither, you will lose every battle.

Knowledge of the enemy, he argues, cannot be obtained from spirits, inferred from past experience or worked out by calculation. It must come from people. The final chapter describes five kinds of spies, including local inhabitants, officials within the enemy's camp and enemy spies turned to one's own side, and says that no one in the army should be more richly rewarded or more closely trusted.

The mechanism is that the side with better information can apply all the other principles; the side without it is guessing.

Implication: invest in learning what your opponent actually intends and can do, and do not let pride stop you from paying for that knowledge.

Limits

Its origins are uncertain. The traditional author may be partly legendary, and the text likely developed over time, so its sayings are better read as a tradition than as one person's doctrine.
Its aphorisms fit almost any reading. Brief and general, they are easily adapted to business, sport or self-help in ways that strip out their context of ancient Chinese warfare, where states fought with conscripted armies.
It is a manual for winning, not for judging whether to fight. Beyond counting the costs to the state, it says little about the justice of war or the suffering of those caught in it.

The Prince — another short, unsentimental handbook on power and conflict.
The 33 Strategies of War — a modern compendium of strategy that draws heavily on Sun Tzu.
The 48 Laws of Power — the use of deception and indirection in everyday struggles for power.