However regrettably, the military, it would appear, does not always attract the best and brightest to its ranks, which may go some way to explain the 'enduring classic' status of a manual of the bleeding obvious. That it should have also in recent times have become bible to the corporate go-getter perhaps says something similar about that group. ( )

The irony of me listening to this audiobook while playing a shooter game where I’m trying to outwit my opponent is very much not lost on me.

I’m not going to war any time soon but it’s certainly interesting to learn how war was waged long ago. ( )

Many of Sun Tzu's ideas are common-sense enough, but succinctly put here. It's a quick, easy read, so it's not hard to make the case that it's worth the time. But gliding through it effortlessly will make it difficult for the ideas to really stick. So I guess it's also easy to make the case for at least one re-read. I'll probably give it another go myself in the near future, but for now I'm happy with the bits and pieces I've gleaned. It certainly didn't change my life or anything, but then I didn't expect it to. ( )

Tempted to give it four stars because it is so much better than so much other Heinlein. But that's not worth much, actually. I did have to edit the blurb, however. ( )

It’s funny: re-organizing my ‘diversities’ books, or, at least/especially the ‘nationalities’ diversities, in terms of, almost the ‘class’ of book, the type—political, social, military, the way I did for ‘general history’…. Something really stood out for me. A lot of books, even putatively favorably disposed towards the non-Westerners or the non-whites, are totally set up to angle you into seeing non-Western violence as irrational, as mindless, as unnatural, almost: in a way that would seem totally out of left field so to speak, unimaginable, almost, (although you can JUST see the non-white as a crushed defeated slave, if you are EXCEPTIONALLY favorable, in a way that you can’t see them, as a victorious independent warrior, right)…. It would just be completely alien, you know, to see our at times very violent white American culture—and dare I even utter the words in my sleep, our allies-of-white-people culture, right—you know: there’s somebody whose violence is irrational, obscene, almost unholy…. And it isn’t the loyal American soldier. It isn’t even really European regimes we’ve quarreled with in the past, like say, Kaiser’s Germany: which was basically an expansionist military dictatorship, at least at one point—but it isn’t at all scandalous to humanize them, right: the way it is scandalous to not, at least subconsciously, see the stern North Korean soldier, the savage African child soldier cannibalism gorilla, the…. I don’t know. It blends into our stigma on minority crime, you know. We see minorities as criminals and the average non-white state as being a criminal regime, somewhere in the back of our head, right….

But yeah: a very ancient, scholarly, and abstract take on a sympathetic look at non-Western violence…. That might almost be allowed, you know.

As opposed to the white folklore view of say, Malcolm X, who pretty much just ran his mouth, maybe did a little non-violent burglary, before he got political, right…. Not respectable the way that, say, dropping two atomic bombs on Japan is, right?

(shakes head, smirks, mumbles indistinctly)

…. “The enhanced personal power traditionally associated with application of Taoist mental technology is in itself a part of the collective power associated with application of the understanding of mass psychology taught in *The Art of War*. What is perhaps most characteristically Taoist about *The Art of War* in such a way as to recommend itself to the modern day is the manner in which power is continually tempered by a profound undercurrent of humanism.”

To translate the translator, so to speak: it doesn’t recommend behaving the way that my country (and Thomas Cleary’s country, the very same) acted in Vietnam, for example: “That village is full of communists; destroy it from the air. Post the Marines outside it: have them shoot anyone trying to escape….”

I don’t know that one possible ideal world would be totally bereft of violence, force, and physical muscle and physical-mental contention, in the course of conflict, right…. But, whatever we have now seems closer to one one possible hell-world, than even what existed in the distant past: or more, even just two or three centuries ago, (although the Atlantic slave trade and its aftermath era is already over 550 years old, right….), if you look at violence in war, including unjustifiable violence in war, and violence towards nature: both incredibly ‘escalated’ compared to the world of the admittedly more embryonic civilizations which existed before the rise of modern industry, (and many of whose embryonic civilizations, were indeed harmed or killed, in the embryo, right: by European ‘explorers’….)….

Yeah.

But yeah: many forms of mental technology existed in the past, and many of those, especially many East Asian forms, still exist…. The opera isn’t over until Richie FINALLY decides enough is enough and that he might as well wrap up this particular endless singing contest, right, to humorlessly and loosely and de-body-shaming-ly paraphrase the popular saying, no….

…. War always threatens to be costly and counter-productive, even to those said to win. Somebody or another is going to be in therapy talking about their dead brother; and you risk overthrowing what were once potential allies…. If war is an expression of alienation—the ‘Lord of the Rings’ scenario, right: then, it cannot be good.

And fame and grit-on-the-brink-of-defeat is no clear indication of strategic or humanistic worth: better not to go too near the precipice of total destruction….

…. “In Taoist thought, power was moral as well as material, and it was believed that moral power manifested itself both as self-mastery and as influence over others…. (One Taoist author commented) ‘This is turn depends on the generals entrusted with military leadership. A general that is not popular is not a help to the nation, not a leader of the army.’…. A general who is ‘not popular’ is one who, according to another way of reading the characters, ‘denies the people.’”

Without trying to forget the problems in a purely secular view, in the final view, we fight because we love: and fighting for love and loving the fight, the zest of it, fighting like an animal racing up or down a hill—whatever the angle of the sun calls for, right—isn’t something Christian teaching has been particularly comfortable with, these twenty centuries…. Without trying to forget the problems in a purely Christian view, in the final view, everything is connected: fighting and loving, moral force and spirit force—even attachment and detachment, in a certain sense, right…. It is the almost terminal viewpoint of the ‘modern Western world’ that everything is separate, that spirit force in a nice thing to play at and lie about, but it makes no difference if the state is based on lies and requires lying, essentially, so let’s buy more bombers, so that we can wipe out the villages marked in red on PowerPoint slide number…. ~That’s the view that’s essentially endangering the planet; that and the almost clinical waste of resources in the economic system—the amount of food that gets thrown away because of pure anxiety, right: rather throw away ten crates of food, if we can manage it, than to have one bare display in Thin Nerves Food Store, right…. But moral force, doesn’t even exist: it’s just a lie that marketing pretends to believe: but only when the cameras are running, right….

I don’t recommend clubbing the first person who turns their back to you with your heavy water bottle, right, but…. But it’s really pretty comforting to read that powerful, corrupt states collapse, right. We trick ourselves into believing that the power of our sins are infinite: and maybe THAT if why we are so chronically unhappy—because, ~~~that’s not happy thinking, hombre~~~, you know?….

…. The quotes and the structure of the introduction alone imply much about the poetic nature of ancient Chinese military theory—far more poetic than anything a German/Prussian would be likely to write: or indeed, an American or the 1980s, or today, as well.

…. The question of loyalty to personality versus loyalty to ideals

~That is a useful conversation.

…. “…. not so much a moral standard in itself but…. (a product of) organization…. an appropriate context for loyalty….”

Some of these phrases are extremely illuminating.

…. And I’m going to make note of all of the commentators referred to, since they’re are obviously only quoted in part:

—Cao Cao
—Meng Shi
—Jia Lin
—Li Quan
—Du You
—Du Mu
—Zhang Yu
—Mei Yaochen
—Wang Xi
—Chen Hao
—Ho Yanxi

…. “The five things (to measure) are the way, [Tao/moral-political force), the weather, the terrain, the leadership, and discipline.” (Master Sun, Ch. 1, Strategic Assessments)

Basically I just see it as the ‘higher’ and the ‘lower’ for both the natural and human elements: weather (above/the heavens), and terrain (below/the earth); and among human consideration, the wisdom of leadership, the integrity of the masses. And everything is unified under the Way: the rightness and the unity of the political venture, which in turn plays into moral considerations.

…. “Leadership is a matter of intelligence, trustworthiness, humaneness, courage, and sternness.” (Master Sun, Ch. 1)

“…. intelligence involves ability to plan and to know when to change effectively.” (Du Mu, commenting on the above)

…. The influence of Taoism—poetry, humaneness, moral force—is perfectly obvious, but it does seem like some Legalism got in too. Cleary refers to Legalism’s belief in “rational organization and rule of law”; one of the commentators (Du Mu) remarks in Chapter 1, “Rewards should not be out of proportion; punishments should not be arbitrary”. Granted that this is not perfect: it seems strikingly similar to many of the ‘fault’-lines of modern rationalistic Western and Western-style civilization today, even if it’s not the utopia of freedom and non-hierarchy that inside-the-Beltway insider liberals imagine that they have created, (albeit mostly for themselves!), and which they believe they have immortalized in, say, “Star Trek”. (Of course, realistically there is a LOT of rationalism, hierarchy, and even legalism in Star Trek, right….). But yeah: apparently, in American high schools in the 21st century—it’s been 15 years since it was me: but I doubt it’s changed, looking at how petty, elitist, etc., the world remains—“Taoism” in history class meant, “the delightfully exotic Orientals” or whatever, (apparently, for what it’s worth, “Oriental” was seemingly a perfectly contemporary/ordinary term to call things Chinese, apparently in use by 40 year old or so reasonably sympathetic specialists, right, in 1988), whereas “Legalism” referred to the yellow peril, basically: those damn ChiComm devils with their foreign military dictatorship had just always been like that, right…. We never saw ourselves as having a similarly rationalistic civilization, indeed that lent more heavily on that end of things, the tilt away from poetry and being quixotic, than the Chinese…. Although you forget—I mean, you forget everything about Chinese culture, being of a different color and continent—how numeric Chinese formal thought is, at least: gotta have five talking points, give or take, and number them, right….

But yeah: China is certainly a mighty civilization, different from India, the West, or the Native nations, right. India’s story, to take the other Eastern nation, seems to have been much less governmental. China’s story does seem like a bigger part revolves around having formed very early in history an essentially very long-lasting political entity, and its thought does seem to have a strong tint of practicality not as frequently present in much of India’s thought, or much of the rest of the world in general, right…. India is much more about surviving disunity and even conquest despite it all. You go beyond. China has lost wars, to be sure, but they also engaged in what seems to have been a very interesting—if world-historic harrowing (I know these last months have been life-mission-change harrowing for me, so that’s nice…. But it also sucks ass, not gonna lie), process of forming, what is only not a truly continent-sized political aegis, by a trick of geography, right…. But yeah: very practical, all very practical. I remember I read a book of mystics quotes once, (not the best, but curious), and the Chinese ones were all: China Bob (sry lol) achieved enlightenment by working his job the right way, and I was sitting like, Your job is an important test, an important stress test, of course, but…. Who the fuck ~thinks~ about that shit, right….

The grand metaphors come from close attention to the ordinary details, right. Practical mysticism. 👌

…. “Structure depends on strategy, strategy is determined according to events.” (Cao Cao)

You mean I don’t sit in my room dreaming up an irresponsible and completely groundless and unrealistic scheme for how the world should be, and then go on a frenzy of blood-letting attempting to do the impossible, like my mentor, Herr Inglaterra? 😮

…. “A military operation has no standard form—it goes by way of deception.” (Cao Cao)

…. Strike when they are weak, not when they are strong: and keep your plans hidden.

…. And yeah: it’s curious how moral force is only one factor out of five, even if it is the factor of ultimate unity of those factors, right. You should not seek ‘battle’ without moral force: but your ‘enemy’ might gain some measure of victory without it, for some space of time, right….

…. “If you keep your armies out in the field for a long time, your supplies will be insufficient.” (Master Sun, Ch. 2, Doing Battle)

The objective is not to film a popular war epic where your kingdom is essentially destroyed and 3/4 of your friends die, and the rest are physically wounded and severely traumatized, right…. “What? It’s not….?” 🫨

…. “Therefore I have heard of military operations that were clumsy and swift, but I have never seen one that was skillful and lasted a long time. It is never beneficial to have a military operation continue for a long time.” (Master Sun, Ch. 2)

…. Other chapter 2 themes: conflict produces more strife, since it creates weakness, poverty, and resource depletion in your own state, and bitterness and opportunism among supporters and potential rebels & enemies…. “What kills the enemy is anger” during the actual strife, but long warfare points more to moralism and machismo than effective anger: “victory, not persistence”. It is better to plunder an enemy than your own people: but a captured enemy treated humanely may join your side.

…. “It is…. Better to keep a[n enemy] unit intact [by bypassing it, capturing it, etc] than to destroy it.” (Master Sun, Ch. 3, Planning a Siege)

“This means that killing is not the important thing.” (Li Quan, in comment to above)

And THAT is non-attachment, right…. Putting a bullet in a guy’s stomach doesn’t give up magical power points that you can buy dragon riding skills with, right. That’s not how dragon riding is learnt…. It’s like: we gotta get the video game developers on the group chat—they done wrong to us, home boys: 🏡 👦 ‘s —lol.

…. “The lowest [form of generalship] is to attack a city.” (Master Sun, Ch. 3)

“This means that when you attack cities and butcher towns, this is the lowest form of attack, because there are many casualties.” (Du You, in comment to above)

To attack the strongest, most easily defended position, and to cause the most damage, is worst. It is better to interdict the enemy alliances or formations, to quickly suppress half-formed armies: not to drench cities with fire and blood, right.

…. Or else you divide the opponent’s armies: or else you maneuver so that though they are all set up in camp faithfully in the field, they might as well be at home, sleeping as to war, for all the good they do. Create divisions. This sounds like conspiracy theory stuff, right: but to be honest, the people who drive humankind to war are themselves dividers. It remains only to divide the dividers, so that the fewest possible lives are destroyed…. When one apple is rotten, one does not throw out the whole bag: one divides out the rotten apple. Sometimes, if only one part of the apple is rotten, one even cuts the apple, so that most or part is saved, right…. One does not gleefully throw away fruit, like, some sort of sicko afraid of lawyers, who manages a ‘great hotel’, right….

…. “Therefore if the smaller side is stubborn, it becomes the captive of the larger side.” (Master Sun, Ch. 3)

“The ~Spring and Autumn Annals~ say, ‘If you cannot be strong, and yet cannot be weak, this will result in your defeat.’”

(Meng Shi, in comment to above)

…. Chapter 4: Formation.

I like the Du Mu comment on the chapter as a whole, “You see the inner conditions of opponents by means of their external formations.” Much of the earlier portions of this chapter are quite enigmatic, curious, deep. Master Sun’s “…. deepest depths of the earth…. highest heights of the sky” quote means to me that with the Mother you are protected: and with the Father, you overcome…. Towards the end of the chapter, the important points are reiterated, that battle is not about making a rad movie where all your friends die, and you almost die: nor is the purpose of war, to plunder the earth like a godforsaken raider from Hell, you know….

…. Chapter 5: Force

Fighting so as to secure safety is a work of art, like any other.

“Momentum” as the collective element in war.

…. Chapter 6: Emptiness and Fullness

IMO it’s hard to abstractly and verbally give, the sense that he’s trying to give, which is essentially, ‘Trick the mutha’—right?

…. Chapter 7: Armed Struggle

“Therefore armed struggle is considered profitable, and armed struggle is considered dangerous.” (Master Sun, Ch. 7)

…. “Act after having made assessments. The one who first knows the measure of far and near wins—this is the rule of armed struggle.” (Master Sun, Ch. 7)

Also that the army is unified and led by means of symbols—drums and banners—and especially simple ones adapted to chaotic conditions.

…. “Energy is what battle depends on.” (Zhang Yu, in comment in chapter seven)

…. “This means that when opponents are on high ground you shouldn’t attack upward, and when they are charging downward you shouldn’t oppose them.” (Du Mu, chapter 7 comment)

…. “Do not follow a feigned retreat. Do not attack crack troops.” (Master Sun, ch. 7)

[Liberal Christian grannies; conservative hardass theologians—LOL. 😂].

…. Chapter 8: Adaptations

“Adaptation means not clinging to fixed methods, but changing appropriately according to events, acting as is suitable.” (Zhang Yu, chapter 8 comment)

“Benefit and harm are interdependent, so the enlightened always consider them [both].” (Ho Yanxi, chapter 8 comment)

“Put them in a vulnerable position and they will surrender on their own.” (Zhang Yu, chapter 8 comment)

I suppose if I were a Christian, I’d call that “conversion”, right: although traditionally and really until today, almost all activities of missionaries and such, has consisted more of the “let’s attack the ‘citadel which is not to be attacked’” sort of activity, right…. Dare I say, some sort or another of tree in a magical walled garden, right….

…. “Good generals…. cannot be pleased or angered.” (Chen Hao, chapter 8 comment)

…. Chapter Nine: Maneuvering Armies

“Advantage in military operation is getting help from the land.” (Zhang Yu, chapter 9 comment)

…. Kevin Baloney, Random IRA Volunteer #7540, was ‘born to die’. He just thought this was a great time for acting act and being a bozo! Such is the way, of morons.

~authentic Sun Tzu comment

…. Chapter 10: Terrain, & Chapter 11: Nine Grounds

Technical knowledge is important in any field of study. The general’s technical knowledge, it would appear, concerns primarily the land, and also people and their reactions to situations (which are primarily generated by geography).

…. Chapter 12: Fire Attack

“There are five kinds of fire attack: burning people….” (Master Sun, ch. 12)

Bros weren’t messing around, even before people decided to start using gunpowder to make weapons, instead of just trick-fires, basically…. (God damn, I love the West…. {some cartoon dad panorama camera shot})….

…. Chapter 13: On the Use of Spies

A military operation that doesn’t in some way serve the political purpose for war, is just a vain slaughter, and mere slaughter is a vain purpose for war…. And wars are won, in the truest sense, by information; muscle is an important but secondary consideration.

…. Re: reverse spies/double agents

And ironically—almost mystically—for you to prevail in struggle, you must, from someone among the ‘enemy’, obtain their ~consent~ and aid, for you to prevail….