Sun Tzu and Military Classics

Sun Tzu believed in freedom of action, mobility, surprise, deception and indirect attacks rather than frontal assaults. His method was always to "entice the enemy, to unbalance him, and to create a situation favorable for a decisive counter-stroke," while avoiding sieges and prolonged wars of attrition (Harvey, 2008, p. xlii). This was the opposite type of strategy from the commanders of the First World War or the American Civil War, who hurled masses of men against powerful defensive positions and inflicted mass casualties on their armies for no real purpose. Basil Liddell Hart, who was "horrified by the waste" of World War I, agreed with Sun Tzu that the indirect approach was superior, particularly using the mobility that tanks and air power provided (Harvey, p. xxxv). Most of the great commanders of history, like George Washington, Bernard Montgomery, Douglas MacArthur and George Patton have followed...
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