The Wiles of War: 36 Military Strategies from Ancient China

Description

The Wiles of War: 36 Military Strategies from Ancient China

Author: Sun Haichen
Order No. 6019
ISBN-13: 9787119034829
ISBN-10: 7119034820
Binding: Paperback
Size: 4.5 x 8
Publisher: Foreign Languages Press
Pub Year: 2009
Pages: 379
Language: English
Price: $24.95

For each strategy, the book provides the Chinese text, a lucid explanation, reference from other military classics, and the account of an ancient battle featuring the successful application of the strategy. With bilingual bibliography and index.

"Of the thirty-six strategies, running away is the best choice." This is a familiar remark, in literary works as well as in real life, from people who want to get around a situation that they are unable to cope with for moment. The expression first appeared in the official History of the Southern Qi dynasty about fifteen hundred years ago. Since then, it gained increasing currency until an anonymous scholar (estimated a contemporary of late Ming or early Qing) laid out the entire thirty-six strategies in a small book called Secret Art of War: Thirty-Six Strategies. Though its technical side has undergone remarkable progress toward greater complexity and more dimensions, war as art has certain fundamental truths that remain valid all through the ages. For instance, war is a political organ to achieve goals that cannot be brought about by peaceful means. A military leader builds up and maintains his strength and weakens that of his opponent, conceals his intentions and capabilities and endeavors to detect those of his opponent, avoids battle at his disadvantage and maneuvers to achieve superiority at the focal points where he chooses to give battle. Modern technology has greatly transformed warfare, but generals and even line officers today often face the same problems that confronted their ancient counterparts. After all, was is launched, conducted, and terminated by humans; therefore it conforms to certain intrinsic laws that are a projection of human nature does not change, war as a human activity will follow some ageless rules in the course, of time.