Empty And Full - Chapter 6 - SUN TZU The Art Of War (How To Win CEO)

The Battlefield - the warrior shapes his victory from the dynamics of the enemy.

We've covered,  the making of plans, which is about calculations, and waging of war, which is about the cost of war. The strategic offensive is to attack the strategy of the other person, the other country, the other business. So know your enemy and know yourself. Victory is certain. We've covered forms and dispositions, which are about invincibility and or invulnerability.  And we've covered potential energy, which is the Falcon swooping in perfect timing,  breaking the back of its prey, which we haven't seen a lot of in this war. Have we?

 Now we've got Empty And Full, which is the battlefield?   about 36 / 37 verses I think so strap in. But it's very useful.

Master Sun said, managing many is the same as managing few. It's a question of division.

Empty and Full. Master Sun said:

First on the battlefield waits for the enemy, fresh.  Last on the battlefield charges into the fray exhausted. The skillful warrior stirs and is not stirred. He lures his enemy into coming or obstructs him from coming.

Exhaust a fresh enemy, starve a - enemy, unsettle a settled enemy, appear at the place to which he must hasten.  Hasten to the place where he least expects you.

March hundreds of miles without tiring by traveling where no enemy is. Be sure of victory by attacking the undefended.  Be sure of defense by defending the unattacked. The skill for warrior attacks so that the enemy cannot defend. He defends so that the enemy cannot attack. Oh, subtlety of subtleties without form a mystery of mysteries without sound.

He is master of his enemy's fate. He advances irresistibly attacking emptiness. He retreats eluding pursuits too swift to be overtaken.  If I wish to engage, then the enemy for all his high ramparts and deep moats, cannot avoid the engagement.

I attacked that, which He is obliged to rescue.

If I do not wish to engage, I can hold my ground with nothing more than a line drawn around it. The enemy cannot engage me in combat. I distract him in a different direction.

His form is visible but I am formless. I am concentrated. He is divided. I am concentrated into one. He is divided into 10. I am 10 to his one; many against his few.  

Attack few with many on my opponent will be weak.

The place I intend to attack must not be known. If it is unknown, the enemy will have to reinforce many places, but I shall attack few.

By reinforcing his Vanguard, he weakens his rear; by reinforcing his rear, he weakens his vanguard. By reinforcing his right flank, he weakens his left; by reinforcing his left, he weakens his right. By reinforcing every part, he weakens every part.

Weakness stems from preparing against attack. Strength stems from obliging the enemy to prepare against an attack.

If we know the place and the day of the battle, then we can engage even after a march of hundreds of miles.

But if neither day, no place is known, then left cannot help right, right cannot help left, Vanguard cannot help rear, rear cannot help Vanguard. It is still worse if the troops are separated by a dozen miles or even by a mile or two.

According to my assessment, the troops of Yue are many, but that will avail them little in the struggle. So I say victory is still possible.

The enemy may be many, but we can prevent an engagement.  

Scrutinise him and know the flaws in his plans.  Rouse him, discover the springs of his actions,

Make his form visible, discover his grounds of death and life.

Probe him,  know his strengths and weaknesses.

The highest skill in forming dispositions is to be without form; formlessness is proof against the prying eyes of the subtlest spy and the machinations of the wisest brain.

Exploit the enemy's dispositions to attain victory; this the common man cannot know. He understands the forms, the dispositions of my victory, but not how I created the forms of victory.

Victorious campaigns are unrepeatable. They take form in response to the infinite varieties of circumstance.

Military dispositions, take form like water. Water shuns, the high and Hastens to the low. War shuns the strong and attacks the weak.

Walter shapes its current from the lie of the land. The warrior shapes his victory from the dynamic of the enemy.

War has no constant dynamic, water has no constant form.

Supreme military skill lies in deriving victory from the changing circumstances of the enemy.

Among the Five Elements there is no one constant supremacy. The four seasons have no fixed station. There are long days and short the moon waxes and wanes.

Best wishes

Joseph

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