What was Sun Tzu wrong about?
How many times are you gonna make this thread
>>64460710I have literally never made this thread, check the archive
The thing that shits me about The Art of War is the original was ~60 pages when translated to english and people trying to cash in keep making 300+ page versions that aren't anything like the original.Also lots of people make the mistake it was intented for senior commanders, it was intended for nepobabies that know nothing and need to be told food is important.
>>64460767So which one is the best translation?
>>64460794Wikipedia has a direct translation.
the importance of aphorisms
>>64460702Just how retarded the people he was writing "An absolute moron's intro to war" for. He should have dumbed it down even further because despite existing for millenia at this point the chinese have never won a war against anyone except themselves without outside help.
>>64460702Theyre contextual prescriptions, not statements of concrete fact
>>64460702He said war is bad if it goes on too long. If that is so, why have the best wars lasted a long time?
>>64460767>Also lots of people make the mistake it was intented for senior commandersit was> it was intended for nepobabies that know nothing and need to be told food is important.the commanders in question were shoving it at them because they knew how important it wastop commanders in the chinese army were expected to recite passages from the book from memory, because you had to live by the book if you wanted to win
>>64460702trying to teach retarded chinks how to win wars was, is, and always will be counterproductive. If you have to spend your entire book explaining how to keep your troops from starving to death in the field you won't have any pages left to discuss how to actually winClausewitz>“The first, the supreme, the most far-reaching act of judgment that the statesman and commander have to make is to establish by that test the kind of war on which they are embarking; neither mistaking it for, nor trying to turn it into, something that is alien to its nature.”Sun Tzu>“mystify, mislead, and surprise the enemy”>“If ignorant both of your enemy and yourself, you are certain to be in peril.”>“If he sends reinforcements everywhere, he will everywhere be weak.”Comparing the foundational works of military thought for the West and China makes it painfully clear that it was over for the Changs before it even began
>>64461106Your really think the Reconquista was that good?
>>64461106HECTOR!!!!!!!
>>64460970> at this point the chinese have never won a war against anyoneHow to admit you know less than nothing about history, without admitting it.
>>64461154China's so pathetic
>>64461169On war is actual intellectual porn
>>64461211it's probably the most dense in meaning of any book I've read. You can spend 10 minutes analyzing every paragraph
This is now a Clausewitz thread.>If the wars of civilised people are less cruel and destructive than those of savages, the difference arises from the social condition both of states in themselves and in their relations to each other. Out of this social condition and its relations war arises, and by it war is subjected to conditions, is controlled and modified. But these things do not belong to war itself; they are only given conditions; and to introduce into the philosophy of war itself a principle of moderation would be an absurdity.
>>64461169On War isn't a foundational text. It was a high level essay on wartime theory and ethics. Clausewitz was making predictions and observations On War while Sun Tzu was writing a field manual. If anything, Clausewitz essentially assumes you know everything The Art of War teaches and builds ontop of that.
>>64460702>Hey!>Hey guys!>GUYS!>Did you know that swamps can be wet? >Or that fire, get this, BURNS STUFF!!!!!!!!>If you're going to war maybe try not to lose?>Dude, I am so fucking deep!Sun Tzu was retarded. You're retarded for liking him.
>>64461801>Unironically thinks this is what Sun Tzu wrote.
>>64461916Yeah, sunnys killer strat was to go peepee in your coke
>>64462151Sounds like you're salty because Clausewitz isn't actually applicable outside of his era.
>>64461801Clausewitz would have slapped you and call you retard for dismissing Sun Tzu. Especially in current event.
>>64462195NTA but there's no clear sign if Clausewitz read Sun Tzu or not. Certainly, his writings echo Sun Tzu and there was a French translation available but Clausewitzs never references Art of War. For all we know they might just have been on the same wavelength.
>>64462159Quite the claim, care to back it up? Inb4 lame reason not to.
>>64460970How do you explain Vietnam, Afghanistan, Windows 11 and the current War in Ukraine then? Morons always get into power and overrule smarter people.
>>64460702Very little. UNfags will cry about his suggestions of perfidy, but the truth is that shit never actually gets prosecuted.
>>64460702It's a very basic foundation but without a foundation nothing on top of it can be built. This is like linguists debating the academic quality of fucking ABC song and judging it based on advanced knowledge. Also, when you factor in how few cultures actually wrote stuff down and didn't just dictate orally like many, the first guy to write 1+1=2 is going to make a disproportionately large impact even if every other civilization also had the same base knowledge.
>>64461801>1833AD>300BC
>>64460767you are misunderstanding Nebobabies were senior commanders in every army but the mongols until modern day.
>>64461169And yet many many of Clausewitz peers and later lost their wars because they ignored Sun Tzu far more than those that ignored clausewitz.
>>64460702>to know your enemy's strength, count thier campfires and multiply by 7He was pretty good at making General Tso's chicken. The rest was pretty stupid.
The part where he insists that you must leave surrounded troops a way out or they will fight to the death; Cannae, Ulm, Sedan, Stalingrad and other battles show that such thing is not necessary.
>>64463806>show that such thing is not necessary.And in all cases, fighting the enemy to annihilation was longer, costlier, and bloodier Sun tzu was still right, the enemy fights harder if they think theres no way out
>>64463749Yes and no, what we today call Generals and Colonels would be nepobabies but Majors could be former enlisted that rose though the ranks.
>>64463756Name a few with their mistakes, if you please.
>>64460702Literally nothing."Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win."
>>64460970They beat the US thoughbeit
>>64463806>Stalingradthe eastern front is a huge example of why leaving the enemy a way out is a good ideathe germans sought out to permanently depopulate whatever part of russia they got, resulting the soviets being emboldened to fight to the absolute bitter endand once the germans were on the backfoot, they rightfully believed that the soviets wouldnt hold back out of revenge for what happenedand the end result was barbaric fighting right up until the soviets put a flag on top of the reichstagthe western allies generally stuck to all points of the geneva convention and so germans surrendered in droves to the west rather than the same desperate defense seen in the eastsun tzu was on the ball on that, as long as the enemy thinks that surrender is worse than death, then they will fight a lot harder
>>64464373Some of this stuff is just prudent psychology, applied to warmaking.Likewise, you could derive limited treatises on international relations from certain aspects of high school popularity contests.
>>64464382>Some of this stuff is just prudent psychology, applied to warmaking.considering it was written 2500 years ago and is still applicable, its worth listening to
>>64464353Ah yes, the quantum mechanics of winners vs losers, almost makes him sound like a stupid nigger. >Nuh-uh, it's super duper smart philosophy, the Chinese love that stuff!!!-_-
>>64464387Oh yeah, do you listen to the Bible as well?
>>64464353trvke
>>64464599No that one's pretty simple.He's just saying that the outcome of a war is often determined before any fighting has actually started, and getting into a war without having already set up the conditions to win it is a pretty good way to get your ass kicked.>>64464382True, and he thought to write it down pretty early. Might seem obvious today but it clearly wasn't always, and people still don't always heed it.
>>64460970People keep saying the shit he writes is obvious, but people still get into disaster wars because they fail to follow the basics he writes about.
>>64464737Examples?
>>64460702Sun Tzu is revered cause he never had to put his ideas into practice fighting against the likes of a completely irrational opponent that wielded the equivalent of a professional army. Take him to the Mediterranean world during the same era and it would quickly become Sun Tzu's How to get buttfucked by horny Greeks
>>64464845Planning for a military victory without a civilian strategic exit strategy is pretty fucking obvious in so far as strategy beating tactics. A literal word for word victory that was achieved with minimal fighting from the Taliban.Ukraine, for obvious reasons.Upcoming Taiwan strait conflict.
>>64464855> fighting against the likes of a completely irrational opponent"If your enemy is of Choleric temper, seek to irritate him."
>>64464863So the taliban won military victories? And I assume you're talking about the Russian invasion of Ukraine? And what did sun say about civilians in war?
>>64464989"In war, let your great objective be victory, not lengthy campaigns"
>>64465013Sidesteping with strawmen only makes your paper dragon look less authentic
>>64465013Fortune cookie quotes that are only quoted to irritate people so then you can claim that people don't understand the simple platitudes and explain common sense. You're just wasting people's time disingenuously, and avoiding engaging in actual conversation because you're intellectually dishonest. Next you'll compare conversation to war and you acting like a jew is actually you winning because we're obviously big mad. Next you'll counter by saying "but isn't that true so what am I doing wrong?" Just pathetic.
What he did wrong is not his fault, but from the thousands of years of retards that actually need to read and recite his dummy guide to war. I love how he himself included a sentence that states "Try to come at me with this as your sole guide and I will bury you, you fucking court Noble"
>>64465041>>64465055So neither of you have actually read Art of War despite being about maybe 20 pages? Or maybe you missed how Sun Tzu was warning us about prolonging a conflict. Can you at least provide a counter-example of Clausewitz being useful for any conflict in the last 50 years?
>>64465068>you can claim that people don't understand the simple platitudes and explain common sense
>>64465098And yet we see military failure after failure that could be stopped by a quick reading of Sun Tzu.
>>64464604Does the Bible teach you about strategic surprise?
>>64466752In the old testament, Elijah uses an army of skeletons at one point. Is that strategic surprise?
>>64461169it does read like a fortune cookie. no disrespect to Sun Tzu.isn't Clausewitz a meme when other strategy books exist? when you consume Clausewitz you make Clausewitz mistakes.
>>64467384>consumeWhen you use the language of the jew, you are one
>>64463749At the time though there were several warring kingdoms. One's no good monger son could inherit the throne at 17 and as nobility's honor demanded, proceed to start a fight with everyone because they wanted the line on the map to move. Instructing these princes on how to keep the throne for over a year was the idea.
>>64466761Jericho is sure to fall to the Hebrew's wonderwaffen Ark
>>64460970I think he knows a little more about fighting than you do pal.
>>64463749Correct but it's also worth noting that in some cases, you had to be a capable commander for your family to become (and remain, in your sons' cases) nobility
>>64469225Not necessarily. Unless there are regular wars an aristocratic family can basically claim to be effective military commanders and nobody will be able to prove otherwise.
>>64460702The jews.
