Quotes About Strategy

AI might similarly help groom the best detectives, bankers, and soldiers in history.

Up until the nineteenth century, the vast majority of military revolutions were the product of organisational rather than technological changes.

military power cannot go far in the twenty-first century, and that waging a successful war means waging a limited war.

Never in history did a government know so much about what's going on in the world – yet few empires have botched things up as clumsily as the contemporary United States. It's like a poker player who knows what cards his opponents hold, yet somehow still manages to lose round after round.

Since AlphaZero had learned nothing from any human, many of its winning moves and strategies seemed unconventional to the human eye. They may well be considered creative, if not downright genius.

Thus the Romans conquered Etruria in order to defend Rome (c.350–300 BC). They then conquered the Po Valley in order to defend Etruria (c.200 BC). They subsequently conquered Provence to defend the Po Valley (c.120 BC), Gaul to defend Provence (c.50 BC), and Britain in order to defend Gaul (c. AD 50). It took them 400 years to get from Rome to London. In 350 BC, no Roman would have conceived of sailing directly to Britain and conquering it.

Just as human politicians on election campaigns go around shaking hands and kissing babies, so aspirants to the top position in a chimpanzee group spend much time hugging, back-slapping and kissing baby chimps. The alpha male usually wins his position not because he is physically stronger, but because he leads a large and stable coalition.

Particularly telling are civilisation-style strategy games, such as Minecraft, The Settlers of Catan or Sid Meier's Civilization. The game may be set in the Middle Ages, the Stone Age or some imaginary fairy land, but the principles always remain the same – and are always capitalist.

the alpha male wins his position by building a stable coalition with other males and females, not through mindless violence. In

The expert goes over my text and says, "Don't use this word—use that word instead. Then we will get more attention from the Google algorithm." We know that if we can just catch the eye of the algorithm, we can take the humans for granted.

Foreign policy commands attention when it's crisis management. A street revolt breaks out in Egypt or Libya or Kiev and everyone asks, how should the president respond? Now these are important parts of America's role in the world, but they are essentially reactive and tactical. The broader challenge is to lay down a longer-term strategy that endures after the crisis of the moment.

Every political mean is imperfect."

France, Germany, Russia, China, and India are major and active players, whereas Great Britain, Japan, and Indonesia, while admittedly very important countries, do not so qualify. Ukraine, Azerbaijan, South Korea, Turkey, and Iran play the role of critically important geopolitical pivots, though both Turkey and Iran are to some extent—within their more limited capabilities—also geostrategically active. More will be said about each in subsequent chapters.

In Iraq we must succeed. Failure is not an option.

A great deal of world politics is a fundamental struggle, but it is also a struggle that has to be waged intelligently.

Because you can't intervene everywhere, you don't conclude you can't intervene anywhere.

Politics is war without bloodshed, while war is politics with bloodshed.

If one must fight one should confine oneself to conventional weapons.

Take the ideas of the masses and concentrate them, then go to the masses, persevere in the ideas and carry them through ... such is the basic method of leadership.

We are advocates of the abolition of war, we do not want war; but war can only be abolished through war.

An army without culture is a dull-witted army, and a dull-witted army cannot defeat the enemy.

You can always make up in creativity what you lack in good fortune. Playing the game of life is like playing poker. Playing three aces badly won't get you as far as playing a terrible hand well.

If you end up getting into a fight with someone, make sure that you win by at least half a mile.

Diplomacy is a continuation of war by other means.