Quotes About Tactics

By reinforcing every part, he weakens every part.

Invincibility lies in the defence; the possibility of victory in the attack.

The spot where we intend to fight must not be made known; for then the enemy will have to prepare against a possible attack at several different points;

In war, then, let your great object be victory, not lengthy campaigns.

Whoever is first in the field and awaits the coming of the enemy, will be fresh for the fight; whoever is second in the field and has to hasten to battle will arrive exhausted.

The control of a large force is the same principle as the control of a few men: it is merely a question of dividing up their numbers.

It is the rule in war, if our forces are ten to the enemy's one, to surround him; if five to one, to attack him; if twice as numerous, to divide our army into two.

No ruler should put troops into the field merely to gratify his own spleen; no general should fight a battle simply out of pique. If it is to your advantage, make a forward move; if not, stay where you are. Anger may in time change to gladness; vexation may be succeeded by content. But a kingdom that has once been destroyed can never come again into being; nor can the dead ever be brought back to life.

O divine art of subtlety and secrecy! Through you we learn to be invisible, through you inaudible, and hence we can hold the enemy's fate in our hands.

It is best to keep one's own state intact; to crush the enemy's state is only second best.

Confront them with annihilation, and they will then survive; plunge them into a deadly situation, and they will then live. When people fall into danger, they are then able to strive for victory.

The good fighters of old first put themselves beyond the possibility of defeat, and then waited for an opportunity of defeating the enemy.

It is only one who is thoroughly acquainted with the evils of war that can thoroughly understand the profitable way of carrying it on.

One hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the most skillful, subduing the other's military without battle is the most skillful.

He who relies solely on warlike measures shall be exterminated; he who relies solely on peaceful measures shall perish.

No ruler should put troops into the field merely to gratify his own spleen; no general should fight a battle simply out of pique.

Hold out baits to entice the enemy. Feign disorder, and crush him.

So long as victory can be attained,  stupid haste is preferable to clever dilatoriness.

Standing on the defensive indicates insufficient strength; attacking, a superabundance of strength.

Supreme importance in war is to attack the enemy's strategy.

Know the enemy and know yourself; in a hundred battles you will never be in peril. When you are ignorant of the enemy, but know yourself, your chances of winning or losing are equal. If ignorant both of your enemy and yourself, you are certain in every battle to be in peril.

All warfare is based on deception.

Through you we learn to be invisible, through you inaudible; and hence we can hold the enemy's fate in our hands.

If I determine the enemy's disposition of forces while I have no perceptible form, I can concentrate my forces while the enemy is fragmented. The pinnacle of military deployment approaches the formless: if it is formless, then even the deepest spy cannot discern it nor the wise make plans against it.