The Art of War by Sun Tzu - Book Report/Review Example

RUNNING HEAD: THE ART OF WAR The Art of War [Name of the Writer] [Name of the Institution] The Art of War Written in the 4th century BCE, The Art of War by Sun Tzu reflects its opposition western post-enlightenment strategic thought: 19. Now there are three ways in which a ruler can bring misfortune upon his army: 20. When ignorant that the army should not advance, to order and advance or ignorant that it should not retire, to order a retirement. This is described as ‘hobbling the army’. Chia Lin: The advance and retirement if the army can be controlled by the general in accordance with prevailing circumstances. No evil is greater than commands of the sovereign from the court. 21. When ignorant of military affairs, to participate in their administration. This causes the officers to be perplexed. 22. When ignorant of command problems to share in the exercise of responsibilities. This engenders doubts in the minds of the officers. (Sun Tzu, The Art of War, p.81) The ‘art of war’ presents the manoeuvre warfare as: ‘For to win one hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the acme of skill. To subdue the enemy without fighting is the acme of skill.’ (Sun Tzu, The Art of War, p.77) The art of war gives the idea of collective advantage whereas the Western post-enlightenment strategic thought only thinks of self interest. The paper discusses that the art of war represent a strategic theory that is fundamentally at odds with western post-enlightenment strategic thought. In many ways, the spirit of the New World Order in West is a mix of socialist economics, Enlightenment notions of rationality, and very deep and rich traditions of medieval millennialism that were carried to West by Protestant preachers who, as Richard Gamble writes, made West into a "permanently revolutionary nation." (Walter, 1997) Gamble calls the outcome of this development the "Christ-Nation," a symbol by which "Wilson reassigned the divine attributes of Christ to the Western nation: the U.S. was the Mediator, the light of the world, the peacemaker, the bringer of salvation."8 In this concept, Gamble writes, we see "the worst of disordered loves." (Mark, 2003) Kennington sees three meanings of the concept Enlightenment in the context of conscious rejection of classical philosophy-what we may call the "political program" implicit in modern philosophy. He writes that "...Enlightenment rhetoric has a permanently divisive social function" that encourages modem man to engage in the mastery of naturejto advance science, and communication between scientists; and to promote "open" societies versus those that "seek the autonomous cultivation and preservation of their own morality and way of life." (Mark, 2003) This "permanently divisive social function" of modern, Enlightenment philosophy found fertile soil in the shaping of Wilson's successful challenge of traditional religion by converting West into a Christ-Nation devoted to permanent revolution. The advantages and losses of manoeuvre warfare are given in the following thoughts from The Art of War: 2. Nothing is more difficult than the art of manoeuvre. What is difficult about manoeuvre is to make the devious route the most direct and to turn misfortune to advantage. 3. Thus, march by an indirect route and divert the enemy by enticing him with bait. So doing, you may set out after he does and arrive before him. One able to do this understands the strategy of the direct and the indirect. 12. Now war is based upon deception. Move when it is advantageous and create changes in the situation by dispersal and concentration of forces. 16. He who knows the art of the direct and the indirect approach will be victorious. Such is the art of maneuvering. (Sun Tzu, The Art of War, pp.102-110) John Keegan, in A History of Warfare, supports the difference in instructional and intellectual thought concerning war between western and eastern cultures. Nonwestern armies have been taught to fight using tactics such as evasion and delay. They were taught to wear an enemy down and fight from distance.16 Sun Tzu describes this type of warfare in The Art of War. The Chou kings fought the Shang dynasty because the dynasty failed to lead the people in a fair and just way. Sun Tzu describes the Chou tactics as evasion and delay, which is how they were forced to fight because the Shang dynasty was superior in both resources and manpower. Sun Tzu also stresses that the logistics support from other people and states also helped the Chou. The Art of War has transcended generations and has been used by nonwestern warriors to learn how to fight and be successful in an insurgency. Post-Enlightenment set the conditions for this type of warfare to proliferate from 1945 to 1972 in East Asia, leaving the colonies there in a power vacuum. (Sun Tzu, The Art of War, pp.38-39) Strategic culture in perspective No one and no institution can operate 'beyond culture'.38 US strategic culture is a 'collective self-image' that generates preferences in the understanding of Sun Tzu and perpetuates and revitalizes these values. Just as Wrigley’s Western way of war could not explain the US behaviour in the Philippines War and First World War, similarly US strategic culture might not affect everyone in the same manner. However, everyone is, to an extent, socialized to think in this technological paradigm via their shared military training and institutions. For this majority, the US strategic culture moderates the effect of Sun Tzu. Traditional ideas of liberty and equality were hypostatized-spun off from the context of the rule of law, federalism rooted in the Constitution of the United States, and historical experience-and made into parts of an Western "creed." This dogmatic system of hypostatized ideas divides West today. As a result, the Western people are easily attracted to appeals to Western idealism. (Ernest, 2005) West’s choices seem to fall into these categories: accept the secular religion of a New World Order; destroy traditional culture in the Middle East through the imposition of the "permanently divisive social function" of Enlightenment rationality; or pursue a foreign policy that seeks to preserve West’s national interests; accept that the Islamic culture of the Middle East has value, and adapt Western policy to the best features of that culture. (Robert, 2002) Wars are costly, and the Western people pay for war with high taxes and spilled blood. After awhile, they vote out of office internationalists and policies not driven by national interest. Observations and Further Research This research alludes to three interesting observations that may point to further research. Firstly, there seems to be a Western approach towards a la carte 'strategies' which decontextualize the cultural and military context in which the strategists wrote. This is supported by evidence of widespread misuse of Sun Tzu. This is alongside other strategic thinkers, such as Clausewitz, whose focus on the fog, friction, chance and luck in war is antithetical to the Western ethos of absolute certainty and precision, and who might have suffered a similar fate. (Walter, 1997) In addition, Jomini's emphasis on science and technology was accepted, but not his one sentence principle - 'bring superior force to bear on a point where the enemy is both weaker and vulnerable to crippling damage' which is similar to Sun Tzu's cheng/ch'i manoeuvre warfare. Therefore, Western pragmatism and its technological focus results in this selective understanding of Sun Tzu that risks losing the inherent logic and consistency within and further aggravates the a-strategic problematic of the United States. (Ernest, 2005) Secondly, it is understandable that Sun Tzu is distorted in the US: there are inherent cultural differences which make it all but inevitable. The Art of War is a short philosophical treatise, which involves the essence of Taoist philosophy and ancient Chinese way of life. Taoism believes in harmony, moderation and the use of minimum force. These run counter to Western ideals of pragmatism, utilitarianism and overwhelming force. Does that mean Sun Tzu is never relevant to the US context? No, but Sun Tzu needs to be appreciated from an outsider's perspective. The fact that Britons Liddell Hart and T E Lawrence also expounded the indirect approach highlights the poverty of any clear-cut East-West dichotomy. Interestingly, Gordon Brown's British strategy for the Long War, clearly distinct from the US emphasis on linearity and technology, reflects an emerging European strategic culture that may be even closer to Sun Tzu's ancient China than the US. (Ernest, 2005) Lastly, what might Sun Tzu have advised on the role of technology in warfare? If technology was rudimentary in ancient China - and Sun Tzu did not mention technology - then is Sun Tzu relevant to twenty-first century warfare? In fact, Sun Tzu lived in an age of technological transformation too, yet he still advised that humans remain the most important element in warfare. The US's failure to understand and act upon its strategic culture perpetuates the Western self-belief of having completely understood and applied Sun Tzu. This helps explain why there has been little development of its post-enlightenment strategic thinking. This self-belief also dangerously maintains its technological-based strategy. The use of technology and management techniques to operational war is not a strategy. This is why Colin Gray labeled the US as 'a-strategic'. (Walter, 1997) These are structural problems which require a searching examination of its own problems and a commitment to act upon them. West was still the same America. It was selfish, but also at times remarkably selfless. It was self-absorbed, but also frequently concerned about horrors and crises overseas. A majority of West could be persuaded, if anyone troubled to make the case, that intervening in the Balkans, in Somalia, in Haiti, was the right thing to do, just as they could be persuaded, until their government could no longer persuade itself, that intervening to "save" South Vietnam was the right thing to do. West still believed in the "myth." They still believed in West the great and West the good. Pragmatism and utilitarianism underlies the US reverence for and pride in its science and technology. Technology is so central that it warrants a National security Science and Technology Strategy, which declares the importance of technological superiority in the US national military strategy. The 2001 US Army Field Manual (FM 3-0) describes 'information technology as both a powerful enabler and tool that creates conditions for decisive action'.27 The 2006 Quadrennial Defense Review Report (QDR) restates its commitment in 'sustaining America's scientific and technological advantage over potential competitors'. Its national experience of technological wars has reinforced the belief that production, rather than strategic skill, determines national security and that numerical inferiority is offset by technological superiority. Precision-guided munitions replace humans with machines on many battlefields, thus reducing casualties, a domestic requirement since the Vietnam War. Technology and US material production capacity promise short and decisive wars, overwhelming the enemy with superior firepower. Furthermore, the successes of information technology in the civilian world and the enticing arguments put forth by the Tofflers on its impact on war-fighting further strengthened the US military's reverence for science and technology. Strategy is thus, to an extent, equated with technology. In general, these US strategic/cultural norms support 'the American way of war': annihilation and attrition. The US likes to 'deliver wars that are short in duration, quick in tempo, low in casualties and strategic in consequences'. (Robert,2002) The enemy is treated as an inventory of targets to be destroyed by procedural attrition warfare, as opposed to a manoeuvre warfare approach, which engages intelligence and the intellect. Manoeuvre warfare is not alien to US military thinking; Ulysses Grant famously demonstrated it in the Civil War. But it was neglected by Weigley's influential thesis and resulted in a continuing propensity towards overwhelming force despite the defeat in Vietnam. Although concepts such as the indirect approach are adopted in the QDR, US strategic culture skews the practice of these concepts towards the traditional direct approach as seen by the GWOT and its call for annihilation. (Robert,2002) Relating back to the research question, the US strategic culture, and specifically its over-reverence of and over-reliance on science and technology, has resulted in the conceptual distortion of Sun Tzu to justify the Information Technology Revolution in Military Affairs (IT RMA). In the quote, 'know the enemy and know yourself, Sun Tzu referred to the foreknowledge of the enemy's intentions through human intelligence and a cultural understanding of the enemy. He cites 'five types of spies: local, internal, double agent, expendable and living'.31 With local, internal, living spies and double agents, the US can know the terrorists' strategies, intentions and alliances. Such foreknowledge essentially allows the US to operate inside the terrorists' OODA loop. (Robert,2002) With expendable spies who can spread false information (deception) and leak it to the terrorists' agents, the US can thus attack the minds of the terrorists. This will mislead or confuse to the extent that their flawed strategy will collapse by itself. In addition, the US could also isolate the terrorists from their allies and sources of funding. This punctures their morale and support base, 'subduing without fighting'. It is thus with good human intelligence in hand that Sun Tzu declared with confidence that 'one who knows the enemy and knows himself will not be endangered in a hundred engagements [in figurative speech]'. (Robert,2002) However, instead of understanding Sun Tzu in this light, the US strategists have distorted Sun Tzu to construe that he recommends the knowing of the enemy's technical capabilities and whereabouts via technological means. Thus, the US seeks to use information and data fusion technology to attain Owens' informational dominance with the selfbelief that Sun Tzu supports this. American strategy first offered both carrots and assurances to the military government, thereby meeting an important requirement of successful coercive diplomacy-that of offering a combination of threats and positive inducements. In this case, the Administration offered Cedras and the military leadership a promise of quiet departure from Haiti, a cash pay off, and no retribution for alleged human rights atrocities, all in return for giving up power. The United States also kept up the strategic pressure, through staging highly publicized military exercises, and, in a stunning military move, making public the Pentagon's invasion plan describing how a 20,000-strong force would invade Haiti. (Holbrooke, 1998) These steps met another critical condition for successfully using the threat of the force as an instrument of policy: A genuine concession to the adversary should be accompanied by a credible and potent threat, and thereby increase the chance of securing compliance with the coercing state's demands. However, there was no specific deadline necessary to bolster credibility and psychological pressure. Haitian leaders sensed hesitation on the part of the United States to carry out the threat, and were willing to call America's action as a bluff. The United States government met this third critical condition for the successful use of coercive diplomacy, when President Clinton in a televised address to the nation on 15 September made it clear that the Haitian military was on borrowed time. Conclusion Sun Tzu actually stated a preference for non-violence, skillful strategizing and psychological operations. In their correct engagements, there is evidence pointing towards articles in Naval Proceedings demonstrating a firmer grasp of Sun Tzu's concepts though Parameters and Military Review also featured writers who truly understood Sun Tzu. Based on the Sun Tzu’s strategic thoughts and the various influences on its strategic thinking, this article concludes that ‘The Art of War’ presents a strategic theory that is fundamentally at odds with western strategic thought. Reference  Ernest R May. (2005). The Twenty-first Century Challenge for US Intelligence' in J E Sims and Gerber (eds), Transforming US Intelligence (Washington DC: Georgetown University Press,) p. 7. The book examines super terrorism by modern war theory can offer direction in rising a new national security policy to contradict the risk. Mark McNeilly (2003). Sun Tzu and the art of modern warfare, (New York: Oxford University Press,) p. 210. The above book is consisted of Sun Tzu’s strategy of Art of war. Ralph Sawyer with Mei-Chun Lee-Sawyer (1996), The Complete Art of War: Sun Tzu & Sun Pin (Colorado: West view Press,) p. 118. The above work is a great description of Chinese strategies of warfare, organization and leadership. Holbrooke Richard (1998). To End a War (New York, NY: The Modern Library,), chs. 7, 21. Robert Coram. ( 2002). Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War, New York: Little, Brown and Company, pp. 424-5. Sun Tzu. (1971). The Art of War, S.B. Griffith trans. and ed. (Oxford University Press,), p.81 This book is divided in two parts. Both parts give detail view of Chinese war strategies and tactics to overcome on enemy. The book mostly emphasizes on subduing the enemy without any fight. Walter A. McDougall, (1997). Promised Land, Crusader State: The American Encounter with the World Since 1776 Boston, 15-38. This book is about America's foreign policy consisting over the precedent two hundred years fixes the hypothesis that America is besieged with two images of itself as reproduction in its foreign policy, beginning its early on version as a diplomatic state to current adaptation as a campaigner state. Read More