It's not, but before the information age you had people thinking that planes wouldn't change warfare so it's a good idea to dumb down the technicalities for the no child left behind crowd such as yourself.
Go read something a million times better than plebian "art of scrub noobs," like von Clausewitz.
>feeding soldiers good >not feeding soldiers bad
mind blown
it has a cool name though. it sounds cool. the ART of WAR. >it's better to win battle than lose
so true!
It's for dumbfuck bureaucrats that just got handed an army out of the blue and suddenly needed to fight a war that would have happened thousands of years ago. That would be like saying >huh... the peasants use sharpened sticks??? Really? Is military engineering really this braindead???
There are retards today which place way too much stock in it, obviously, but that doesn't mean that it is the pinnacle of military science.
Everyone here seems to miss the main point of the book, even though its explicitly spelled out in the very first paragraph
Warfare is expensive, risky, difficult, and absolutely vital to not be ground into dust
If you fuck it up, your likely to get out of it with your country intact >War is a grave affair of state >it is a place of life and death >a road to survival and extinction >a matter to be pondered carefully
And yes, this does sound obvious, but look at WW1, Vietnam, Soviet Afghanistan, the Falklands, and of course the war in Ukraine, and see how often it is forgotten
And Hannibal kicked Romes ass, following most of the principals of that book, until Scipio attacked Carthage in Spain and Africa, also following those principles
If the senators had their way, they would have kept throwing bodies at Hannibal, and he would fight them at a time of his choice, at ground of his choice, and decimate them, until Rome ran out of citizens, and then slaves, and then Allies as the revolted.
That's not the point, the point is that the book lays out fundamental principles of warfare, and that even in areas as far away as the med, the generals that followed those principles where by far the most successful, and those that ignored them, like Crassus, failed.
Everything about that war goes against AoW. >poor logistic lines >no capturing surrendering soldiers >slow heavy units beating fast mobile ones
Just stfu already.
about that war goes against AoW >Attacking the enemy where he's weakest >lure the enemy into fighting on unfavourable terrain >Smaller forces beating larger ones through better organization and strategy >refusing to engage in sieges, as they would remove his ability to dictate the terms of battle >directly following the strategies described for mountains, rivers and marshes in chapter 9
sure thing buddy
2 weeks ago
Anonymous
>having big dick armorered elephants means you're smarter and more organized >refusing to siege rome didn't cost him the war
okay there friend pal
2 weeks ago
Anonymous
NTA and also not an expert, but I thought Hannibal didn't lay siege on Rome because he didn't have enough troops to actually do it and as a result just ran around bleeding Rome dry instead.
2 weeks ago
Anonymous
I don't think he would've even if he had double the troops.
He didn't have the morale (his army was mostly mercenaries) or supplies (mostly replenished by raiding, which requires moving around a lot) to lay siege, and like I said it would remove his greatest asset, the use of maneuver and terrain
2 weeks ago
Anonymous
>attack enemy where he's weakest
fuck nobody told me
2 weeks ago
Anonymous
in mount and blade that is where the enemy is at the weakest because otherwise you'd have to spend days and days hunting enemy armies down and instead they're all just right there waiting to be slaughtered
Everything about that war goes against AoW. >poor logistic lines >no capturing surrendering soldiers >slow heavy units beating fast mobile ones
Just stfu already.
the book is overhyped by retards
but its overhyped by retards because its original intended target audience was retards
specifically it was intended to give a very base level of understanding of the kind of shit you probably can and should do in warfare to chinese aristocrats/nobility and bureaucrats who had never led anything more than a shopping trip
it's also the reason why it uses so much taoist imagery and is intentionally obtuse; this was intended to make it look more like some unironically 2deep4u hidden knowledge for said retards and entice them to actually read it since if they didn't, but others did, they would embarass theirselves socially
it's literally babby's first guide to warfare except it doesn't even serve that purpose anymore due to being horrible out of date
>Idk, the second army in the world currently isn't even following his basic instruction guide, I think he had a point to me >keep your plans a secret from your soldiers and even your closest confidants
Followed it perfectly. >by making retreat impossible, your army will fight with determination and not a thought spent on fleeing
Kherson, though it's of courae not an absolute.
Russia's army is led following Sun Tsu's principles.
Ukraine's army follows Clausewitz.
Make of that what you will.
>Dude, before starting a war, you should know how strong is your army and know how strong is the enemy >man, you should keep your war plans secret, if enemies know where your forces are and when they are planning to attack its a bad thing >You should take care of your logistics and be able to supply your army >You should be aware weather and ground conditions when planning operations >You should avoid wasting your armies on besieging fortified positions >Your generals should be competent and not stupid >Don't waste your army when you have nothing to gain >Don't allow for infighting in your ranks, soldiers should trust and respect leaders, leaders should respect soldiers
etc etc
Now, if you want to laugh that its all so basic, boring, kindergarten stuff that should be obvious to anyone - well, take a good look at picrel.
>US and British intelligence predict down to the day Putin plans to attack, loudly announces it for weeks >attack anyway
what is this military maneuver called?
It's the "It's not gonna get better for us if we wait, so just stick to the plan and we'll probably be able to bum rush our way to the capitol"
It's not a completely wrong idea, since Ukraine had been getting stronger since 2014 and had it's economy and internal politics slowly improve. The problem was that by early 2022, bum rushing their way through was already no longer an option. They just assumed that they could still pull a 2014 somehow, despite 8 years of serious Ukrainian investments in training and arms since then.
>>US and British intelligence predict down to the day Putin plans to attack, loudly announces it for weeks
anyway
Only a complete idiot would attack after their secret plans were revealed to the whole world so that's exactly why they did it, to catch the world offguard.
You do not understand the nature of this war.
The point is for Russia and the West to destroy each other, so that the nation that actually controls the governments of both empires can stand victorious in the end.
>if it already controls both empires
They control the government and the elite. It's a very fragile top-down power structure that pits them in opposition to the majority of the population. Hence why they want the 2nd amendment gone so bad.
I would also like to point out that both President Biden and Trump have publicly confirmed that they control some 85% of the mass media and the federal government of the US, meaning that you are mentally retarded if you're still unaware of this fact:
https://odysee.com/@OlinLive:f/trumpisrael:8
https://www.theoccidentalobserver.net/2013/05/24/joe-bidens-faux-pas/ >why would it want to destroy them?
They hate the populations of both empires and want to eradicate them on a biological level. They're in fact commanded by their religion to commit genocide against the nation of Esau/Edom, which they identify with Europeans and Christians, which includes both Russia and the West. See picrelated and also see this video for ten minutes of a number of their religious leaders proclaiming this:
https://odysee.com/@KnowMoreNews:1/Edom-Finished:d >Are you retarded?
No, but you are. I can't even imagine being as fucking dumb as you. Watching tens of thousands of hours of TV and not noticing that it's all produced by people from the same tiny ethno-religious minority with hughly distinctive phenotypes? You lack critical thinking abilities to such a degree that it's questionable whether you can even be considered human.
>.if it already controls both empires why would it want to destroy them?
lmao, next you're gonna ask "if they control both political parties, why would they want them to campaign against each other?"
>US and British intelligence predict down to the day Putin plans to attack, loudly announces it for weeks >attack anyway
what is this military maneuver called?
Hey he did keep it a secret from his own troops.That counts right?
>The West knew >The Ukranians knew >The Russian government knew the west knew >Russian troops kept in the dark about the invasion, some thought they were just doing maneuvers when captured
The only group that didn't know the invasion was coming was the actual Russian invader lol
Did Ukraine know? They mobilized a bit late (not as late as the Russians) and didn't seem as well prepared as they could be, such as losing Kherson early on. And Zelensky was even publicly disputing the US intelligence shortly before the invasion. I don't think they ignored the build-up of Russian forces but they seemed to be somewhat prepared more than fully prepare for it.
Speculatively, Russian aligned elements in the Ukrainian military/government might have been able to muddle intelligence enough. They "removed" some high level guys and arrested some of Putin's friends iirc. They could have been successfully sabotaging the early response.
afaik they "knew" but they were still worried of it being bs or cancelled at the last second due to fear of panic and other shenanigans that they didn't properly react to it. but i just read that somewhere and it might have been nonsense
This is just the latest example. Basically any strategy is fine as long as it isn’t completely retarded, but history is packed to the gills with complete retards in command.
Aren't like half of these military advisor quotes from civ 5? man I'm not even smart enough to play on high difficulty and this fucker went straight to hard mode
You're meant to translate what Sun Tzu says into strategy, because TAoW is more principal.
Honestly, "Sit on the bank of the river and watch the bodies of your enemy float by" is such an amazing principal in general, but how it applies to you is where the meaningful strategy comes in.
It seems I never saved a picture of the pontooooooning disaster. What a pity.
I wonder if that Uke engineer is still around.
On defending river crossings, the Art of War says to let half the enemy force cross and then attack - one of the more specific pieces of advice in the book.
>Read Clausewitz >fifty pages explaining strategy is defined as the summation of the discounitation of the continuous state change of discrete battles which in turn is defined as the culmination of individual actions culminating in a culmination of culminated strategic culminations >1 page of yeah sometimes you don't know stuff on the battlefield
>discredit the man who invented scorch earth tactic
Is an ancient as fuck tactic invented by nobody.
Clausewitz' main value is he discusses war within the context of the modernizing world of nation-states in Europe in the 19th Century, a world which in many ways is still applicable today. Most especially in line with Metternich's (incidentally his contemporary) idea of the Balance of Powers among Nations states after the establishment of the Holy Alliance post-BTFOing of Napoleon.
Its unlike Sun who discusses war as a human phenomena in general, whose work boils it down to its very basics.
You really didn't read shit. Anyone who did usually sees the value of both instead of engaging in muh fanboyism.
First of Clausewitz is about applying long term pressures, especially for partisan/guerrila style warfare. But it's I expected a pleb like you to know nothing. Doesn't surprise me, and maybe you did read some of his stuff but you 100% understood nothing that makes him outstanding as a strategist.
>All your post does is prove my point
I explained the context of the art of war and you called it "shilling."
GTFO illiterate moron.
Your very first line is about hating people putting Sun Tzu fanboys in their place. Just fuck off already.
Every field needs an introductory book to teach people the basics, without this most people would commit very stupid mistakes, wich in war you can only do once.
There's a lot of low level insticts involved that were evolved to scare away rival monkeys which are counter productive when applied to warfare with bronze age or better technology. Many of the things that seem obvious when you think about it go against these instincts, so it's worth explicitly stating them.
It's a brain-dead IN HINDSIGHT field.
In reality the fog of information makes strategy the kind of nerve racking career that makes betting it all on 00 at the roulette table seem downright relaxing by comparison.
This fog of information is what drove western (and well, just about every other) philosophy to become worshippers of miracles and higher powers, whereas the maniacal autism of one man in CHYNA nailed warfare so tightly to what his Greek contemporaries would call logos that logos became the guiding principle of Chinese affairs while other parts of the world remained glued to popes, shamans and caliphs.
It just turned out that the best logos in presiding over a population is to suppress their rights, power and freedom, leading to a lack of creative thoughts and scientific/industrial development - somewhat of a recurring theme across the world.
It's for dumbfuck bureaucrats that just got handed an army out of the blue and suddenly needed to fight a war that would have happened thousands of years ago. That would be like saying >huh... the peasants use sharpened sticks??? Really? Is military engineering really this braindead???
There are retards today which place way too much stock in it, obviously, but that doesn't mean that it is the pinnacle of military science.
It's for anybody who finds themselves in a war you moron. People literally aren't born with an innate knowledge about how to fight intelligently and effectively, nor do they gather that knowledge spontaneously.
>in a context where literacy is the domain of rote memorization and regurgitation of exams, bros literally must be taught how to think on the battlefield >Wu/Mu, Tao.
The operational minutia is superseded by the OODA loop order of operations. It's teaching retards how to deal with uncertainty (and cultivate that in the enemy's mind).
> It's teaching retards how to deal with uncertainty
Ah yes, because only retarded people struggle with the fog of war and not knowing anything specific on the battlefield. You are a fucking retard.
I despise fags who say "hurr Sun Tzu is common sense," they take the book out of its purpose and context. >Centuries before Sun Tzu, China was under the Zhou Dynasty (1200-400 BC) >It had a feudal warrior class- the Shi- who had monopoly over martial skills & military leadership. >Commoners could not serve in the military, only the Shi can do that.
>The Zhou Dynasty collapses and Warring States-era China (700s-200s BC) begins >China gets split into separate Kingdoms fighting each other for supremacy. >An era of total war: Kings used every resource they had in brutal prolonged campaigns vs. rivals. >By the middle of the era, the Shi got BTFO via attrition. >Since dead Shi couldn't be replaced quick enough, Kings began to allow commoners to serve in the military. >Kings also began promoting commoners into military leadership.
>Basically: people with zero military backgrounds were joining the military in kingdoms all over China.
>Be General Sun Tzu (or whoever, we dunno if he's 1 guy, a group of generals, or a legendary figure) >Be worried over all of these noobs in the military. >Especially the noobs in the officer class. >They need to learn the basics of war fast. >So you write down the very first "Dummies Guide to War." >I n a very general sense to be applicable to all scenarios, write about the objectives of war, what you need to do before engaging in warfare, sound tactics and strategy, and how to deal with either defeat/victory. >Emphasize that war is a matter of national survival, so dont be a dumbass and do chivalrous bullshit like fighting fairly or honor duels. >Ancient Chinks love poetry so you write it in poem form, with witty memorizable slogans like "Know thyself & know thy enemy."
>You finish the book hoping these morons have a solid foundation for military thinking. >My_job_here_is_done.scroll
>Centuries later Total War playing incels call your book "common sense" coz its not the special secret recipe book to victory that they thought it was.
Cognitive dissonance is a bitch isn't it? Art of War is for people too lazy to bother reading real military strategies from famous generals. In fact we can find some of the most notably generals in history like ex. Napoleon being the type of hot tempered person who shouldn't lead according to Sun Tzu. It's not only an entry level book, it contains bad moral relativistic babbling proverbs meant to bloster you into a complacent fucktard who truely knows nothing about war. They don't fucking teach Sun Tzu at west point they skim that shit and go deep into Clausewitz. Fucking read good shit, whatever I'm wasting my precious time with you dumb cretins. Fuck you.
>They don't fucking teach Sun Tzu at west point they skim that shit and go deep into Clausewitz.
They don't teach neither Sun Tzu or Clausewitz at all unless you enroll in the History of Military Sciences.
Most of the Westpoint's Geneeral Education curriculum focuses on way more modern publications. And holy fuck a lot of it is Self-Help bullshit. >https://history.army.mil/html/books/105/105-1-1/CMH_Pub_105-1-1_2011.pdf
I despise fags who say "hurr Sun Tzu is common sense," they take the book out of its purpose and context. >Centuries before Sun Tzu, China was under the Zhou Dynasty (1200-400 BC) >It had a feudal warrior class- the Shi- who had monopoly over martial skills & military leadership. >Commoners could not serve in the military, only the Shi can do that.
>The Zhou Dynasty collapses and Warring States-era China (700s-200s BC) begins >China gets split into separate Kingdoms fighting each other for supremacy. >An era of total war: Kings used every resource they had in brutal prolonged campaigns vs. rivals. >By the middle of the era, the Shi got BTFO via attrition. >Since dead Shi couldn't be replaced quick enough, Kings began to allow commoners to serve in the military. >Kings also began promoting commoners into military leadership.
>Basically: people with zero military backgrounds were joining the military in kingdoms all over China.
>Be General Sun Tzu (or whoever, we dunno if he's 1 guy, a group of generals, or a legendary figure) >Be worried over all of these noobs in the military. >Especially the noobs in the officer class. >They need to learn the basics of war fast. >So you write down the very first "Dummies Guide to War." >I n a very general sense to be applicable to all scenarios, write about the objectives of war, what you need to do before engaging in warfare, sound tactics and strategy, and how to deal with either defeat/victory. >Emphasize that war is a matter of national survival, so dont be a dumbass and do chivalrous bullshit like fighting fairly or honor duels. >Ancient Chinks love poetry so you write it in poem form, with witty memorizable slogans like "Know thyself & know thy enemy."
>You finish the book hoping these morons have a solid foundation for military thinking. >My_job_here_is_done.scroll
>Centuries later Total War playing incels call your book "common sense" coz its not the special secret recipe book to victory that they thought it was.
Agreed. It's a great overview of the most important aspects of warfare, and like 85% of it is still totally relevant.
It's impressive that such a "modern" book (with respect to logic and military science) was written thousands of years ago.
Yep. There are more detailed and nuanced texts throughout history, but the reason The Art of War has never stopped being relevant is because well-written basic primers to fields of study will always be the most useful texts. Eventually you go on to more nuanced and thorough works but you all start here.
True, people think it's "common sense" because they had access to video games, internet, movie and books nowadays. The book was written when access to war was either to be in the middle of it or read some writing.
Pretty much this. People don't understand just how much the average person and themselves don't know.
People in 1920 didn't know what 1921 would hold and the same is true for 2023.
We have so much access to technology and information nowadays, that dumb people have this pretentious idea that somebody somewhere knows what's going on.
Truth is, they don't, nobody does, and the guys who know nobody does have actually read a book from 3000 years ago that is still as relevant today as it was then.
Fucking global power countries today do stupid shit that the "common sense" in Sun Tzu literally, verbatim, tells them is a bad idea.
>People in 1920 didn't know what 1921 would hold and the same is true for 2023.
so true, in hindsight when we look upon poor decisions made many years ago, we scratch our heads and wonder how they could be so fucking retarded, but they were just as smart as us.
>“The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.”
https://twitter.com/KSAmofaEN/status/1634180277764276227?t=fF8uy9nynPwysPiWg5fzsg&s=19
https://twitter.com/BeckyCNN/status/1634231636312088578?t=BeEd4I-nH9SMqb9DUc_USg&s=19
>Art of War
What you have to understand is that it's a product of the time.
The education back then was fucking abysmal and so was the quality of advisor.
Sure, the book is a collection of obvious facts mixed in with a massive heap of bullshit.
But the other guy gets his advice from a charlatan pretending to read chicken entrails.
So if you read the book you were a fucking military genius in comparison..
For most of human history war was an aesthetic function more than it was a utilitarian one. Look at the code of chivalry for instance — absolutely incomprehensible in fighting an effective war.
Both are effective but they are still revelant because they let out the tactical aspect of war. Machiavelli didn’t in his art of war and it’s really a fucking useless book by today standard
The Art of War is a handbook for the militarily illiterate. Sun Tzu was basically a bureaucrat trying to teach the bare basics of running an army to aristocrats with delusions of grandeur. As a result, it's only 13 chapters long and most of it is common sense things.
It's a good place to start but you definitely want to move on to more advanced works like On War or The Strategikon.
It's easy to forget but for most of history generals were selected based on breeding and politics, and you could get absolute idiots with zero training and track record put in charge of an army and potentially the fate of a nation. Perhaps people like Varro "just charge Hannibal in one blob yolo" and Varus "Give me back my legions lmao" wouldn't had been so disastrous if they were told to shut up and read a fucking book when they were young.
It's not, but before the information age you had people thinking that planes wouldn't change warfare so it's a good idea to dumb down the technicalities for the no child left behind crowd such as yourself.
No the book itself is just overrated.
it has a cool name though. it sounds cool. the ART of WAR.
>it's better to win battle than lose
so true!
Everyone here seems to miss the main point of the book, even though its explicitly spelled out in the very first paragraph
Warfare is expensive, risky, difficult, and absolutely vital to not be ground into dust
If you fuck it up, your likely to get out of it with your country intact
>War is a grave affair of state
>it is a place of life and death
>a road to survival and extinction
>a matter to be pondered carefully
And yes, this does sound obvious, but look at WW1, Vietnam, Soviet Afghanistan, the Falklands, and of course the war in Ukraine, and see how often it is forgotten
Scrub book for clueless war noobs. Plenty of empires rose from decades of constant total war struggles like Rome vs Carthage.
And Hannibal kicked Romes ass, following most of the principals of that book, until Scipio attacked Carthage in Spain and Africa, also following those principles
If the senators had their way, they would have kept throwing bodies at Hannibal, and he would fight them at a time of his choice, at ground of his choice, and decimate them, until Rome ran out of citizens, and then slaves, and then Allies as the revolted.
No one in the west read this book until it was sold to American middle managers in the 50s are career advice
That's not the point, the point is that the book lays out fundamental principles of warfare, and that even in areas as far away as the med, the generals that followed those principles where by far the most successful, and those that ignored them, like Crassus, failed.
about that war goes against AoW
>Attacking the enemy where he's weakest
>lure the enemy into fighting on unfavourable terrain
>Smaller forces beating larger ones through better organization and strategy
>refusing to engage in sieges, as they would remove his ability to dictate the terms of battle
>directly following the strategies described for mountains, rivers and marshes in chapter 9
sure thing buddy
>having big dick armorered elephants means you're smarter and more organized
>refusing to siege rome didn't cost him the war
okay there friend pal
NTA and also not an expert, but I thought Hannibal didn't lay siege on Rome because he didn't have enough troops to actually do it and as a result just ran around bleeding Rome dry instead.
I don't think he would've even if he had double the troops.
He didn't have the morale (his army was mostly mercenaries) or supplies (mostly replenished by raiding, which requires moving around a lot) to lay siege, and like I said it would remove his greatest asset, the use of maneuver and terrain
>attack enemy where he's weakest
fuck nobody told me
in mount and blade that is where the enemy is at the weakest because otherwise you'd have to spend days and days hunting enemy armies down and instead they're all just right there waiting to be slaughtered
Everything about that war goes against AoW.
>poor logistic lines
>no capturing surrendering soldiers
>slow heavy units beating fast mobile ones
Just stfu already.
>slow heavy units beating fast mobile ones
Numidian Light Cavalry play a big role for both combatants tho. Especially at Zama
really was a totally retarded book
the book is overhyped by retards
but its overhyped by retards because its original intended target audience was retards
specifically it was intended to give a very base level of understanding of the kind of shit you probably can and should do in warfare to chinese aristocrats/nobility and bureaucrats who had never led anything more than a shopping trip
it's also the reason why it uses so much taoist imagery and is intentionally obtuse; this was intended to make it look more like some unironically 2deep4u hidden knowledge for said retards and entice them to actually read it since if they didn't, but others did, they would embarass theirselves socially
it's literally babby's first guide to warfare except it doesn't even serve that purpose anymore due to being horrible out of date
Idk, the second army in the world currently isn't even following his basic instruction guide, I think he had a point to me
>Idk, the second army in the world currently isn't even following his basic instruction guide, I think he had a point to me
>keep your plans a secret from your soldiers and even your closest confidants
Followed it perfectly.
>by making retreat impossible, your army will fight with determination and not a thought spent on fleeing
Kherson, though it's of courae not an absolute.
Russia's army is led following Sun Tsu's principles.
Ukraine's army follows Clausewitz.
Make of that what you will.
>Russia's army is led following Sun Tsu's principles.
>Ukraine's army follows Clausewitz.
>Make of that what you will.
>Russia's army is led following Sun Tsu's principles.
>Ukraine's army follows Clausewitz.
>Make of that what you will.
>by making retreat impossible
Isn't that Ukraine is doing
It's literally hunting down Ukrainian men overseas
What are you talking about? Don't you know of the classic Russian Feint?
>Dude, before starting a war, you should know how strong is your army and know how strong is the enemy
>man, you should keep your war plans secret, if enemies know where your forces are and when they are planning to attack its a bad thing
>You should take care of your logistics and be able to supply your army
>You should be aware weather and ground conditions when planning operations
>You should avoid wasting your armies on besieging fortified positions
>Your generals should be competent and not stupid
>Don't waste your army when you have nothing to gain
>Don't allow for infighting in your ranks, soldiers should trust and respect leaders, leaders should respect soldiers
etc etc
Now, if you want to laugh that its all so basic, boring, kindergarten stuff that should be obvious to anyone - well, take a good look at picrel.
>US and British intelligence predict down to the day Putin plans to attack, loudly announces it for weeks
>attack anyway
what is this military maneuver called?
It's the "It's not gonna get better for us if we wait, so just stick to the plan and we'll probably be able to bum rush our way to the capitol"
It's not a completely wrong idea, since Ukraine had been getting stronger since 2014 and had it's economy and internal politics slowly improve. The problem was that by early 2022, bum rushing their way through was already no longer an option. They just assumed that they could still pull a 2014 somehow, despite 8 years of serious Ukrainian investments in training and arms since then.
Concorde Fallacy
>>US and British intelligence predict down to the day Putin plans to attack, loudly announces it for weeks
anyway
Only a complete idiot would attack after their secret plans were revealed to the whole world so that's exactly why they did it, to catch the world offguard.
didn't help that Colonel Potato Peeler showed the whole world the invasion plan as well.
>what is this military maneuver called?
Monkey Riding Drunken Bear
It's part of the Russian mentality, except this time there are actual consequences.
You do not understand the nature of this war.
The point is for Russia and the West to destroy each other, so that the nation that actually controls the governments of both empires can stand victorious in the end.
...if it already controls both empires why would it want to destroy them? Are you retarded?
>if it already controls both empires
They control the government and the elite. It's a very fragile top-down power structure that pits them in opposition to the majority of the population. Hence why they want the 2nd amendment gone so bad.
I would also like to point out that both President Biden and Trump have publicly confirmed that they control some 85% of the mass media and the federal government of the US, meaning that you are mentally retarded if you're still unaware of this fact:
https://odysee.com/@OlinLive:f/trumpisrael:8
https://www.theoccidentalobserver.net/2013/05/24/joe-bidens-faux-pas/
>why would it want to destroy them?
They hate the populations of both empires and want to eradicate them on a biological level. They're in fact commanded by their religion to commit genocide against the nation of Esau/Edom, which they identify with Europeans and Christians, which includes both Russia and the West. See picrelated and also see this video for ten minutes of a number of their religious leaders proclaiming this:
https://odysee.com/@KnowMoreNews:1/Edom-Finished:d
>Are you retarded?
No, but you are. I can't even imagine being as fucking dumb as you. Watching tens of thousands of hours of TV and not noticing that it's all produced by people from the same tiny ethno-religious minority with hughly distinctive phenotypes? You lack critical thinking abilities to such a degree that it's questionable whether you can even be considered human.
Schizoid anti semetic ramblings again
>.if it already controls both empires why would it want to destroy them?
lmao, next you're gonna ask "if they control both political parties, why would they want them to campaign against each other?"
They say it themselves:
Hey he did keep it a secret from his own troops.That counts right?
>The West knew
>The Ukranians knew
>The Russian government knew the west knew
>Russian troops kept in the dark about the invasion, some thought they were just doing maneuvers when captured
The only group that didn't know the invasion was coming was the actual Russian invader lol
Did Ukraine know? They mobilized a bit late (not as late as the Russians) and didn't seem as well prepared as they could be, such as losing Kherson early on. And Zelensky was even publicly disputing the US intelligence shortly before the invasion. I don't think they ignored the build-up of Russian forces but they seemed to be somewhat prepared more than fully prepare for it.
Speculatively, Russian aligned elements in the Ukrainian military/government might have been able to muddle intelligence enough. They "removed" some high level guys and arrested some of Putin's friends iirc. They could have been successfully sabotaging the early response.
afaik they "knew" but they were still worried of it being bs or cancelled at the last second due to fear of panic and other shenanigans that they didn't properly react to it. but i just read that somewhere and it might have been nonsense
this sounds like a beginner tutorial for an RTS
thats because it was supposed to be esentially that, a retard chinese prince's guide to warfare
This. Sun Tzu's advice may come across as simple, but as we have seen from Russia's performance in Ukraine, it's extremely important.
This is just the latest example. Basically any strategy is fine as long as it isn’t completely retarded, but history is packed to the gills with complete retards in command.
Aren't like half of these military advisor quotes from civ 5? man I'm not even smart enough to play on high difficulty and this fucker went straight to hard mode
>not realizing its a philosophical script
NGMI
>studying philosophy
Fag
You're meant to translate what Sun Tzu says into strategy, because TAoW is more principal.
Honestly, "Sit on the bank of the river and watch the bodies of your enemy float by" is such an amazing principal in general, but how it applies to you is where the meaningful strategy comes in.
It seems I never saved a picture of the pontooooooning disaster. What a pity.
I wonder if that Uke engineer is still around.
On defending river crossings, the Art of War says to let half the enemy force cross and then attack - one of the more specific pieces of advice in the book.
Go read something a million times better than plebian "art of scrub noobs," like von Clausewitz.
>doesn't cover intelligence
>doesn't cover logistics
He basically ignores two of the most important parts of warfare
Because he shouldn't have to spoon feed retards that don't know basic shit.
>Read Clausewitz
>fifty pages explaining strategy is defined as the summation of the discounitation of the continuous state change of discrete battles which in turn is defined as the culmination of individual actions culminating in a culmination of culminated strategic culminations
>1 page of yeah sometimes you don't know stuff on the battlefield
>discredit the man who invented scorch earth tactic
After you're done reading Clauzerwitz then you study Frederik the Great then Napoleon.
>discredit the man who invented scorch earth tactic
Is an ancient as fuck tactic invented by nobody.
Clausewitz' main value is he discusses war within the context of the modernizing world of nation-states in Europe in the 19th Century, a world which in many ways is still applicable today. Most especially in line with Metternich's (incidentally his contemporary) idea of the Balance of Powers among Nations states after the establishment of the Holy Alliance post-BTFOing of Napoleon.
Its unlike Sun who discusses war as a human phenomena in general, whose work boils it down to its very basics.
You really didn't read shit. Anyone who did usually sees the value of both instead of engaging in muh fanboyism.
First of Clausewitz is about applying long term pressures, especially for partisan/guerrila style warfare. But it's I expected a pleb like you to know nothing. Doesn't surprise me, and maybe you did read some of his stuff but you 100% understood nothing that makes him outstanding as a strategist.
Your very first line is about hating people putting Sun Tzu fanboys in their place. Just fuck off already.
>I only read the first line and got mad.*
Every field needs an introductory book to teach people the basics, without this most people would commit very stupid mistakes, wich in war you can only do once.
There's a lot of low level insticts involved that were evolved to scare away rival monkeys which are counter productive when applied to warfare with bronze age or better technology. Many of the things that seem obvious when you think about it go against these instincts, so it's worth explicitly stating them.
>feeding soldiers good
>not feeding soldiers bad
mind blown
soldiers good
>>not feeding soldiers bad
>mind blown
^t. russian general, unironically
It's a brain-dead IN HINDSIGHT field.
In reality the fog of information makes strategy the kind of nerve racking career that makes betting it all on 00 at the roulette table seem downright relaxing by comparison.
This fog of information is what drove western (and well, just about every other) philosophy to become worshippers of miracles and higher powers, whereas the maniacal autism of one man in CHYNA nailed warfare so tightly to what his Greek contemporaries would call logos that logos became the guiding principle of Chinese affairs while other parts of the world remained glued to popes, shamans and caliphs.
It just turned out that the best logos in presiding over a population is to suppress their rights, power and freedom, leading to a lack of creative thoughts and scientific/industrial development - somewhat of a recurring theme across the world.
It's for dumbfuck bureaucrats that just got handed an army out of the blue and suddenly needed to fight a war that would have happened thousands of years ago. That would be like saying
>huh... the peasants use sharpened sticks??? Really? Is military engineering really this braindead???
There are retards today which place way too much stock in it, obviously, but that doesn't mean that it is the pinnacle of military science.
It's for anybody who finds themselves in a war you moron. People literally aren't born with an innate knowledge about how to fight intelligently and effectively, nor do they gather that knowledge spontaneously.
>in a context where literacy is the domain of rote memorization and regurgitation of exams, bros literally must be taught how to think on the battlefield
>Wu/Mu, Tao.
The operational minutia is superseded by the OODA loop order of operations. It's teaching retards how to deal with uncertainty (and cultivate that in the enemy's mind).
> It's teaching retards how to deal with uncertainty
Ah yes, because only retarded people struggle with the fog of war and not knowing anything specific on the battlefield. You are a fucking retard.
Why is this edgy contrarianism cropping up lately vs. Sun Tzu?
Did something happen in reddit?
Because it's for sub 100 IQ noobs of war.
Yeah. Like you.
Cognitive dissonance is a bitch isn't it? Art of War is for people too lazy to bother reading real military strategies from famous generals. In fact we can find some of the most notably generals in history like ex. Napoleon being the type of hot tempered person who shouldn't lead according to Sun Tzu. It's not only an entry level book, it contains bad moral relativistic babbling proverbs meant to bloster you into a complacent fucktard who truely knows nothing about war. They don't fucking teach Sun Tzu at west point they skim that shit and go deep into Clausewitz. Fucking read good shit, whatever I'm wasting my precious time with you dumb cretins. Fuck you.
You have not read either Sun Tzu of Clausewitz and it shows.
I have and I started 15 years ago. Fuck your entry level plebeian book. Stop shilling it.
Lmao you can't even read my whole post and he claims he read it as a teen gtfo.
All your post does is prove my point. You better live with the fact people will bring it up everytime some fanboy hails it as the holy grail.
>All your post does is prove my point
I explained the context of the art of war and you called it "shilling."
GTFO illiterate moron.
>They don't fucking teach Sun Tzu at west point they skim that shit and go deep into Clausewitz.
They don't teach neither Sun Tzu or Clausewitz at all unless you enroll in the History of Military Sciences.
Most of the Westpoint's Geneeral Education curriculum focuses on way more modern publications. And holy fuck a lot of it is Self-Help bullshit.
>https://history.army.mil/html/books/105/105-1-1/CMH_Pub_105-1-1_2011.pdf
I despise fags who say "hurr Sun Tzu is common sense," they take the book out of its purpose and context.
>Centuries before Sun Tzu, China was under the Zhou Dynasty (1200-400 BC)
>It had a feudal warrior class- the Shi- who had monopoly over martial skills & military leadership.
>Commoners could not serve in the military, only the Shi can do that.
>The Zhou Dynasty collapses and Warring States-era China (700s-200s BC) begins
>China gets split into separate Kingdoms fighting each other for supremacy.
>An era of total war: Kings used every resource they had in brutal prolonged campaigns vs. rivals.
>By the middle of the era, the Shi got BTFO via attrition.
>Since dead Shi couldn't be replaced quick enough, Kings began to allow commoners to serve in the military.
>Kings also began promoting commoners into military leadership.
>Basically: people with zero military backgrounds were joining the military in kingdoms all over China.
>Be General Sun Tzu (or whoever, we dunno if he's 1 guy, a group of generals, or a legendary figure)
>Be worried over all of these noobs in the military.
>Especially the noobs in the officer class.
>They need to learn the basics of war fast.
>So you write down the very first "Dummies Guide to War."
>I n a very general sense to be applicable to all scenarios, write about the objectives of war, what you need to do before engaging in warfare, sound tactics and strategy, and how to deal with either defeat/victory.
>Emphasize that war is a matter of national survival, so dont be a dumbass and do chivalrous bullshit like fighting fairly or honor duels.
>Ancient Chinks love poetry so you write it in poem form, with witty memorizable slogans like "Know thyself & know thy enemy."
>You finish the book hoping these morons have a solid foundation for military thinking.
>My_job_here_is_done.scroll
>Centuries later Total War playing incels call your book "common sense" coz its not the special secret recipe book to victory that they thought it was.
Didn't read
Seeth chink
Figures.
read and agreed
Agreed. It's a great overview of the most important aspects of warfare, and like 85% of it is still totally relevant.
It's impressive that such a "modern" book (with respect to logic and military science) was written thousands of years ago.
Basically the Euclid of war
Yep. There are more detailed and nuanced texts throughout history, but the reason The Art of War has never stopped being relevant is because well-written basic primers to fields of study will always be the most useful texts. Eventually you go on to more nuanced and thorough works but you all start here.
True, people think it's "common sense" because they had access to video games, internet, movie and books nowadays. The book was written when access to war was either to be in the middle of it or read some writing.
Pretty much this. People don't understand just how much the average person and themselves don't know.
People in 1920 didn't know what 1921 would hold and the same is true for 2023.
We have so much access to technology and information nowadays, that dumb people have this pretentious idea that somebody somewhere knows what's going on.
Truth is, they don't, nobody does, and the guys who know nobody does have actually read a book from 3000 years ago that is still as relevant today as it was then.
Fucking global power countries today do stupid shit that the "common sense" in Sun Tzu literally, verbatim, tells them is a bad idea.
>People in 1920 didn't know what 1921 would hold and the same is true for 2023.
so true, in hindsight when we look upon poor decisions made many years ago, we scratch our heads and wonder how they could be so fucking retarded, but they were just as smart as us.
>“The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.”
https://twitter.com/KSAmofaEN/status/1634180277764276227?t=fF8uy9nynPwysPiWg5fzsg&s=19
https://twitter.com/BeckyCNN/status/1634231636312088578?t=BeEd4I-nH9SMqb9DUc_USg&s=19
https://twitter.com/WSJ/status/1636313903985577984?t=ksl1o6A0AxkY5HhgORdq9Q&s=19
>Art of War
What you have to understand is that it's a product of the time.
The education back then was fucking abysmal and so was the quality of advisor.
Sure, the book is a collection of obvious facts mixed in with a massive heap of bullshit.
But the other guy gets his advice from a charlatan pretending to read chicken entrails.
So if you read the book you were a fucking military genius in comparison..
Sun Tzu Art of War is a good primer on the basics. If you expect some drone warfare out of it, you're missing the point and context.
For most of human history war was an aesthetic function more than it was a utilitarian one. Look at the code of chivalry for instance — absolutely incomprehensible in fighting an effective war.
clausewitz is the ultimate pseud book
Both are effective but they are still revelant because they let out the tactical aspect of war. Machiavelli didn’t in his art of war and it’s really a fucking useless book by today standard
I'm so fucking tired of the Redditor circlejerk over
>le sun tzu bad its all so obvious omg
Read the book of five rings by Musashi. I’m currently reading Meditations and I will read On Resistance to Evil by Force next.
The book was composed about 2,500 years ago. Actually I think Mohism is better.
The Art of War is a handbook for the militarily illiterate. Sun Tzu was basically a bureaucrat trying to teach the bare basics of running an army to aristocrats with delusions of grandeur. As a result, it's only 13 chapters long and most of it is common sense things.
It's a good place to start but you definitely want to move on to more advanced works like On War or The Strategikon.
It's easy to forget but for most of history generals were selected based on breeding and politics, and you could get absolute idiots with zero training and track record put in charge of an army and potentially the fate of a nation. Perhaps people like Varro "just charge Hannibal in one blob yolo" and Varus "Give me back my legions lmao" wouldn't had been so disastrous if they were told to shut up and read a fucking book when they were young.