War in China and West

Once I tried read the “On War” by Carl von Clausewitz, I opened a page, and there had an calculation of how many man would kill a certain number of soldiers; I stopped there. Of course war is not an exercise of the so praised in the West math, but more chaotic. Sun tzu wrote “amidst the chaos of battle may seem disorder”; Sun Tzu would won a fight before it is started “The skilled general seeks victory and then fight“. Although maybe the equivalent of the Art of War may be The Prince of Niccolo Machiavelli, this shows the focus of them.
For example the theory of numbers that show a problem of a prisioner, that West already know the answer, the guy twill contribute or he will be retaliated after, you will not need any complicated calculation.
If I were to fight a martial artist I would ambush him or her, attack with in a superior position, what is shown on rings are nothing but a spetacle.

War is never over

As I recommended a new way of count go victories, a game is never the end of all (this is true in all games played more than once, as counting victories or ratings, but in my weiqi 围棋 (圍棋) (go) calculations, the results of your acts continues to have influence, similarly to life).
War is never over. We could see this in the results of the starving of the German army in the First World War (WWI), that produced a feeling of revenge that caused the second world war (WWII). That produced a sense of non-aggression in the countries that lost the war (mainly Japan and Germany), and have reflex in all the world, the whole universe is at war. And these events can be traced back since the start of the universe to all times to come. Is important to notice this, all is connected and the comprehension of this can make we understand better our actions.

Sun Tzu孙子 and the sovereign

There seems to be a great tension with the War imagined by Sun Tzu and the civilian authorities. There’s a famous story that he beheaded one of the preferred concubines of a Sovereign just to prove his leadership. He demonstrate what seems a discordance with the Sovereign Orders, as if they are not desirable: “Will conquer who is not interfered by the Sovereign”, ”certain orders must not be obeyed”.
In fact this is misleading; I would say even that he liked when the Sovereign intervened, as a State have other priorities but war, what he said is that the General that is not impeded by these other priorities will be likely to conquer. Like the famous phrase, criticized by Confucianists: “War is based on deception”; Sun Tzu don’t said you should lie, he just said that who deceives is more likely to win. In various parts of the Art of War 孙子宾法he points that the State and the General’s orders must be in harmony “The general receives the orders from the Sovereign …“ and at the same time points the exceptions, there’s different circumstances, you should adapt “orders of the sovereign that must not be obeyed”.

The whole universe is at war

That is why the Sun Tzu’s Art of War 孙子宾法 is so formidable, the game of weiqi(go)(围棋)(圍棋) so useful; they reflect the whole existence. The energy released in the Big Bang, the matter, the void, atoms forming molecules, molecules divided in atoms, light, darkness. That is for the Westerns that think knowing about the space and matter is the most important thing, I need not to mention the war on the human realm, that, apart various wars themselves, have conflicts of hierarchy, governs, struggle in classes, for resources, etc. Even on “Equalitarian” societies like the communists, socialists, etc. we generally see a governing party and a great leader exalted. Even if we end with all human conflicts, the fact that we cannot strive and possibly the forces that imped such events are a form of dominance over another force.

5 levels of war

There’s generally accepted there’s three levels in war: strategy, operations, and tactics; strategy is a long term plan, tactics a short term and operations a mid-level. I would add to these three levels two new ones: politics and technique. There’s generally accepted there’s a level of hierarchy, strategy on top, tactics on bottom, and operations as a mid-level; strategy and operations in lower levels but with a bigger base, for example, as a pyramid. Sun tzu said, Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat. That system of pyramid is sometimes criticized, by me too, but represent a vague idea of the level of these parts; I would put politics, or diplomacy, i prefer the term politics because of the greater scope (how people of different hierarchies, and their rulers, and incidents affect the state of war and peace) on the base of the pyramid, followed by strategy, operations, tactics and finally, on the top, technique, dexterity, ability.

For example, politics would be the base, where all is started and is so low that is sometimes not even important, since in war there are sometimes non cooperative adversaries, but it sometimes defines the state of war, maybe 孙子Sun Tzu talked about it when he said “the excellence is to conquer the enemy without fighting”. Of course using this phrase as a excuse for no need of war is a complete misconception, which would made the most part of art of war useless, Sun Tzu himself said “war is of vital importance to the state”; people more acquainted with war would use politics in a more immediate scope of war, for example bribing an army in the field, or making them surrender of fear of what could happen to them, a strategy very used by the mongols. Followed by the long term strategies, as Sun Tzu said, start even before the start of a war; followed by operational level of organizing the different groups of forces in the fronts; followed by tactics, the plan of attacking directly the troops, flanking them, ambushes, attacks of a weak point, etc. where the real battle is decided; and finally, the overlooked technique; wouldn’t the perfect all other four levels, combined in a favorable position to attack be ruined by a troop that don’t know how to fight with swords and spears or don’t have the aim to take the adversaries in a gun fight,or if they don’t have the coordination to advance in the proper formations?

This pyramid seems to be inverted compared to what generally is represented the levels, but I will explain soon why it is made so wait my next texts.

Do not learn moves, Learn with moves

A weiqi (go) saying, referring to the studies of joseki(patterns that are common in the game) that is indeed very useful in go, but should be applied to war too. In martial arts, don’t learn moves or forms and simply repeat them, learn WITH then; Sun Tzu said “do not repeat tactics that give you victory”. And this all should be applied to all Chinese philosophies. Do not learn the forms of太极拳太極拳Taijiquan(taichichuan) as if the fight would require them in the exact order you train, or they would exhaust all the possibilities of the art, Sun Tzu said that the tactics would be never exhausted; don’t simply know a judgment or line reading of the 易经(經)Yi jing (I ching) if when they say good fortune or misfortune is all you need to know; don’t learn by heart the 八卦bagua water in times of drought could mean a good thing not danger; don’t learn the text of the art of war and think it will make you a master of war, Sun Tzu said that the plans should be modified according to the circumstances; in feng shui don’t put an object in a direction that should give you luck in front of the door.