dave lukins

SapperSgt..Clausewitz had a captive audience of high ranking Prussian Officers to pass on his words of wisdom. However ,our chinese friend had tens of thousands who"Heung" on to his every word..or else. Both have their place secured in Military History...now ,Charles M Schultz there's a topic for debate!!lol

Kansas Bear

When considering "Arts of War", one should also realize there were numerous "books" on military strategy that were written by Chinese authors..

T'ai Kung
Ssu-ma
Wu-tzu
Wei Liao-tzu
Huang Shih-kung
T'ang T'ai-tsung & Li Wei-kung
T'sao T'sao


Just to name a few.

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zraver

I voted neither, not because they lack relevance, but becuase its apples and oranges to compare them. Sun Tzu dealth with strategic and politcal goals of war as applied to the nation state. Von Clauswitz dealt with tactical and operational matters pertainig to feild armies once a state of war exists.

its like comparing Eisenhower or Marshal (masters of the Sun Tzu school of total and politcal warfare) and Patton (one of the great feild commanders) the two simply don't readily comapre but rather complament one another.

Asim Aquil

Any nice place to read up on both? Though I've read Sun Tzu's translated stuff in brief and just heard some quotations...

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Shek

You've got it backwards. Clausewitz's most famous dictum is that war is the "continuation of politics by other means."

However, it is nice to have company in the "neither" column and I like your thought that they are really complementary.

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Shek

Asim,

If you're serious on reading up on some modern strategy readings, here's a good book that will give you a great survey of the most influential strategists in the past few centuries.

http://www.amazon.com/Makers-Modern-...e=UTF8&s=books

I don't have any recommendations for good companion books for Sun Tzu.

Asim Aquil

I'm reading up on this:

http://www.clausewitz.com/CWZHOME/Vo...ONWARTOC2.HTML

zraver

Read em again Shek, "war is a continuation of politics by other means" is VC's out in dealing with the politcal aspect of going to war. He then spends his time detailing how to win the battle. One reason he rejects decpetion is it drains away from the schwerepunkt. Very sound reasoning on the tactical and operational level where the goal is to find your enemies center of gravity and knock it out so that his will to resist is broken.

On the strategic level and on the politcal level deception is critical, VC surely knew this. The fact that he does not distinguish between strategic deception and frivilous tactical trickery shows again his fixation on the tactical and operational aspects of war.

Sun Tzu on the other hand spends most of his time advising on what a ruler (political head) has to do to enable his generals to win. His advice to generals is more cautionary on what to do to prepare before the fight, not how to actually grab your enemy by the throat and throttle the life out of him.

Both ST and VC have blind spots. ST is so cautionary that his teachings almost breed timidity, and a student who is not already in possesion of a surfeit of agression will lose every fight tryign to follow ST's precepts. History is repleat with such commanders who had every thing they needed to win but agression.

VC on the other hand is so fixated on the idea that centers of gravity like capitols and major cities are the key to victory, that enemies who place thier reliance on alternatives can often avoid the decisive blow he calls for and thus remain in the fight.

The two blend well together becuase the caution/agression play off agaisnt one another while together they deal with various aspects and levels of war from the politcal to the tactical.

Inst

I think the reason Sun Zi was so cautious was because of his situation. In the Warring States period, each state had many neighbors, some of them capable powers and none of them willing to settle for less than total victory. Attrition in this case does not mean that your kill:loss is on parity with your immediate opponent, it has to be on parity with all your neighbors.

Imagine if the moment the Prussians reached Paris, the Austro-Hungarian Empire would immediately launch an attack on Prussia simply for the sake of taking advantage of a distracted state.

The Chap

I opted for "none".

Anyone for old Nic?

"The Prince" still seems fresh.

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dave lukins

And whilst they were distracted attacking Prussia,who would be protecting their homeland? I see a loop developing here!!

zraver

very true, funny VC also emerged in a multi-polar world of similar quasi-fuedal or proto states many with very capable commanders. A case of steel sharpening steel as it were. Warring States, End of Republican/ early Imperial Rome, Napoleonic Era, and WW2 definately rank as the 4 big periods of human history when truky great military minds have emerged en masse.

troung

Jomini

For better of worse the bloodless/limited war theories he came up with sold well during his time and keep creeping back in. Jomini called for small (compared to Nap's forces) and well trained proffesional forces fighting for limited political objectives (minor adjustments of borders) and relying on manuever warfare to force the enemy into bad positions and to threaten their supply lines without risking ones own. He called for a general staff, medical service and humane punishments for soldiers.

And better yet he wrote his thoughts down giving a sort of manual (to those that could read French and had the time to actually read him). And he had his famous scientifc approach to warfare putting it all down in rational science.

He was a legend in his own time and was "read" up until the 1950s (bad translations made it so he wasn't really read - more quoted). Claus died an unknown until mentioned in 1870 by Moltke which caused people to "read" him.

In the era of the restoration he promoted small armies fighting for limited gains with limited bloodshed. Wanted to restrain the bloodshed of armed conflict. The nation in arms of the revolutionary war was to be a militia at best. He had a niche which was pointing in a different direction and reaching back to what was before Nap.


A very favorible review I found online... I'll post a very unfavorible review if someone wants...
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Antoine Henri De Jomini:The Art of War eBook

The art of war, independently of its political and moral relations, consists of five principal parts, viz.: Strategy, Grand Tactics, Logistics, Tactics of the different arms, and the Art of the Engineer. We will treat of the first three branches, and begin by defining them.

Written by: Antoine Henri De Jomini, Horace E. Cocroft (Commentary), G. H. Mendell (Translator), W. P. Craighill (Translator)

Book Description
"In 1991, General Norman Schwarzkopf drove Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait using several specific strategies. Schwarzkopf established a temporary supply base in the Saudi Arabian desert to form a base of operations for the U.S. Seventh Corps and then used Marine and Arab coalition allies in a pinning operation against Iraqi troops in Kuwait while the Seventh Corps made a turning movement into the Iraqi rear. Having captured its limited, geographic objective, the coalition called a halt to the war. Schwarzkopf's strategies came straight from Antoine-Henri Jomini's The Art of War, which is the foundation of professional military education in the Western world." - from the new introduction....Antoine Henri de Jomini's The Art of War is considered by many to be the definitive work on military strategy and tactics. His impact on professional military thinking, doctrine and vocabulary is unparalleled by any other military theoretician. Though authors like Clausewitz may be better known to some, few can match the breadth of practical advice offered by the man who served both Napoleon and the Russian Tsar....This edition faithfully reproduces Jomini's seminal work, beautifully reformatted and typeset and includes a new introduction and brief chapter by chapter commentary.

Read Full Review and Download The Art of War eBook
The Art of War eBook - Military - Defense News | Defence Forum | Military Pictures Photos | Weapons

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Swift Sword

Sir,

Based on the choices available, I voted for Sun Tzu.

On your immediate question of relevance, I think that Sun Tzu's stressing of the political dimension of conflict as well as the importance of information makes his work eminently useful in the current security climate.

Furthermore, I think that the large number of commentaries on Sun Tzu's "Art of War" by various authors in various ages at various locations makes the study of that book in conjunction with the later commentaries a more useful package to both the strategist and the policy maker than Clausewitz.

Too, anybody can read Sun Tzu and "get it" with a little study of history and some sincere reflection. Clausewitz, OTOH, can be a beast to the uninitiated or otherwise faint of heart.

In general, I think that Clausewitz got it backwards: diplomacy is war continued by other means, not the reverse.

In the grand scheme of things, it would seem that war is the lower, baser human state with regards to human conflict and interaction, not the higher.

I feel that Zraver has some very valid insights into the matter and Troung is being very helpful by pointing people in the direction of Jomini.

Regards,

William

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Ironduke

I voted Sun Tzu... won't go into details (as strange as it might sound), but I find that his strategies have their uses in other types of "battlefields".

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