The 33 Strategies of War (34 page)

Focus on your greater goal, your destiny.
The first step toward becoming a grand strategist--the step that will make everything else fall into place--is to begin with a clear, detailed, purposeful goal in mind, one rooted in reality. We often imagine that we generally operate by some kind of plan, that we have goals we are trying to reach. But we're usually fooling ourselves; what we have are not goals but wishes. Our emotions infect us with hazy desire: we want fame, success, security--something large and abstract. This haziness unbalances our plans from the beginning and sets them on a chaotic course. What have distinguished all history's grand strategists and can distinguish you, too, are specific, detailed, focused goals. Contemplate them day in and day out, and imagine how it will feel to reach them and what reaching them will look like. By a psychological law peculiar to humans, clearly visualizing them this way will turn into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Having clear objectives was crucial to Napoleon. He visualized his goals in intense detail--at the beginning of a campaign, he could see its last battle clearly in his mind. Examining a map with his aides, he would point to the exact spot where it would end--a ridiculous prediction, it might seem, since not only is war in any period subject to chance and to whatever the enemy comes up with to surprise you, but the maps of Napoleon's era were notoriously unreliable. Yet time and again his predictions would prove uncannily correct. He would also visualize the campaign's aftermath: the signing of the treaty, its conditions, how the defeated Russian czar or Austrian emperor would look, and exactly how the achievement of this particular goal would position Napoleon for his next campaign.

As a young man, Lyndon B. Johnson, despite his limited education, was determined to become president one day. Dream turned into obsession: he could picture himself as president, strutting the world's stage. As he advanced in his career, he never did anything without one eye on this ultimate objective. In 1957, Johnson, by that time a Texas senator, supported a civil rights bill. That damaged him in Texas but elevated him nationally: apparently a senator from the South had stuck his neck out, risking his job. Johnson's vote caught the attention of John F. Kennedy, who, in the campaign of 1960, nominated him for vice president--the job that was ultimately Johnson's stepping-stone to the presidency.

Clear long-term objectives give direction to all of your actions, large and small. Important decisions become easier to make. If some glittering prospect threatens to seduce you from your goal, you will know to resist it. You can tell when to sacrifice a pawn, even lose a battle, if it serves your eventual purpose. Your eyes are focused on winning the campaign and nothing else.

Your goals must be rooted in reality. If they are simply beyond your means, essentially impossible for you to realize, you will grow discouraged, and discouragement can quickly escalate into a defeatist attitude. On the other hand, if your goals lack a certain dimension and grandeur, it can be hard to stay motivated. Do not be afraid to be bold. In the large sense, you are working out for yourself what Alexander experienced as his destiny and what Friedrich Nietzsche called your "life's task"--the thing toward which your natural leanings and aptitudes, talents and desires, seem to point you. Assigning yourself a life task will inspire and guide you.

The goal's nature is critical: some objectives, if realized, will hurt you in the long run. The objectives of grand strategy in the true sense are to build a solid foundation for future expansion, to make you more secure, to increase your power. When Israel seized the Sinai Desert during the Six-Day War in 1967, what seemed to make sense was creating a kind of buffer zone between itself and Egypt. In fact, this just meant more territory to patrol and control, and it created a cause to motivate enduring hostility in the Egyptian populace. The Sinai was also vulnerable to surprise attack, which is what ended up happening in the Yom Kippur War of 1973. Since holding on to the desert, though seductive, ultimately disserved the needs of security, in the terms of grand strategy it was probably a mistake. It is sometimes hard to know what the long-term effects of achieving a goal will be, but the more seriously and realistically you examine the possibilities downwind, the less likely you are to miscalculate.

Widen your perspective.
Grand strategy is a function of vision, of seeing further in time and space than the enemy does. The process of foresight is unnatural: we can only ever live in the present, which is the ground for our consciousness, and our subjective experiences and desires narrow the scope of our vision--they are like a prison we inhabit. Your task as a grand strategist is to force yourself to widen your view, to take in more of the world around you, to see things for what they are and for how they may play out in the future, not for how you wish them to be. Every event has a reason, a causal chain of relationships that made it happen; you have to dig deep into that reality, instead of seeing only the surfaces of things. The closer you get to objectivity, the better your strategies and the easier the path to your goals.

THE WILD BOAR AND THE FOX

A wild boar was sharpening his tusks on a tree trunk one day. A fox asked him why he did this when there was neither huntsman nor danger threatening him. "I do so for a good reason," he replied. "For if I am suddenly surprised by danger I wouldn't have the time to sharpen my tusks. But now I will find them ready to do their duty."

The fable shows that it is no good waiting until danger comes to be ready.

F
ABLES
, A
ESOP
, S
IXTH CENTURY B.C.

You can take a step in this direction by always trying to look at the world through the eyes of other people--including, most definitely, your enemy--before engaging in war. Your own cultural preconceptions are a major hindrance to seeing the world objectively. Looking through other people's eyes is not a question of political correctness or of some soft, hazy sensitivity; it makes your strategies more effective. During the Vietnam War, the North Vietnamese intensely studied the American cultural scene. They looked for shifts in public opinion and strained to understand the U.S. political system and the social effects of television. American strategists, on the other hand, revealed an absolutely minimal understanding of the alien cultures of Vietnam--whether the South Vietnamese culture they were supporting or the North Vietnamese culture they were trying to fight. Blinded by their obsession with stopping the spread of communism, they failed to note the far deeper influences of culture and religion on the North Vietnamese way of fighting. Theirs was a grand-strategic blunder of the highest order.

Grand strategists keep sensitive antennae attuned to the politics of any situation. Politics is the art of promoting and protecting your own interests. You might think it was largely a question of parties and factions, but every individual is, among other things, a political creature seeking to secure his or her own position. Your behavior in the world always has political consequences, in that the people around you will analyze it in terms of whether it helps or harms them. To win the battle at the cost of alienating potential allies or creating intractable enemies is never wise.

Taking politics into account, you must figure out your grand strategy with a mind to gaining support from other people--to creating and strengthening a base. In the Roman Civil War in 49
B.C.
, Julius Caesar faced off against Pompey, who was then the more experienced military man. Caesar gained the edge by planning his maneuvers with an eye to their effect on public opinion in Rome. Lacking support in the Senate, he built support among the general public. Caesar was a brilliant political animal, and what made him so was his grasp of the public psyche: he understood their self-interest and shaped his strategies accordingly. Being political means understanding people--seeing through their eyes.

Sever the roots.
In a society dominated by appearances, the real source of a problem is sometimes hard to grasp. To work out a grand strategy against an enemy, you have to know what motivates him or is the source of his power. Too many wars and battles drag on because neither side knows how to strike at the other's roots. As a grand strategist, you must expand your vision not only far and wide but under. Think hard, dig deep, do not take appearances for reality. Uncover the roots of the trouble and you can strategize to sever them, ending the war or problem with finality.

When the Carthaginian general Hannibal invaded Italy in 218
B.C.
, various Roman generals strained to defeat him, but none was effective. The Roman general later called Scipio Africanus looked at the situation differently: the problem wasn't Hannibal himself, or his base in Spain, or his ability to restock his supplies by sea from Carthage; the problem was Carthage itself. This was a country with an intractable hatred of Rome, and a long power struggle had endured between the two. Instead of taking on Hannibal, a brilliant military man, in Italy, then, Scipio invaded Carthage, forcing Hannibal to leave Italy to defend his homeland. The attack on Carthage was more than a mere feint to draw Hannibal away; it was a sizable invasion. Scipio's grand strategy worked to perfection: not only did he defeat Hannibal in battle, he destroyed Carthage as a rival power, permanently ending its ability to stand up to Rome.

This is as it should be. No major proposal required for war can be worked out in ignorance of political factors; and when people talk, as they often do, about harmful political influence on the management of war, they are not really saying what they mean. Their quarrel should be with the policy itself, not with its influence. If the policy is right--that is, successful--any intentional effect it has on the conduct of war can only be to the good. If it has the opposite effect the policy itself is wrong. Only if statesmen look to certain military moves and actions to produce effects that are foreign to their nature do political decisions influence operations for the worse. In the same way as a man who has not fully mastered a foreign language sometimes fails to express himself correctly, so statesmen often issue orders that defeat the purpose they are meant to serve. Time and again that has happened, which demonstrates that a certain grasp of military affairs is vital for those in charge of general policy. Before continuing, we must guard against a likely misinterpretation. We are far from believing that a minister of war immersed in his files, an erudite engineer or even an experienced soldier would, simply on the basis of their particular experience, make the best director of policy--always assuming that the prince himself is not in control. Far from it. What is needed in the post is distinguished intellect and strength of character. He can always get the necessary military information somehow or other. The military and political affairs of France were never in worse hands than when the brothers Belle-Isle and the Duc de Choiseul were responsible--good soldiers though they all were.

O
N
W
AR
, C
ARL VON
C
LAUSEWITZ
, 1780-1831

A part of grand strategy related to severing the roots is seeing dangers as they start to sprout, then cutting them down before they get too big to handle. A grand strategist knows the value of preemptive action.

Take the indirect route to your goal.
The greatest danger you face in strategy is losing the initiative and finding yourself constantly reacting to what the other side does. The solution, of course, is to plan ahead but also to plan subtly--to take the indirect route. Preventing your opponent from seeing the purpose of your actions gives you an enormous advantage.

So make your first move merely a setup, designed to extract a response from your opponent that opens him up to what comes next. Hit him directly and he reacts, taking a defensive pose that may allow him to parry your next blow; but if he can't see the point of your strike, or if it misleads him as to where the next one will come from, he is defenseless and blind. The key is to maintain control of your emotions and plot your moves in advance, seeing the entire chessboard.

The film director Alfred Hitchcock made this strategy a life principle. His every action a setup designed to yield results down the road, he calmly thought ahead and moved step by step. His goal was to make a film that matched his original vision, uncorrupted by the influence of the actors, producers, and other staff who necessarily came along later. By controlling every detail of the film's screenplay, he made it almost impossible for the producer to interfere. Should the producer try to meddle during the actual shooting, Hitchcock would have a camera ready on set with no film in it. He could pretend to take the extra shots that the producer wanted, letting the producer feel powerful without risk to the end result. Hitchcock did the same with actors: instead of telling them directly what to do, he would infect them with the emotion he wanted--fear, anger, desire--by the way he treated them on set. Every step on the campaign trail fit perfectly into the next one.

In working on the level not of the battle but of the campaign, your first step is crucial. It should usually be deceptively soft and indirect, making it harder to read. The Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor during World War II was a devastating surprise, but as the first move of a campaign it was a disaster. The Japanese showed their hand too quickly; rallying American public opinion to an intense level of anger, they ensured that the Americans would prosecute the war to the bitter end--and it was the Americans who had the greater military resources. Always pay attention to the first step of the campaign. It sets the tempo, determines the enemy's mind-set, and launches you in a direction that had better be the right one.