The Art of War

The Art of War is an ancient Chinese military treatise that is attributed to Sun Tzu (also referred to as "Sunzi" and "Sun Wu"), a high ranking military general and strategist during the late Spring and Autumn period (some scholars believe that the Art of War was not completed until the subsequent Warring States period).

Composed of 13 chapters, each of which is devoted to one aspect of warfare. It is said to be the definitive work on military strategies and tactics of its time, and is still read for its military insight.
The Art of War is one of the oldest and most successful books on military strategy in the world. It has been the most famous and influential of China's Seven Military Classics: "for the last two thousand years it remained the most important military treatise in Asia, where even the common people knew it by name." It has had an influence on Eastern military thinking, business tactics, and beyond...
Sun Tzu emphasized the importance of positioning in military strategy. The decision to position an army must be based on both objective conditions in the physical environment and the subjective beliefs of other, competitive actors in that environment. He thought that strategy was not planning in the sense of working through an established list, but rather that it requires quick and appropriate responses to changing conditions. Planning works in a controlled environment; but in a changing environment, competing plans collide, creating unexpected situations.
The book was first translated into the French language in 1772 by French Jesuit Jean Joseph Marie Amiot and into English by British officer, Everard Ferguson Calthrop, in 1905. Leaders as diverse as Mao Zedong, General Vo Nguyen Giap, Baron Antoine-Henri Jomini, General Douglas MacArthur, and leaders of Imperial Japan have drawn inspiration from the work. The Art of War has also been applied to business and managerial strategies.

The beginning of The Art of War, in a classical bamboo book from the reign of the Qianlong Emperor.



The Art of War is divided into 13 chapters (or piān), and the collection is referred to as being one zhuàn ("whole" or alternatively "chronicle").

This track is about "Defeating your enemy without fighting", based on chapter three ('Attack by Strategem', 謀攻谋攻).