
人皆知我所以勝之形,而莫知吾所以制勝之形。
Source: The Art of War, Chapter VI · Weaknesses and Strengths
A collection of quotes on the topic of strategy, people, doing, other.
人皆知我所以勝之形,而莫知吾所以制勝之形。
Source: The Art of War, Chapter VI · Weaknesses and Strengths
Letters published in the Buffalo News (10 June 2001)
2000s
Source: An Ordinary Person's Guide to Empire (2005), p. 86
Source: War Talk
Probably apocryphal. This quotation does not appear in any print translation of Sun Tzu. The first citation in Google Books is from 2002; no citation in Google Books occurs in a translation of Sun Tzu.
Misattributed
“Thus, what is of supreme importance in war is to attack the enemy's strategy.”
是故上攻伐谋
The Art of War, Chapter III · Strategic Attack
Variant: Thus, what is of supreme importance in war is to attack the enemy's strategy.
Source: The History of Sexuality, Volume 1: An Introduction
Source: Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done
“The essence of strategy is choosing what not to do.”
Source: What is strategy?, 1996, p. 70
“If you don't have a strategy, you're part of someone else's strategy.”
“Strategy will compensate the talent.
The talent will never compensate the strategy.”
What US leaders have never understood about Iran http://nypost.com/2015/07/19/what-us-leaders-have-never-understood-about-iran/, New York Post (July 19, 2015).
New York Post
Go Rin No Sho (1645), The Wind Book
Context: Some other schools have a liking for extra-long swords. From the point of view of my strategy these must be seen as weak schools. This is because they do not appreciate the principle of cutting the enemy by any means. Their preference is for the extra-long sword and, relying on the virtue of its length, they think to defeat the enemy from a distance.
In this world it is said, "One inch gives the hand advantage", but these are the idle words of one who does not know strategy. It shows the inferior strategy of a weak spirit that men should be dependant on the length of their sword, fighting from a distance without the benefit of strategy.
Go Rin No Sho (1645), The Wind Book
§ 6
"Looking Back on the Spanish War" (1943)
Context: The outcome of the Spanish war was settled in London, Paris, Rome, Berlin — at any rate not in Spain. After the summer of 1937 those with eyes in their heads realized that the Government could not win the war unless there were some profound change in the international set-up, and in deciding to fight on Negrin and the others may have been partly influenced by the expectation that the world war which actually broke out in 1939 was coming in 1938. The much-publicized disunity on the Government side was not a main cause of defeat. The Government militias were hurriedly raised, ill-armed and unimaginative in their military outlook, but they would have been the same if complete political agreement had existed from the start. At the outbreak of war the average Spanish factory-worker did not even know how to fire a rifle (there had never been universal conscription in Spain), and the traditional pacifism of the Left was a great handicap. The thousands of foreigners who served in Spain made good infantry, but there were very few experts of any kind among them. The Trotskyist thesis that the war could have been won if the revolution had not been sabotaged was probably false. To nationalize factories, demolish churches, and issue revolutionary manifestoes would not have made the armies more efficient. The Fascists won because they were the stronger; they had modern arms and the others hadn't. No political strategy could offset that.
The most baffling thing in the Spanish war was the behaviour of the great powers. The war was actually won for Franco by the Germans and Italians, whose motives were obvious enough. The motives of France and Britain are less easy to understand. In 1936 it was clear to everyone that if Britain would only help the Spanish Government, even to the extent of a few million pounds’ worth of arms, Franco would collapse and German strategy would be severely dislocated. By that time one did not need to be a clairvoyant to foresee that war between Britain and Germany was coming; one could even foretell within a year or two when it would come. Yet in the most mean, cowardly, hypocritical way the British ruling class did all they could to hand Spain over to Franco and the Nazis. Why? Because they were pro-Fascist, was the obvious answer. Undoubtedly they were, and yet when it came to the final showdown they chose to stand up to Germany. It is still very uncertain what plan they acted on in backing Franco, and they may have had no clear plan at all. Whether the British ruling class are wicked or merely stupid is one of the most difficult questions of our time, and at certain moments a very important question.
“Strategy requires thought, tactics require observation.”
Source: "Can Socialists Be Happy?" https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwell/essays-and-other-works/can-socialists-be-happy/, Tribune (20 December 1943). Published under the name ‘John Freeman’.
“The most dangerous strategy is to jump a chasm in two leaps.”
Interview in The Palm Beach Post (1 August 2008) http://www.palmbeachpost.com/localnews/content/state/epaper/2008/08/01/0801obama1.html
2008
Regarding Forrest's millitary genius, William T. Sherman w:The Life of General Nathan Bedford Forrest, by John Allan Wyeth, p.635.
Source: Blue Ocean Strategy, 2005, p. 13 (2016 extended edition)
Go Rin No Sho (1645), The Ground Book
Testimony before the Senate Committees on Armed Services and Foreign Relations (15 May 1951), published in Military Situation in the Far East, hearings, 82d Congress, 1st session, part 2 (1951), p. 732.
Variation: "… a wrong war at the wrong place and against a wrong enemy."
Military Situation, p. 753.
Go Rin No Sho (1645), The Fire Book
"Further Reflections on the Conversations of Our Time" (1997), which received first place in the Philosophy and Literature Bad Writing Contest
2014, Address to the United Nations (September 2014)
“Getting the right people in the right jobs is a lot more important than developing a strategy.”
Source: Jack: Straight from the Gut (2001), Ch. 24.
At the 1958 Commonwealth Games, Milkha describes how Dr. Howard, the American coach built the strategy to outrace his biggest threat Milkha At Midnight, 13 December 2013, publisher+Outlook India http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?282698,
2000s, White House speech (2006)
In a speech on Democratic Development, Pluralism and Civil Society delivered at the Nobel Institute, Oslo, Norway (7 April 2005). http://www.akdn.org/speech/nobel-institute-oslo
Source: A Soldier's Story (1951), p. ix.
2009, A New Beginning (June 2009)
1950s, The Russell-Einstein Manifesto (1955)
"Rational expectations and the dynamics of hyperinflation." 1973
“What strategy does the brain use to read itself out?”
In Search of Memory (2006)
Context: What strategy does the brain use to read itself out? That question, which is central to the unitary nature of conscious experience, remains one of the many unresolved mysteries of the new science of mind.
Go Rin No Sho (1645), The Water Book
Context: The gaze should be large and broad. This is the twofold gaze "Perception and Sight". Perception is strong and sight weak.
In strategy it is important to see distant things as if they were close and to take a distanced view of close things. It is important in strategy to know the enemy's sword and not to be distracted by insignificant movements of his sword. You must study this. The gaze is the same for single combat and for large-scale combat.
2014, Statement on ISIL (September 2014)
Context: Now, it will take time to eradicate a cancer like ISIL. And any time we take military action, there are risks involved –- especially to the servicemen and women who carry out these missions. But I want the American people to understand how this effort will be different from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. It will not involve American combat troops fighting on foreign soil. This counterterrorism campaign will be waged through a steady, relentless effort to take out ISIL wherever they exist, using our air power and our support for partner forces on the ground. This strategy of taking out terrorists who threaten us, while supporting partners on the front lines, is one that we have successfully pursued in Yemen and Somalia for years. And it is consistent with the approach I outlined earlier this year: to use force against anyone who threatens America’s core interests, but to mobilize partners wherever possible to address broader challenges to international order.
“Strategy is the craft of the warrior.”
Go Rin No Sho (1645), The Ground Book
Context: Strategy is the craft of the warrior. Commanders must enact the craft, and troopers should know this Way. There is no warrior in the world today who really understands the Way of strategy.
There are various Ways. There is the Way of salvation by the law of Buddha, the Way of Confucius governing the Way of learning, the Way of healing as a doctor, as a poet teaching the Way of Waka, tea, archery, and many arts and skills. Each man practices as he feels inclined.
“If you do not look at things on a large scale it will be difficult for you to master strategy.”
Go Rin No Sho (1645), The Ground Book
Context: If you do not look at things on a large scale it will be difficult for you to master strategy. If you learn and attain this strategy you will never lose even to twenty or thirty enemies. More than anything to start with you must set your heart on strategy and earnestly stick to the Way. You will come to be able to actually beat men in fights, and to be able to win with your eye. Also by training you will be able to freely control your own body, conquer men with your body, and with sufficient training you will be able to beat ten men with your spirit.
Go Rin No Sho (1645), The Wind Book
Context: If you rely on strength, when you hit the enemy's sword you will inevitably hit too hard. If you do this, your own sword will be carried along as a result. Thus the saying, "The strongest hand wins", has no meaning.
In large-scale strategy, if you have a strong army and are relying on strength to win, but the enemy also has a strong army, the battle will be fierce. This is the same for both sides.
Without the correct principle the fight cannot be won.
The spirit of my school is to win through the wisdom of strategy, paying no attention to trifles. Study this well.
2015, State of the Union Address (January 2015)
Context: When we make rash decisions, reacting to the headlines instead of using our heads; when the first response to a challenge is to send in our military -- then we risk getting drawn into unnecessary conflicts, and neglect the broader strategy we need for a safer, more prosperous world. That’s what our enemies want us to do. I believe in a smarter kind of American leadership. We lead best when we combine military power with strong diplomacy; when we leverage our power with coalition building; when we don’t let our fears blind us to the opportunities that this new century presents. That’s exactly what we’re doing right now. And around the globe, it is making a difference. [... ] That’s how America leads -- not with bluster, but with persistent, steady resolve.
The Economics of Success (D. van Nostrand & Co., 1963), pp. 291–292
“We have two essential strategies for coping: the way of avoidance or the way of attention.”
The Aquarian Conspiracy (1980), Chapter Three, Brains Changing, Minds Changing
“A man is just a woman’s strategy for making other women.”
Source: The Handmaid’s Tale (1985), Chapter 20 (p. 121)
“However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results”
Attribution debunked by Langworth.
Misattributed
Source: Published by Richard Langworth online: https://richardlangworth.com/quotes
“Forward momentum only worked as a strategy if one had correctly identified which way was forward.”
Source: Vorkosigan Saga, Komarr (1998), Chapter 16 (p. 268)
“Strategy is a commodity, execution is an art.”
Source: Magic Bites
Source: Her Own Rules
“Niceness is a decision, a strategy of social interaction; it is not a character trait.”
Source: The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals That Protect Us from Violence
Source: Magic Breaks
“Appeals to the past are among the commonest of strategies in interpretations of the present.”
Source: The Poker Face of Wall Street (2006), Chapter 1, The Art of Uncalculated Risk, p. 23
Ibid.
"The Ends of Zionism: Racism and the Palestinian Struggle"
[Conservation Biology, Whither Conservation Biology?, June 1993, 7, 2, 215–217, 10.1046/j.1523-1739.1993.07020215.x, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1046/j.1523-1739.1993.07020215.x] (quote from p. 215)
"Making the Wars for Oil Obsolete," May 22, 2016 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hd6gLKkaBD4
Source: "Control: Organizational and economic approaches," 1985, p. 135
Source: The 25-Year War: America's Military Role in Vietnam (1984), p. 45
A Fundamental Quest – Hizb ut-Tahrir and the Search for the Islamic Caliphate, Grey Seal, London 1996
Violence is golden
A Sky Without Eagles (2014)
Rich Dad Poor Dad: What the Rich Teach Their Kids About Money-That the Poor and the Middle Class Do Not!
Source: Women, Men, and the International Division of Labor, 1983, p. 93
"Imaginationland," The Daily Dish (25 October 2007)
Radio address http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2007/01/20070113-2.html discussing his plan to send 21,500 more troops to Iraq (January 13, 2007)
2000s, 2007
“Strategy Is not a to-do list.”
Entrepreneur "Strategy is Not a To-do List" https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/238513 October 16, 2014.
The Other World (1657)
Source: "Beyond McGregor’s Theory Y", 2002, p. 2: introduction; Republished in: Douglas McGregor. The Human Side of Enterprise 1960/2006. p. 366
Trumpocracy: The Corruption of the American Republic (2018)
Globe Asia Interview, Sep, 2015. http://www.inside-rge.com/Sukanto-Tanoto-Resource-King-GlobeAsia
2015
"Exclusive Amit Shah Interview: People are waiting to vote for Modi," 2013, "Sunday Interview: We had 450 video raths with GPS and I’d get feedback on my mobile, says Amit Shah", 2014
“In this the Fire Book of the NiTo Ichi school of strategy I describe fighting as fire.”
Go Rin No Sho (1645), The Fire Book
Close Encounters http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A62470-2002Apr4, Washington Post (April 7, 2002)
On reading Rocket Man by Ray Bradbury
Brown : The Last Discovery of America (2003)
"Why I won't buy an iPad (and think you shouldn't, either)" on BoingBoing (2 April 2010) http://boingboing.net/2010/04/02/why-i-wont-buy-an-ipad-and-think-yo.html