When people read the word “war”, they assume the worst. However, war may be a good thing on two levels: denotatively and connotatively.
Denotatively, the word has its roots in the Indo-European wers–, which means “to confuse or mix up.”
Connotatively, war may refer to struggle. Could be a struggle with one’s inner demons or struggle with the truth.
Written by the military strategist, Sun Tzu and translated Thomas Clearly, The Art of War, clearly (pun unintended) leans to the latter. This is why it is deemed one of the best books about management leadership.
Its keen insights into human nature serve as windows to the varying and varied dimensions of leadership and how these dimensions reflect a workable as opposed to armchair strategy in overcoming the so called human predicament.
And what is that predicament?
Well, the tendency of humankind towards self-indulgent adventuring instead of venturing towards horizons, which reveal that the best conduct of war is in its avoidance.
This is why war is presented here as a head game, consisting of moving one’s metaphorical chess pieces to checkmate conclusions.
“Thus, those skilled in war, subdue the enemy’s army without battle,” Sun Tzu writes.
However, if push comes to shove and war is a consequence of such jostling, then timing is key.
You know, like the timing “when the strike of a hawk breaks the body of its prey”. Timing determines the momentum with which the hawk swoops down in overwhelming fashion.
This is how one may overwhelm their opponents. Not just in the fog of war, but in the cold light of day of a boardroom showdown, too.
No defence
The prey must not be able to defend or protect itself.
Accordingly, one must attack where the enemy does not know where to defend where the enemy does not know where to attack. “Now, an army can be likened to water, for just as flowing water avoids the heights and hastens to the lowlands, so an army should avoids strength and strike weakness,” Sun Tzu states.
Diplomacy
Here Sun Tzu extols the virtue of creating alliances to fight a common enemy. Or what comedian George Carlin once advised when he said, “If you cannot beat them, organise for them to be beaten.”
Clearly, the translator of this book, tests this thought with a real life war situation. He cites Stalin’s non-aggression pact with Hitler in August 1939. The Soviet Union tried to sign an agreement of mutual assistance with Britain and France in order to ward off an invasion by Nazi Germany.
The leaders of Britain and France refused, hoping to direct the full weight of German might on the Soviet Union, their ideological adversary.
This left Stalin, the leader of the Soviet Union, no choice but to sign a pact with Hitler. This pact bought his regime some time by preventing the German advance and giving him latitude to prepare for when Hitler did finally attack. And when he did, the Soviets were more than equal to the task of repulsing the Wehrmacht.
So diplomacy, as President Museveni demonstrated during the doomed 1985 Nairobi Peace Talks, is an effective weapon in one’s armory.
Remember what Sun Tzu said earlier: a successful joust is based on timing. Diplomacy affords such timing.
Sun Tzu’s contradictions
As with all human thought and practice, there are weaknesses in Sun Tzu’s prescriptions.
“His principles are too rigid and mechanical. For example, ‘Do not thwart an army which is returning homewards. One must leave a way of escape to a surrounded enemy, and do not press a desperate enemy too hard’.”
However, he had instructed us earlier, as I have shown above, that one must attack when the enemy is at its lowest or weakest. Now he is saying the opposite.
In fine, a retreating army must not be given a chance to rise again as it will use better timing to beat your army at later stage.
Keys to governance
Sun Tzu said, “When people are stupid, by knowledge one may rise to supremacy.”
I can’t think of any better reason for the National Resistance Movement (NRM) dumbing down the Ugandan population by promoting sizzle over substance. And then deploying spies amongst the populace to gain knowledge of its ways and manipulate its position of weakness towards NRM’s eternal rule.
Title: The Art of War
Author: Sun Tzu (Translated by Thomas Clearly)
Price: Shs60,000
Availability: Aristoc Bookshop
Published: 1998
Pages: 242
