Quotes By Sun Tzu

He who is prudent and lies in wait for an enemy who is not, will be victorious.

The enlightened ruler is heedful, and the good general full of caution.

It is essential to seek out enemy agents who have come to conduct espionage against you and to bribe them to serve you. Give them instructions and care for them. Thus doubled agents are recruited and used.

When envoys are sent with compliments in their mouths, it is a sign that the enemy wishes for a truce.

Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win.

The good fighters of old first put themselves beyond the possibility of defeat, and then waited for an opportunity of defeating the enemy.

If our soldiers are not overburdened with money, it is not because they have a distaste for riches; if their lives are not unduly long, it is not because they are disinclined to longevity.

Know thy self, know thy enemy. A thousand battles, a thousand victories.

Regard your soldiers as your children, and they will follow you into the deepest valleys; look on them as your own beloved sons, and they will stand by you even unto death.

Know your enemy and know yourself and you can fight a hundred battles without disaster.

Supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting.

Confront them with annihilation, and they will then survive; plunge them into a deadly situation, and they will then live. When people fall into danger, they are then able to strive for victory.

Thus, what is of supreme importance in war is to attack the enemy's strategy.

The skilful employer of men will employ the wise man, the brave man, the covetous man, and the stupid man.

You have to believe in yourself.

The opportunity to secure ourselves against defeat lies in our own hands, but the opportunity of defeating the enemy is provided by the enemy himself.

Be extremely subtle, even to the point of formlessness. Be extremely mysterious, even to the point of soundlessness. Thereby you can be the director of the opponent's fate.

To see victory only when it is within the ken of the common herd is not the acme of excellence.

The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.

All warfare is based on deception.

Secret operations are essential in war; upon them the army relies to make its every move.

If we know that our own men are in a condition to attack, but are unaware that the enemy is not open to attack, we have gone only halfway towards victory.

Can you imagine what I would do if I could do all I can?

Pretend inferiority and encourage his arrogance.

For to win one hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the acme of skill. To subdue the enemy without fighting is the acme of skill.

He who knows when he can fight and when he cannot, will be victorious.

All war is based on deception.

If fighting is sure to result in victory, than you must fight, even though the ruler forbid it; if fighting will not result in victory, then you must not fight even at the ruler's bidding.

Now the reason the enlightened prince and the wise general conquer the enemy whenever they move and their achievements surpass those of ordinary men is foreknowledge.

If you know the enemy and know yourself you need not fear the results of a hundred battles.