Sun Tzu Short Quotes

25 Sourced Quotes

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Set the troops to their tasks without imparting your designs.

Sun Tzu
Rewards for good service should not be deferred a single day.

Sun Tzu
Peace proposals unaccompanied by a sworn covenant indicate a plot.

Sun Tzu
Hold out baits to entice the enemy. Feign disorder, and crush him.

Sun Tzu
Who does not know the evils of war cannot appreciate its benefits.

Sun Tzu
Be subtle! be subtle! and use your spies for every kind of business.

Sun Tzu
Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where you are not expected.

Sun Tzu
The King is only fond of words, and cannot translate them into deeds.

Sun Tzu
He will win who knows how to handle both superior and inferior forces.

Sun Tzu
In war, then, let your great object be victory, not lengthy campaigns.

Sun Tzu
He will win who, prepared himself, waits to take the enemy unprepared.

Sun Tzu
Attack is the secret of defense; defense is the planning of an attack.

Sun Tzu
To maintain an army at a distance causes the people to be impoverished.

Sun Tzu
Spies cannot be usefully employed without a certain intuitive sagacity.

Sun Tzu
What is of supreme importance in war is to attack the enemy's strategy.

Sun Tzu
As water has no constant form, there are in war no constant conditions.

Sun Tzu
The opportunity of defeating the enemy is provided by the enemy himself.

Sun Tzu
Hence the saying: One may know how to conquer without being able to do it.

Sun Tzu
Knowledge of the enemy's dispositions can only be obtained from other men.

Sun Tzu
There has never been a protracted war from which a country has benefitted.

Sun Tzu
So the important thing in a military operation is victory, not persistence.

Sun Tzu
Unless you enter the tiger's lair, you cannot get hold of the tiger's cub's.

Sun Tzu
If it is to your advantage, make a forward move; if not, stay where you are.

Sun Tzu
One defends when his strength is inadequate, he attacks when it is abundant.

Sun Tzu
Ground which can be abandoned but is hard to re-occupy is called entangling.

Sun Tzu