In all history, there is no instance of a country having benefited from prolonged warfare. Only one who knows the disastrous effects of a long war can realize the supreme importance of rapidity in bringing it to a close.

Be where your enemy is not.

The best victory is when the opponent surrenders of its own accord before there are any actual hostilities...It is best to win without fighting.

If you know both yourself and your enemy, you can win a hundred battles without a single loss.

Now this foreknowledge cannot be elicited from spirits; it cannot be obtained inductively from experience, nor by any deductive calculation.

A wise general makes a point of foraging of the enemy.

When the higher officers are angry and insubordinate, and on meeting the enemy give battle on their own account from a feeling of resentment, before the commander-in-chief can tell whether or not he is in a position to fight, the result is ruin.