The supreme excellence is not to win a hundred victories in a hundred battles. The supreme excellence is to subdue the armies of your enemies without having to fight them.

If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle

The consummate leader cultivates the moral law, and strictly adheres to method and discipline; thus it is in his power to control success.

Thus those skilled in war subdue the enemy's army without battle .... They conquer by strategy.

If soldiers are punished before they have grown attached to you, they will not prove submissive; and, unless submissive, then will be practically useless. If, when the soldiers have become attached to you, punishments are not enforced, they will still be unless.

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.

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