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.

Too frequent rewards indicate that the general is at the end of his resources; too frequent punishments that he is in acute distress.

To conquer the enemy without resorting to war is the most desirable. The highest form of generalship is to conquer the enemy by strategy.

If the mind is willing, the flesh could go on and on without many things.

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

O divine art of subtlety and secrecy! Through you we learn to be invisible, through you inaudible and hence we can hold the enemy's fate in our hands.

If your opponent is of choleric temper, seek to irritate him. Pretend to be weak, that he may grow arrogant.