If ignorant both of your enemy and yourself, you are certain to be in peril.

So it is that good warriors take their stance on ground where they cannot lose, and do not overlook conditions that make an opponent prone to defeat.

It is sufficient to estimate the enemy situation correctly and to concentrate your strength to capture him. There is no more to it than this. He who lacks foresight and underestimates his enemy will surely be captured by him.

In the practical art of war, the best thing of all is to take the enemy's country whole and intact; to shatter and destroy it is not so good.

They [spies] cannot be properly managed without benevolence and straightforwardness.

Be where your enemy is not.

The best general is the one who never fights.