Know thy enemy and know thy self and you will win a hundred battles.

What is of the greatest importance in war is extraordinary speed: One cannot afford to neglect opportunity.

Nothing is more difficult than the art of maneuvering for advantageous positions.

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

A kingdom that has once been destroyed can never come again into being; nor can the dead ever be brought back to life.

Be extremely subtle, even to the point of formlessness. Be extremely mysterious, even to the point of soundlessness. Thereby you can be the director of the opponent's fate.

It is a doctrine of war not to assume the enemy will not come, but rather to rely on one's readiness to meet him; not to presume that he will not attack, but rather to make one's self invincible.