A biography for Sun Tzuhasn’t been written yet.
“first lay plans which will ensure victory, and then lead your army to battle; if you will not begin with stratagem but rely on brute strength alone, victory will no longer be assured”
“It is essential to seek out enemy agents who have come to conduct espionage against you and to bribe them to serve you. Give them instructions and care for them. Thus doubled agents are recruited and used.”
“Know the enemy, know yourself and victory is never in doubt, not in a hundred battles.”
“We are not fit to lead an army on the march unless we are familiar with the face of the country -- its mountains and forests, its pitfalls and precipices, its marshes and swamps.”
“There is no instance of a nation benefitting from prolonged warfare.”
“To know your Enemy, you must become your Enemy.”
“The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.”
“He will win who, prepared himself, waits to take the enemy unprepared.”
“Engage people with what they expect; it is what they are able to discern and confirms their projections. It settles them into predictable patterns of response, occupying their minds while you wait for the extraordinary moment — that which they cannot anticipate.”
“Pretend inferiority and encourage his arrogance.”
“Thus it is that in war the victorious strategist only seeks battle after the victory has been won, whereas he who is destined to defeat first fights and afterwards looks for victory.”
“who wishes to fight must first count the cost”
“Victory usually goes to the army who has better trained officers and men.”
“If those who are sent to draw water begin by drinking themselves, the army is suffering from thirst. [One may know the condition of a whole army from the behavior of a single man.]”
“If you know the enemy and know yourself you need not fear the results of a hundred battles.”
“If ignorant both of your enemy and yourself, you are certain to be in peril.”
“Conceal your dispositions, and your condition will remain secret, which leads to victory; show your dispositions, and your condition will become patent, which leads to defeat.”
“To see victory only when it is within the ken of the common herd is not the acme of excellence.”
“When your army has crossed the border, you should burn your boats and bridges, in order to make it clear to everybody that you have no hankering after home.”
“There has never been a protracted war from which a country has benefited.”