The Supreme Art Of War Is

From Chapter 3 (Strategic Attack) of The Art of War, the military treatise attributed to Sun Tzu and composed around the 5th century BC during China's Spring and Autumn period. This line encapsulates Sun Tzu's highest strategic ideal: the acme of skill is to defeat the enemy without fighting. Chapter 3 distinguishes five escalating degrees of military excellence, with subduing the enemy's plans first, then alliances, then armies, and only as a last resort attacking fortified cities. Carl von Clausewitz would later offer the opposing view that battle itself was the decisive instrument of war.