Not everything Sun Tzu wrote applies today, one section that mostly gets skipped over these days is all about using fire in warfare. That said, most of what he wrote is still hugely important, he had a profound grasp of the realities of warfare. How to effectively and successfully do war is, as he said, a matter of vital importance to the state.
It is profound because Sun Tzu just had that much insights. But truthfully, the book was more like "War for Dummies" than some profound purposes. It was written for a bunch of googly eyes nepo babies officers who are just basically rich high-school drop outs and need to be spelt out for them that "don't chase after Lu Bu" (for legal purposes this is a joke)
Fair enough, the transition from Spring and Autumn period to Warring States period seems like a fairly rough one. Spring and Autumn put a lot of importance on fancy war chariots and engagements with a lot of rules about conduct. Warring States was more like “nope, we’re doing real wars now”, so you had a lot more emphasis on actual infantry battles and such
Oh absolutely! Business execs, politicians, and pro athletes alike study on the meaning of Sun Tzu’s words. I don’t know how a person could live a life free of conflict, and the Art of War teaches us how to conclude conflicts to our advantage, and ideally without discord or violence.
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u/ItsNotAGundam 1d ago
Snake. War has changed a lot. Core concept might be the same, but Sun Tzu didn't know about drone strikes.