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Notes from a Sun Tzu Skeptic (2019)

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Re: Notes from a Sun Tzu Skeptic (2019)

#201

Post by Galacta7 »

js2 wrote: post #147
SamBam wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They can, but you have over a million members of the military who have all sworn an oath that they will "obey the orders of the President of the United States." If they had all sworn an oath that they will "obey the orders of General McEvilFace," it would be a lot easier to maneuver all your coup pawns into place even over the protestations of the president, even without those soldiers needing to fully realize that a…

I just want to point out that their oath is first to uphold the Constitution, then to the President, then to their officers above them. https://www.military.com/join-armed-forces/swearing-in-for-m... Americans disagree about a lot, including how to interpret the Constitution and which parts of it are more or less important. But I would really hope that myself and any other random American can at least agree that our…

It's interesting that this shared allegiance to the Constitution was still strained to the breaking point 160+ years ago. I wonder how U.S. military leaders must have felt when huge swaths of the military (and military leaders) decided that bond was no longer strong enough for them to maintain their loyalty to it.

Re: Notes from a Sun Tzu Skeptic (2019)

#202

Post by jesterson »

chaostheory wrote: post #43

I’m not sure how Sun Tzu is complete garbage when his strategies were vague and often not specific, so you can adapt them according to the situation To me the problem is that the study of war, like the study of economics or any other social study; isn’t a real science. There is no repeatable theoretical model, including The Art of War. There are no universal laws that always hold true in all situations.

> There are no universal laws that always hold true in all situations

As many people pointed out, there are plenty. Humans don't change over course of centuries.

Re: Notes from a Sun Tzu Skeptic (2019)

#203

Post by ralfd »

eru wrote: post #59
tialaramex wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's why I don't understand why in the US, the president is also the top military commander. Somebody has to be in charge of the military. If that person is just someone promoted from within, you're never more than one person's decision from a coup d'etat, "A republic, if you can keep it". So, an elected leader it is. Of the three branches of the US government, only one is intended to provide an executive function,…

In Germany the (civilian) defense minister is the head of the armed forces. (Though I think that role might go to the chancellor in times of war. Not sure.)

What counts as "war" though? Technically every President since Roosevelt has used military force without a formal declaration of war by Congress. And modern Germany is not a military power projecting hegemon. I can't imagine a civilian defense minister (who in a coalition government maybe isn't even the party of the chancellor) is ordering politically important drone strikes like the US President. If Germany was in similar role the system would quickly evolve that the Chancellor would order the military.

Re: Notes from a Sun Tzu Skeptic (2019)

#204

Post by karatinversion »

jesterson wrote: post #202
chaostheory wrote: post #43

I’m not sure how Sun Tzu is complete garbage when his strategies were vague and often not specific, so you can adapt them according to the situation To me the problem is that the study of war, like the study of economics or any other social study; isn’t a real science. There is no repeatable theoretical model, including The Art of War. There are no universal laws that always hold true in all situations.

> There are no universal laws that always hold true in all situations As many people pointed out, there are plenty. Humans don't change over course of centuries.

Indeed, many of these are present in Sun Tzu, eg.

- soldiers need to be fed

- attacks on undefended locations are more likely to succeed

- if you can set your enemy on fire, do so, people really don’t like being on fire

Re: Notes from a Sun Tzu Skeptic (2019)

#205

Post by [deleted] »

kjs3 wrote: post #183
feoren wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> did you miss the part where certain very prominent Americans have been vocal about how inconvenient the Constitution is and that any provision of it which they disagree with should be 'terminated' Those prominent Americans include the original authors of said constitution: they always knew it would be a living document to be modified via amendments. Constitutional "originalists" who believe we should be totally beh…

I'm not talking about originalists, and I'm not talking about amending the Constitution through legitimate political process. I'm talking about people who feel that parts of the Constitution that they do not like they simply don't have to follow. That's about as unAmerican as it gets.

[deleted]

Re: Notes from a Sun Tzu Skeptic (2019)

#206

Post by t43562 »

michaelt wrote: post #149
t43562 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Guerillas need money too. Weapons are not free and guerillas need to eat too.

As long as you've got some bootstrap weapons, you can always steal more from whatever force it is you're fighting against. In WW2 the US proposed sending resistance fighters a million single-shot handguns [1], allowing them to kill occupation forces and take their weapons. And while men with guns very often get shot, they never starve. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FP-45_Liberator

That puts you at an extreme disadvantage which could be solved with ... money. And of course in history guerillas often have had sources of supply from other countries who are in effect providing the money. All the proxy wars of the Cold War period were like this - the Chinese or Russians or North Koreans supplying guerillas in Africa against non-communist governments or the US or South Africa doing the same for guerillas against "communist" governments.

I'm from Zimbabwe - everything in Rhodesia was about money. Money needed by the government of the time to stop the guerillas and money needed by the guerillas to house them in neighboring countries, feed and arm them.

Now that Zimbabwe is in terrible economic trouble and has obviously rigged elections and much suppression of opposition voters and of course a military coup that everyone denies was a coup, there is no rebellion and there are no guerillas because they would have no support (no money, no safe harbour, no weapons). The Russians, Chinese, South Africans and DPRK have the situation they want and the US etc don't care about it either.

Re: Notes from a Sun Tzu Skeptic (2019)

#207

Post by snapcaster »

_0ffh wrote: post #148
snapcaster wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like what? can you name one? If this is true, how come the people that study this aren't rich?

The law of diminishing marginal utility for example can be logically proven using this method. Alas, knowing it won't make you rich, the world is not that simple.

Agree with sibling comment that this is more "heuristic" than "law". There are many things that have basically 0 utility up until some threshold, there are things that become more marginally useful the more of them you have (users for your social media app)

Re: Notes from a Sun Tzu Skeptic (2019)

#208

Post by runlaszlorun »

Gud wrote: post #127
runlaszlorun wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure about the “military hammer for a solution”. At least not these days. Sure there are some- Wesley Clark’s push into Kosovo seemed suspect to me at the time. But there are many of the Colin Powell types who resist these unnecessary entanglements. I wouldn’t be surprised if back in the Grenada/Panama era of the 80’s that there may have been many chomping at the bit. These days, I’m guessing not so much.

Not sure why you are using Colin Powell as an example. He’s one of the worst stooges, helping both covering up the My Lai massacre and presenting false evidence for the UN regarding the Iraqi WMDs.

I’ve never heard about Powell and My Lai. Feel free to point me in the right direction.

As to Iraq and WMDs, you could prob call him a “stooge” if you wanted to. But the little I know from a distance, that was something that racked his conscience for the rest of his life.

Re: Notes from a Sun Tzu Skeptic (2019)

#209

Post by labster »

_8j50 wrote: post #110
labster wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that quote is just a corollary to this one: "War is the continuation of policy with other means." — Carl von Clausewitz A foreign policy that achieves your aims is better than a foreign war; a functional domestic policy is better than a civil war. But sometimes people won’t compromise and the only policy left is war.

And I don't agree with that point in general except when someone starts being violent against you, a peaceful resolution is not desirable for long term peace. Similar to a school bully or when you get in prison and you start getting picked on. Resolving things peacefully with that bully only lets other bullies come after you later on. But harming that one bully effectively ensures your safety long term.

You can disagree with it but Clausewitz is central to modern military doctrine. Analogizing interstate anarchy to bullies is fine but a bit limited; you’re never going to capture IR neorealism that way.

Re: Notes from a Sun Tzu Skeptic (2019)

#210

Post by YourDadVPN »

rramadass wrote: post #162
detourdog wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My interest in ancient cultures is how those people coped with life. Gilgamesh, torah, Aesop's fables, 1001 Arabian nights are interesting to me for how each culture dealt with and documented the human condition and social interactions. To me Sun Tzu writings and all the ancient writings are about preparing one's "mind" for an attitude that can be used to cope. The commonality of story to a culture strengthens the so…

>the ancient writings are about preparing one's "mind" for an attitude that can be used to cope [with whatever Life may throw at you] This is exactly it! One of my interests is the study of "Worldly Wisdom"(have a bunch of books from different cultures in my collection) categorized into; 1) "Idealistic"(Ethical/Moral) - Lots of Philosophies/Holy Books/etc. deal with this. 2) "Realistic/Pragmatic"(the World as it is a…

Do you have any recommended reading for these three categories?
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