War Philosophies of Sun Tzu and Clausewitz

If we look at the subject of ‘war’, two historical military generals cum philosophers Sun Tzu and Carl von Clausewitz hold a prominent position. Both of these writers have explained their views regarding the strategy and tactics in war, in their famous books; ’The Art of War’ and ‘On War’ respectively. Although one’s era is around 2500 and the other's, 280 years old. Yet, they are still referred to by many world politicians in their speeches and are taught in many military colleges around the world, simply because of their remarkable contribution to the subject of war. In this article, we are going to do a critical analysis regarding their status as philosophers as well as to try to determine who was better and why.

Philosophers or Mere War Consultants

I think it would be more appropriate to call them war consultants rather than philosophers, as philosophers are usually referred to as people who have grossly as well as positively contributed to humanity—which in their case, is hard to say. They have emphasized more on the strategy of war and gave little importance to other things like, legitimacy of war, when a war becomes inevitable and more importantly when it is not, a valid cause, freedom fighting etc. The point can be better understood by looking into the backgrounds of each.

The Sun Tzu’s period is before Christ, when China was not a single country, but a group of territories ruled by different Emperors-- with almost same religious and cultural backgrounds. A constant struggle of gaining more and more territory and power was the name of the game. War experts like Sun Tzu were in great demand at that time simply because, the wars literally had no moral cause and the one with better technical know how; ends up as the winner.

Similarly Clausewitz was a Prussian (German) general who fought many wars during the napoleon era and gathered immense experience regarding warfare. He later joined the Russian Army and served the state of Russia as a senior military general. So, both were war experts or consultants rather than philosophers.

Comparison

Sun Tzu believed more in other methods like the use of propaganda, covert operations by secret agents, breaking the allies of the enemy by offering bribes/incentives/threats-- by the political government in order to impose its will on the enemy. In other words, he was not much of an advocate of using army in a war and instead, believed in winning wars with minimum conventional engagement. His propaganda and covert operations might start a civil war in the enemy country causing more loss of life, but that was the idea behind his ideology-- make the enemy weak without exposing yourself and suffering casualties. He may be called as the pioneer of psychological war-fare. The fact that he had no respect for moral ethics and laws of engagement, can be judged from the fact that he explains the use of fire in war, telling to burn the enemy camps when the soldiers are sleeping and tells that this would terrorize the enemy. Sun Tzu also mentions that all “wars are based on deception”. The importance he gave to the role of spies, propaganda and terror tactics in a war, may again put him as the pioneer of the “spies, lies and terrorize strategy” which is off-course very popular even in present times. Unfortunately there is hardly any attempt to calculate the long term results of such a strategy. Infect, the idea of imposing your will on others mentioned by Sun Tzu itself explains his expansionist tendency, which is the cause of conflicts in this World.

Clausewitz on the other hand emphasized on 'total war' or force against force and how to strike hard and break the back bone of the enemy in a war. Even he believed that; ‘war is merely the continuation of policy by other means’, but is more ethical and does not emphasize the use of deception as a tool. One interesting thing he tells is that; the intelligence reports in an ongoing war can be wrong due to many factors and may not be considered as reliable. Even the factors of war cannot be taken as constant-- neither the parameters of a war can be predicted. He further advises that ‘war should not be made a habit by a government, but only fought after careful consideration’.

Both Sun Tzu and Clausewitz had many similarities as well in their views such as; both believed that the war should be as short as possible and that ‘wars alone’ cannot help governments achieve their objectives.

Why to Prefer Clausewitz

I think that; if we have to pick one, Clausewitz is a better choice as he was more straight-forward— he did not emphasize the use of lies or propaganda. His approach seems a bit violent, but is more upright as he does not consider war, all about ‘deception’ like Sun Tzu. But he might be right as deception sometimes back-fires in many ways, for example; loosing reputation, loosing allies, loosing the moral of soldiers-- or even increasing moral of the other side. Moreover; not using ‘deception’ and having a more honest approach can even turn your enemies into friends and therefore; eliminating altogether the need of a war. Losing a moral edge is not good in both peace and war. Let's not forget that lies are always short lived.

But that is not all; I think he thought of a more serious problem arising from secret covert operations which off-course are usually unethical-- that is the sense of ‘guilt’ among soldiers/agents. This may contribute to hidden toll of a war, in the shape of serious psychological illnesses or even suicides among soldiers. If we include the soldiers who commit suicide or develop serious psychological illness in addition to “martyred” and injured, only then we could have a more accurate idea of the casualties suffered-- or may be the result of war itself.