Art of War 3.3
The Art of War (孫子兵法), Attack By Stratagem 謀攻篇
故上兵伐謀其次伐交其次伐兵下政攻城
Thus the highest form of generalship is to baulk the enemy’s plans;
the next best is to prevent the junction of the enemy’s forces;
the next in order is to attack the enemy’s army in the field;
and the worst policy of all is to besiege walled cities.
Lionel Giles's notes
I.e., as Li Ch‘üan says (伐其始謀也), in their very inception. Perhaps the word “baulk” falls short of expressing the full force of 伐, which implies not an attitude of defence, whereby one might be content to foil the enemy’s stratagems one after another, but an active policy of counter-attack. Ho Shih puts this very clearly in his note: “When the enemy has made a plan of attack against us, we must anticipate him by delivering our own attack first.”
Isolating him from his allies. We must not forget that Sun Tzŭ, in speaking of hostilities, always has in mind the numerous states or principalities into which the China of his day was split up.
When he is already in full strength.
The use of the word 政 is somewhat unusual, which may account for the reading of the modern text: 其下攻城.
Character glossary
- 故gùreason, cause; happening, instance
- 上shàngabove, on top, superior; to go up; to at
- 兵bīngsoldier; troops, an army; warlike
- 伐fácut down, subjugate, attack
- 謀móuto plan, to scheme; strategem
- 其qíhis, her, its, their; that
- 次cìorder, sequence; second, next; one after
- 交jiāoto connect; to deliver, to exchange; to
- 下xiàbelow, underneath; inferior; to bring do
- 政zhènggovernment, politics
- 攻gōngto accuse; to assault; to criticize
- 城chéngcastle, city, town; municipality
Passages with shared wording
- Zhuangzi The Identity of Contraries
- Zhuangzi Opening Trunks
- Art of War 11.54
- Art of War 2.2
- Art of War 3.4
- Tao Te Ching Chapter 64
Data: English Wikisource (Public domain texts; transcription CC BY-SA 4.0). Retrieved 2026-10-22.
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