The Dougout

This paper runs a little long, but I'm happy with how it turned out. Given the paper's length, it's rather self-indulgent of me to post it as a blog entry. But, it's my blog so what the heck:

Sun Tzu in Art of War places a great deal of emphasis on the army commander. According to Sun Tzu leadership is central to establishing the character of a Chinese army. With reference to the men in the ranks of a Chinese army the greatest importance is placed on their relationship to their general. In chapter X verse 20 of Art of War, Sun Tzu notes that a competent general should regard his soldiers as “infants.” If a general treats his men as “beloved sons” they will follow him anywhere and will fight along side the general until death. The commentary on this verse reinforces this line of thought. According to both Tu Mu and Chang Yu, a general should endure the same rigors as his men. However, in the very next verse Sun Tzu warns against generals overindulging their troops since this will lead to a “disorderly” army of “spoiled children.”

These two passages exhibit the interesting dualism in Chinese thought on warfare. The idea that a general should be benevolent, just, and share in his troops hardships is clearly Confucian. Confucianism held that rulers (and generals) should govern by providing a moral example to their subordinates. By this method a righteous ruler would not have to resort to force, and if the ruler did so it was evidence of failing to provide the proper example of correct conduct. The next passage in Sun Tzu, referenced above, is an example of the Legalist influence on both that writer and the Chinese military in general. The Legalists advocated a system of strict punishment and rules and was based on a rather cynical view of human nature.[1] The Legalist position also reinforces the Chinese view that a general should impress his troops with his “awesomeness.” “Awesomeness” here refers to a general’s ability to impress his men with both his power and sagacity. It has been compared to Frederick the Great’s famous quip that Prussian troops should fear their officers more than the enemy: “The general must be an exemplary figure: loved yet awesome, capable yet receptive, unquestioned in authority and free of doubt.”[2]

Chinese warfare in general and Sun Tzu in particular were credited with using and advocated the indirect approach whenever possible. Sun Tzu, for example, wrote that both sieges and protracted war should be avoided as “there has never been a protracted war from which a country has benefited.”[3] Sun Tzu stated that a skilled general should be able to achieve his goals by strategy and without fighting battles; this principle has obvious parallels with Confucian thought. In one passage the commentator Li Chuan makes clear that this principle was widely held. He explains that after a lengthy siege Tsang Kung was still unable to take the enemy stronghold. Tsang Kung was criticized by his king for not using proper strategy. The king of Tung Hai was quoted as saying:

Now you have massed troops and encircled the enemy, who is determined to fight to the death. This is no strategy! You should lift the siege. Let them know that an escape route is open and they will flee and disperse. Then any village constable will be able to capture them![4]

This view is also consistent with Sun Tzu’s principle that a minimum amount of damage should be done to a territory during war. This line of thought seems to be based on the view that the purpose of Chinese war (at least against other Chinese) was the taking and controlling of territory and not the destruction of enemy forces. The peasants who made up the enemy army would become an asset after the war so they were not to be destroyed if avoidable.

The way Chinese generals were to motivate their soldiers was by the development of chi. Chi is not just the morale of an army but its way of achieving a high fighting spirit. John Lynn, in his recent book Battle, quotes from the Wei Liao-Tzu: “Now the means by which the general fights is the people; the means by which the people fight is their ch’i.”[5] Again, the emphasis for Chinese troops to acquire chi is the personal loyalty of the troops to their commander.

There are some preliminary questions that should be noted before plunging into the issue of whether there is an identifiable “Western Way of War” to be compared to a comparable “Asian Way of War.” One point that should be noted is that there is not a single “Asian Way of War.” As John Lynn observed, there are identifiable differences on how warfare was conducted in East Asia and South Asia. There is a marked difference in attitudes between the Chinese and Japanese classics, at least in the ones I have already read. The Chinese military writers were most influenced by Confucianism and Legalism. The Japanese writers Miyamoto Musashi and Yagyu Munenori were most influenced by Zen Buddhism. Zen Buddhism does not seem to have been influential in military affairs outside of Japan. Even within China there are two very different military traditions based on who the enemy was. When fighting the Steppe horse archers to the north the Chinese had to utilize an army that was as mobile as possible. On the other hand, when Chinese armies were fighting amongst themselves, the Japanese in Korea, or the pirates in the south they had to adopt disciplined infantry armies. However, even when these factors are taken into consideration there are elements of East Asia warfare that are different to those of the West.

Regarding Western warfare there are at least two different theories on the “Western Way of War.” The most well known has been presented by Victor Davis Hanson in such works as The Western Way of War originally published in 1989 and Carnage and Culture that came out in 2001. Hanson stated that Western culture was founded by the classical Greeks and that their type of warfare has influenced all succeeding Western militaries. Hanson further argued that the Greek and therefore Western method of war was/is based upon fundamental cultural values. As John Keegan explains:

Victor Davis Hanson, in his breathtakingly original study of warmaking in classical Greece, is persuasive that it was the small landholders of the Greek city states who invented the idea of the ‘decisive battle’ as Westerners have practiced it ever since.[6]

While Hanson focuses on cultural values to explain the development of Western warfare, Geoffrey Parker maintains that the Western military tradition (and its superiority) is based on having the best technology. In his essay on this topic William R. Thompson ignores both Hanson and Keegan but does ably defines Parker’s position: “The West was able to conquer the rest of the world thanks primarily to its edge in military technology.”[7] Another difference between these two viewpoints is that while Hanson maintains that there is continuity in Western warfare dating from ancient Greece, Parker’s focus is entirely on the post medieval period.[8]

Between these two, Hanson’s thesis is stronger. Parker himself notes the numerous occasions where non-Western powers quickly adopted weapons based on Western technology that they then used effectively against both Western and non-Western powers. For example, by the middle of the sixteenth century Acheh had fought the Portuguese to a stand-off and acquired trading concessions.[9] Another case is that of the Chinese “pirate” Cheng Ch’eng-Kung otherwise known as Coxinga. After the fall of the Ming Dynasty, Coxinga by using Fujian as a base was able to control the South China Sea by the middle Seventeenth century. As Parker relates:

By 1655, Coxinga commanded some 2,000 warships and well over 100,000 troops, making admirable use of European weaponry (whether imitated, captured or purchased) that he had originally encountered as a boy at Hirado, where his father had for a time served as chief interpreter to the Dutch factory.[10]

Coxinga’s empire (ruled by his son after his death) was only brought to an end when the new rulers of the Ching Dynasty deprived it of its naval bases on the Chinese mainland.

Hanson, on the other hand, focuses on the cultural differences between Western and non-Western civilizations and how these differences impacted military performance. One key concept to Hanson’s thesis is what he calls “civic militarism.” In his discussion of the battle of Cannae Hanson states that the reason Rome was able to recover from this disaster was its ability to quickly replace the lost legions. This ability stemmed from Roman (Western) concepts of citizenship:

This revolutionary idea of Western citizenship – replete with ever more rights and responsibilities – would provide superb manpower for the growing legions and a legal framework that would guarantee that the men who fought felt that they themselves in a formal and contractual sense had ratified the conditions of their own battle service.[11]

Of course, legionaries could and did develop personal loyalty to their commanders as in the case of Julius Caesar. However, at least in theory they were supposed to be loyal to both Rome and the idea of Rome. As noted above, the focus of Chinese armies was for their soldiers’ to both fear and worship their leaders. Whether this differing emphasis on troop motivation had a detrimental effect upon the operational efficiency of Chinese armies is a different question.

Hanson only deals briefly with the case of China in Carnage and Culture. Hanson states that although the Chinese invented printing and gunpowder they did not have in place the social institutions that were required for their further development. These conditions, Hanson implies, are of an economic nature the rigid Imperial system discouraged entrepreneurs from improving on technology in an open market place.[12]

Hanson most sustained presentation of his thesis is the book Carnage and Culture. While he very briefly discusses China in it, there is a chapter devoted to the battle of Midway. This battle is an excellent case study for Hanson’s thesis because both combatants’ military equipment was very similar. In this case it was the non-Western power that had a technological edge by virtue of Japan’s superior carrier aircraft. Despite being outnumbered and outgunned the U.S. Navy emerged victorious from the battle due to certain cultural values that gave the Americans an advantage over their opponents who did not possess such values. Hanson identifies the most important of these cultural values with the chapter title: “Individualism.” The ability of military nonconformists to break the Japanese naval code and give the Americans fore warning of the attack was not the only example Hanson cites. Another key reason for victory at Midway was the ability of American officers, both senior and junior, to improvise and innovate strategy and tactics in the confusion of battle.

As a leading historian of the Pacific war has noted, the Japanese were at their worst when forced to improvise when their plans went awry. After Japan’s string of early victories through May 1942, American counter-attacks based on what they had learned in a few short months would force the Japanese to do what they were not psychologically equipped for. H. P. Willmott noted that this situation had also occurred in the Coral Sea:

The way the Japanese shaped up to battle after Tulagi indicates a curious inability to readjust to a changing situation. Of course, this was not directly the fault of the local commanders, who had been given a task and inadequate means to see it through to successful completion. But they reacted to events with a wooden orthodoxy, passing current orders down the chain of command without regard to the dictates of the existing situation.[13]

However, as Hanson makes clear there is nothing that “curious” about the calcified nature of the Japanese military. It was an extension of the hierarchal and authoritarian nature of Japanese society, particularly during the 1930s which witnessed the regimentation of Japanese society that made obedience to authority the primary virtue.

The Second World War in the Pacific provides numerous examples of the very different approaches to war between the Americans and Japanese. In the Southwest Pacific Theater there was even a role reversal in doctrine. The Japanese Army fighting in New Guinea and the Solomons was modeled on the Prussian Army’s method of direct assault. However, their antagonist General Douglas MacArthur preferred the indirect approach in order to minimize his casualties, the very strategy of Sun Tzu![14] This illustrates that while the Japanese found it impossible to adapt to the unprecedented war in Melanesia their American enemy was quickly able to implement the method of their downfall.

At root Hanson’s thesis is correct. In the last five hundred years (Hanson would argue for the last 2500 years) the West has been able to establish its long-term military superiority against all comers. This military hegemony has its foundation not in guns, germs or steel but in certain cultural values that has led to more successful military organization. In the present day every nation’s military is, at least to some extent, based upon Western examples that date back to Rome.


[1] David A. Graff. Medieval Chinese Warfare: 300-900. (New York: Routledge, 2002 ) pp. 20-1
[2] David A. Graff and Robin Higham. A Military History of China. (Cambridge, MA.: Westview Press, 2002) p. 107
[3] Sun Tzu, II: 7
[4] Sun Tzu, III: 10
[5] Lynn, p. 45
[6] John Keegan. A History of Warfare. (New York: Vintage Books, 1993) pp. 73-4
[7] William R. Thompson “The Military Superiority Thesis and the Ascendancy of Western Eurasia in the World System” Journal of World History 10, 1 (Spring 1999) p. 143
[8] Geoffrey Parker. The Military Revolution: Military Innovation and the Rise of the West, 1500-1800. (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1988)
[9] Parker, p. 105
[10] Parker, p. 112
[11] Victor Davis Hanson. Carnage and Culture (New York: Anchor Books, 2002) p. 122
[12] Hanson, p. 16
[13] H. P. Willmott. The Barrier and the Javelin. (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1983) pp. 223-4
[14] Douglas MacArthur. Reminiscences (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1964) p. 167