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The 33 Strategies of War - Grey Man Strategies PDF
The 33 Strategies of War - Grey Man Strategies PDF
Defensive Warfare
8: Pick your battles carefully: Perfect-economy
Consider the hidden costs of war: time, political goodwill, an embittered enemy bent on
revenge. Sometimes it is better to undermine your enemies covertly.
9: Turn the tables: Counterattack
Let the other side move first. If aggressive, bait them into a rash attack that leaves them in a
weak position.
10: Create a threatening presence: Deterrence
Build a reputation for being a little crazy. Fighting you is not worth it. Uncertainty can be better
than an explicit threat. If your opponents aren't sure what attacking you will cost, they will not
want to find out.
Offensive Warfare
12: Lose battles, but win the war: Grand strategy
Grand strategy is the art of looking beyond the present battle and calculating ahead. Focus on
your ultimate goal and plot to reach it.
13: Know your enemy: Intelligence
The target of your strategies is not the army you face, but the mind who runs it. Learn to read
people.
14: Overwhelm resistance with speed and suddenness: Blitzkrieg
Speed is power. Striking first, before enemies have time to think or prepare will make them
emotional, unbalanced, and prone to error.
15: Control the dynamic: Forcing
Instead of trying to dominate the other side's every move, work to define the nature of the
relationship itself. Control your opponent's mind, pushing emotional buttons and compelling
them to make mistakes.
16: Hit them where it hurts: Center-of-gravity
Find the source of your enemy's power. Find out what he cherishes and protects and strike.
17: Defeat them in detail: Divide and conquer
Separate the parts and sow dissension and division. Turn a large problem into small, eminently
defeatable parts.
18: Expose and attack your opponent's soft flank: Turning
Frontal assaults stiffen resistance. Instead, distract your enemy's attention to the front, then
attack from the side when they expose their weakness.
Unconventional Warfare
23: Weave a seamless blend of fact and fiction: Misperception
Make it hard for your enemies to know what is going on around them. Feed their expectations,
manufacture a reality to match their desires, and they will fool themselves. Control people's
perceptions of reality and you control them.
24: Take the line of least expectation: Ordinary-Extraordinary
Upset expectations. First do something ordinary and conventional, then hit them with the
extraordinary. Sometimes the ordinary is extraordinary because it is unexpected.
25: Occupy the moral high ground: Righteousness
The cause you are fighting for must seem more just than the enemy's. Questioning their
motives and making enemies appear evil can narrow their base of support and room to
maneuver. When you come under moral attack from a clever enemy, don't whine or get angry-fight fire with fire.