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The Art of War - by Sonny the Zoo By Jon Blyth "May you live in interesting times..." That's an ancient Chinese curse, that is. Perfectly understandable since my working life started to get very "interesting" recently. It's shocking that I am now having to slog my way through the days, snowed under with paperwork and completely unable to spend time pondering the important things in life (wargaming, writing daft articles etc.) Anyway, as far as ancient Chinese curses go, it's a good one. However, I do wonder whether those crafty Orientals from the olden days were really as wise as they're cracked up to be. Take Sun Tzu for example - how much wisdom do you need to formulate the theory that it's a really good idea to have more troops on your side than the other side has? Or that you should only fight when conditions are to your advantage etc. I mean, that's no use for wargamers. I checked Clausewitz and Jomini and had a quick look through Machiavelli as well - still nothing to help me win on a Friday night. So I called in a few favours and can pass on a new viewpoint... The Art of War - by Sonny the Zoo Part 1 - Overall Strategy So you wanna win a war, right? First you gotta figure out how bad you wanna win it. Know how I got my name? Some pezzanovante got a beef with me - I take him down to the Bronx Zoo and show him the lions. He don't get the message he takes another trip, this time one way. You wanna fight? You gotta win. You wanna draw? Forget-about-it. Where it counts there ain't no draws. It's like this - you gotta piece of work to do, you do it quick. That guy sittin across from you - could be he's a stand-up guy. Could be he's a babbo, but you gotta treat him the same. You get your crew in and whack the opposition fast and hard. Tactics is for the goombahs who wanna think about the whole world for a while. (You wanna think tactics then you make Consiglieri and leave the fightin to the captains). You make sure all your button men have gone to the mattresses and then, when you're ready, you hit the opposition with everything - in the one place. Flank schmank you go for the middle of it and clip anyone who moves. End of the day, last man standing is the Capo Di Tutti Capi, the rest is the Capo Di Tuttu Dicapito. Am I wrong? Translation = "after assessing your own defensive position as being tenable, an incisive and overwhelming assault on the opponents center will be sure to carry the day".