Thread by @ThyConsigliori

John Minford, #SunTzu 2:7 "No nation has ever benefited from a protracted war."

When you speak, you likely qualify. Did you see what I did there? Likely. That is a qualifier. If you wish to be nice, if you wish to not offend peoples' weak sensitivities, you must qualify. Master Sun, he seems not to care so much.

Without qualifier, and so very rudely, our Master states emphatically...it has never happened. Never, never ever? Never, he tells us.

Never is a very long time. How can he be 100% certain, 100% sure? It actually very simple. Inside every nation there are war mongers who benefit from the flow of money for conflict. They have no care to the benefit of the nation.

In a protracted war, the benefactors from this protraction are stealing the very energy and essence of the nation itself. A protracted war is clearly the result of evil actors serving themselves and NOT the nation.

This is a matter of profound significance. In any nation, every nation, at every point in time, there are those who benefit from war. This has nothing to do with the morality of war. This has everything to do with power, and the power to benefit from the expenditure of money.

Feel it. The nation does not benefit. The evil war lords do.

Please remember, I am a hawk. I prefer war to surrender. I am NOT anti-war. Yet, as the decades of my life have passed, I have come to be a war skeptic.

A righteous war is possible. But it must be short.

The only wars that may arise to the sacred status of "justified," are short wars, never long ones. If we accept that, then what about America's presence in so many fields over so many decades? A military presence does not equal war. Sure, America may be needed here or there.

In his amazing work, also called The Art of War, Chairman Mao describes the process of evolving from fluid, guerrilla warfare, to what his translator calls "positional" warfare. Guerrilla is yin, positional is yang.

Guerilla has no assets or places to hold. Positional is the opposite.

You'd think that positional warfare had all the advantages, and you'd be completely wrong. As soon as any power structure extends over a position, the people at the top start benefiting more than others.

Sadly, John Lennon's Imagine accounted for, it makes no difference whatsoever if the government is Communist or Capitalist, or if there are great borders or none. Power always confers its rewards, no matter what form of government or economy is employed. Always.

Note the word "always" above. No qualifier. Just like Master Sun's "never." Let's go again. How does he know that his never is true? Because he separates the nation from its rulers. Rulers come and go, and rarely suffer no matter. It is the nation, its people, who suffer.

Now perhaps, in his day, Master Sun really did equate the nation to its ruler, and is saying that rulers will always fail in protracted wars. Fair enough. But I think he was deeper than that. I think he knew that the nation itself could never benefit.

Let's imagine that Sun and Lao knew each other. Let's imagine them seated over some wonderful rice wine, playing Go. Lao Tzu goes, "You know, Sun, I mention how in peaceful nations the villagers hear the dogs from their neighboring village, but never go visit."

Referring to his descendant Emperor Wu, famed as the creator of the I Ching, Sun says, "Yep. Wu will soon tell us that the village well is the most important thing. We must make sure the water is clean, good to drink. Nothing else matters so much."

"Checkmate," says Lao, as he jumps up and does an amazing goal zone dance over yet another victory.

And Sun says, "Must you always win, I'm beginning to think I don't know myself or you at all."

To which Lao says, "If your wars weren't so protracted..."

America is an empire. We have positions all over the planet. We send our guerillas, I mean special forces, to engage in fluid actions wherever needed. But be clear, we have positions, protected territories, everywhere.

What gets called "war" is when our positions are attacked by guerrillas. That is, attacked such that it makes the news. All of our wars, now, are positional wars. We never admit we fight guerilla wars, or at least, don't call them that.

But underneath it all is simply the question of the village well. Who controls it? Do the families have free or paid access? What President Trump has told us is that he wants to spend less money shooting guns and killing people. He wants fewer protracted wars, less killing.

It's time, he tells us, to secure the village well and put less bad people in place controlling it, to the degree we can. What's more, and this is HUGE, our own position is at risk. There is a positional war for America, herself, to protect our own village well.

This is a defensive, and NOT an offensive war. The term for it is Strategic Defense.

We will have many opportunities to discuss that, and Strategic Offense, and Passive Defense (which is not a good thing!) and Compulsive Offense (obviously also not good) in coming days.

For today, please remember that the nation herself ALWAYS suffers from protracted wars. Oh, oh! Our current Afghanistan war is the equal, in time, of four WWIIs. Think about that. A = 4WWII. How's that for an equation?

To return to previous sections in our #WarForAmerica2020 and #SunTzuForMAGA series, don't forget to head over to @WarForAmerica21.

And also, be sure to purchase John Minford's translation, here:

amazon.com/Art-War-Pengui…