The 33 Strategies of War (29 page)

Later that day Louis invited Bollate to his private rooms and, lounging on his bed, began an apparently casual conversation. Drifting into politics, he described himself as a supporter of the Duke of Milan's: he would do anything, he said, to help the duke expand his power. Then he asked, "Tell me, Christopher, has it been reported to you what I said this morning in council? Tell me the truth--was it not some courtier who told you?" Bollate confessed that he had actually been in the room during the king's tirade and had heard the king's words himself. He also protested that the Duke of Milan was a loyal friend of France. Louis replied that he had his doubts about the duke and had cause to be angry--but then he immediately changed the subject to something pleasant, and Bollate eventually left.

The next day the king sent three councilors to visit Bollate. Was he comfortable in his lodgings? Was he happy with his treatment from the king? Was there anything they could do to improve his stay at the French court? They also wanted to know if he was going to pass on the king's words to the duke. The king, they said, considered Bollate a friend, a confidant; he had merely been venting his emotions. It meant nothing. Bollate should forget the whole thing.

Of course, none of these men--the councilors, the courtiers, Bollate--knew that the king had done all this deliberately. Louis was certain that the perfidious ambassador--whom he hardly considered a friend, let alone a confidant--would report what he had said in detail to the duke. He knew that the duke was treacherous, and this was precisely how Louis wanted to send him a warning. And it seemed the message got through: for the next several years, the duke was an obedient ally.

Interpretation

The Spider King was a man who always plotted several moves in advance. In this case he knew that if he spoke politely and diplomatically to the ambassador of his worries about the duke, his words would carry no weight--they would seem like whining. If he vented his anger directly to the ambassador, on the other hand, he would look out of control. A direct thrust is also easily parried: the duke would just mouth reassurances, and the treachery would go on. By transmitting his threat indirectly, however, Louis made it stick. That the duke was not meant to know he was angry made his anger truly ominous: it meant he was planning something and wanted to keep the duke from suspecting it and knowing his true feelings. He delivered his threat insidiously to make the duke ponder his intentions and to instill an uneasy fear.

It was thus that, during the 1930s, the diplomacy of Mussolini's Italy was greatly enhanced by a stance of restless bellicosity and by a mirage of great military strength: an army of "eight million bayonets," whose parades were dashing affairs of
bersaglieri
on the run and roaring motorized columns; and an air force greatly respected, not least for its spectacular long-range flights to the North Pole and South America; and a navy that could acquire many impressive ships because so little of its funding was wasted on gunnery trials and navigation. By a military policy in which stage management dominated over the sordid needs of war preparation, Mussolini sacrificed real strength for the sake of hugely magnified images of what little strength there was--but the results of suasion that those images evoked were very real: Britain and France were both successfully dissuaded from interfering with Italy's conquest of Ethiopia, its intervention in Spain, and the subjection of Albania; and none dared oppose Italy's claim to be accepted as a Great Power, whose interests had to be accommodated sometimes in tangible ways such as the licenses obtained by Italian banks in Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, and Yugoslavia). Only Mussolini's last-minute decision to enter the war in June 1940--when his own considerable prudence was overcome by the irresistible temptation of sharing in the spoils of the French collapse--brought years of successful deception (and self-deception) to an end.

S
TRATEGY
: T
HE
L
OGIC OF
W
AR AND
P
EACE
, E
DWARD
N. L
UTTWAK
, 1987

When we are under attack, the temptation is to get emotional, to tell the aggressors to stop, to make threats as to what we'll do if they keep going. That puts us in a weak position: we've revealed both our fears and our plans, and words rarely deter aggressors. Sending them a message through a third party or revealing it indirectly through action is much more effective. That way you signal that you are already maneuvering against them. Keep the threat veiled: if they can only glimpse what you are up to, they will have to imagine the rest. Making them see you as calculating and strategic will have a chilling effect on their desires to harm or attack you. It is not worth the risk to find out what you may be up to.

4.
In the early 1950s, John Boyd (1927-97) served with distinction as a fighter pilot in the Korean War. By the middle of that decade, he was the most respected flight instructor at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada; he was virtually unbeatable in practice dogfights, so good that he was asked to rewrite the manual on fighter-pilot tactics. He had developed a style that would demoralize and terrorize, get inside the opponent's head, disrupt his ability to react. Boyd was clever and fearless. But none of his training and skill, none of his brushes with death as a pilot, prepared him for the bloodless backstabbing, political maneuvering, and indirect warfare of the Pentagon, where he was assigned in 1966 to help design lightweight jet fighters.

As Major Boyd quickly discovered, Pentagon bureaucrats were more concerned with their careers than with national defense. They were less interested in developing the best new fighter than in satisfying contractors, often buying their new technological gear regardless of its suitability. Boyd, as a pilot, had trained himself to see every situation as a kind of strategic combat, and in this instance he decided to transfer his skills and style of warfare to the jungles of the Pentagon. He would intimidate, discourage, and outsmart his opponents.

Boyd believed that a streamlined jet fighter of the kind he was designing could outperform any plane in the world. But contractors hated his design, because it was inexpensive--it did not highlight the technology they were trying to peddle. Meanwhile Boyd's colleagues in the Pentagon had their own pet projects. Competing for the same pot of money, they did everything they could to sabotage or transform his design.

Boyd developed a defense: Outwardly he looked a little dumb. He wore shabby suits, smoked a nasty cigar, kept a wild look in his eye. He seemed to be just another emotional fighter pilot, promoted too fast and too soon. But behind the scenes he mastered every detail. He made sure he knew more than his opponents: he could quote statistics, studies, and engineering theories to support his own project and poke holes through theirs. Contractors would show up in meetings with glossy presentations delivered by their top engineers; they would make fantastic claims to dazzle the generals. Boyd would listen politely, seem impressed, and then suddenly, without warning, he would go on the offensive--deflating their optimistic claims, showing in detail that the numbers did not add up, revealing the hype and the fakery. The more they protested, the more vicious Boyd got, bit by bit tearing their project to shreds.

Blindsided by a man they had grossly underestimated, time and again the contractors would leave these meetings vowing revenge. But what could they do? He had already shot down their numbers and turned their proposals to mush. Caught in the act of oversell, they had lost all credibility. They would have to accept their defeat. Soon they learned to avoid Boyd: instead of trying to sabotage him, they hoped he would fail on his own.

In 1974, Boyd and his team had finished the design of a jet they had been working on, and it seemed certain to be approved. But part of Boyd's strategy had been to build up a network of allies in different parts of the Pentagon, and these men told him that there was a group of three-star generals who hated the project and were planning his defeat. They would let him brief the various officials in the chain of command, all of whom would give him their go-ahead; then there would be a final meeting with the generals, who would scuttle the project as they had planned to all along. Having gotten that far, though, the project would look as if it had been given a fair hearing.

In addition to his network of allies, Boyd always tried to make sure he had at least one powerful supporter. This was usually easy to find: in a political environment like the Pentagon, there was always some general or other powerful official who was disgusted with the system and was happy to be Boyd's secret protector. Now Boyd called on his most powerful ally, Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger, and won Schlesinger's personal approval for the project. Then, at the meeting with the generals, whom he could tell were inwardly gloating that they finally had him, Boyd announced, "Gentlemen, I am authorized by the secretary of defense to inform you that this is not a decision brief. This briefing is for information purposes only." The project, he said, had already been approved. He went on to deliver his presentation, making it as long as possible--twisting the knife in their backs. He wanted them to feel humiliated and wary of messing with him again.

As a fighter pilot, Boyd had trained himself to think several moves ahead of his opponents, always aiming to surprise them with some terrifying maneuver. He incorporated this strategy into his bureaucratic battles. When a general gave him some order that was clearly designed to ruin the plans for his lightweight jet, he would smile, nod, and say, "Sir, I'll be happy to follow that order. But I want you to put it in writing." Generals liked to issue commands verbally rather than putting them on paper as a way to cover themselves in case things went bad. Caught off guard, the general would either have to drop the order or deny the request to put it in writing--which, if publicized, would make him look terrible. Either way he was trapped.

After several years of dealing with Boyd, generals and their minions learned to avoid him--and his foul cigars, his verbal abuse, his knife-twisting tactics--like the plague. Given this wide berth, he was able to push his designs for the F-15 and F-16 through the Pentagon's almost impossible process, leaving an enduring imprint on the air force by creating two of its most famous and effective jet fighters.

Interpretation

Boyd realized early on that his project was unpopular at the Pentagon and that he would meet opposition and obstruction up and down the line. If he tried to fight everyone, to take on every contractor and general, he would exhaust himself and go down in flames. Boyd was a strategist of the highest order--his thinking would later have a major influence on Operation Desert Storm--and a strategist never hits strength against strength; instead he probes the enemy's weaknesses. And a bureaucracy like the Pentagon inevitably has weaknesses, which Boyd knew how to locate.

The people in Boyd's Pentagon wanted to fit in and be liked. They were political people, careful about their reputations; they were also very busy and had little time to waste. Boyd's strategy was simple: over the years he would establish a reputation for being difficult, even nasty. To get involved with Boyd could mean an ugly public fight that would sully your reputation, waste your time, and hurt you politically. In essence Boyd transformed himself into a kind of porcupine. No animal wants to take on a creature that can do so much damage, no matter how small it is; even tigers will leave it alone. And being left alone gave Boyd staying power, allowing him to survive long enough to shepherd the F-15 and F-16 through.

Reputation, Boyd knew, is key. Your own reputation may not be intimidating; after all, we all have to fit in, play politics, seem nice and accommodating. Most often this works fine, but in moments of danger and difficulty being seen as so nice will work against you: it says that you can be pushed around, discouraged, and obstructed. If you have never been willing to fight back before, no threatening gesture you make will be credible. Understand: there is great value in letting people know that when necessary you can let go of your niceness and be downright difficult and nasty. A few clear, violent demonstrations will suffice. Once people see you as a fighter, they will approach you with a little fear in their hearts. And as Machiavelli said, it is more useful to be feared than to be loved.

Authority: When opponents are unwilling to fight with you, it is because they think it is contrary to their interests, or because you have misled them into thinking so.

--
Sun-tzu (fourth century
B.C.
)

REVERSAL