The 33 Strategies of War (36 page)

Metternich, then thirty-two, came from one of Europe's most illustrious families. A speaker of impeccable French, a staunch conservative in politics, he was a paragon of breeding and elegance and an inveterate ladies' man. The presence of this polished aristocrat would add a sheen to the imperial court that Napoleon was creating. More important, winning over a man of such power--and Napoleon could be quite seductive in private meetings--would help in his grand strategy of making Austria a weak satellite. And Metternich's weakness for women would give Napoleon a way in.

The two men met for the first time in August 1806, when Metternich presented his credentials. Napoleon acted coolly. He dressed well for the occasion but kept his hat on, which in the mores of the time was rather rude. After Metternich's speech--short and ceremonious--Napoleon began to pace the room and talk politics in a way that made it clear he was in command. (He liked to stand up to talk to people while they remained seated.) He made a show of speaking pointedly and concisely; he was not some Corsican rube for the sophisticated Metternich to play with. In the end he was sure he had made the impression he wanted.

Coordination is less of a problem when political leaders themselves play an active part in the intelligence effort. When he was Senate majority leader, Lyndon Johnson cultivated an extensive intelligence system with sources all over Washington. At one point in the 1950s, Johnson complained to a reporter that he was focusing on internal Democratic problems while failing to cover divisions in the Senate GOP. To make his point, he pulled out a memorandum on a recent private meeting at which the reporter and several of his colleagues had gotten a briefing on GOP factionalism from Senator Thurston Morton (R-KY). Rowland Evans and Robert Novak recalled: "The Intelligence System was a marvel of efficiency. It was also rather frightening." Even in the White House, Johnson believed in firsthand political intelligence. According to his aide Harry McPherson, "I guess he called a lot of people, but I could usually count on it in the late afternoon, as he woke up from his nap, that I would get a call which would usually say, 'What do you know?'" McPherson would then pass along the latest news that he picked up from reporters and political figures.

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ARFARE
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ITNEY
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Over the months to come, Napoleon and Metternich had many more such meetings. It was the emperor's plan to charm the prince, but the charm ran inescapably the other way: Metternich had a way of listening attentively, making apt comments, even complimenting Napoleon on his strategic insights. At those moments Napoleon would beam inside: here was a man who could truly appreciate his genius. He began to crave Metternich's presence, and their discussions of European politics became more and more frank. The two became friends of sorts.

Hoping to take advantage of Metternich's weakness for women, Napoleon set up his sister, Caroline Murat, to have an affair with the prince. He learned from her a few pieces of diplomatic gossip, and she told him that Metternich had come to respect him. In turn she also told Metternich that Napoleon was unhappy with his wife, Empress Josephine, who could not bear children; he was considering divorce. Napoleon did not seem upset that Metternich knew such things about his personal life.

In 1809, seeking revenge for its ignominious defeat at Austerlitz, Austria declared war on France. Napoleon only welcomed this event, which gave him a chance to beat the Austrians still more soundly than before. The war was hard fought, but the French prevailed, and Napoleon imposed a humiliating settlement, annexing whole sections of the Austrian Empire. Austria's military was dismantled, its government was overhauled, and Napoleon's friend Metternich was named foreign minister--exactly where Napoleon wanted him.

Several months later something happened that caught Napoleon slightly off guard but delighted him: the Austrian emperor offered him his eldest daughter, the Archduchess Marie Louise, in marriage. Napoleon knew that the Austrian aristocracy hated him; this had to be Metternich's work. Alliance by marriage with Austria would be a strategic tour de force, and Napoleon happily accepted the offer, first divorcing Josephine, then marrying Marie Louise in 1810.

Metternich accompanied the archduchess to Paris for the wedding, and now his relationship with Napoleon grew still warmer. Napoleon's marriage made him a member of one of Europe's greatest families, and to a Corsican, family was everything; he had won a dynastic legitimacy he had long craved. In conversation with the prince, he opened up even more than before. He was also delighted with his new empress, who revealed a keen political mind. He let her in on his plans for empire in Europe.

In 1812, Napoleon invaded Russia. Now Metternich came to him with a request: the formation of an army of 30,000 Austrian soldiers at Napoleon's disposal. In return Napoleon would let Austria rebuild its military. Napoleon saw no harm in this step; he was allied with Austria by marriage, and rearmament there would help him in the end.

Months later the Russian invasion had turned into a disaster, and Napoleon was forced to retreat, his army decimated. Now Metternich offered his services as a mediator between France and the other European powers. Centrally placed as it is, Austria had performed that task in the past, and anyway Napoleon had little choice: he needed time to recoup. Even if Austria's role as a mediator allowed it to reassert its independence, he had little to fear from his in-laws.

In all the martial arts, in all the performing arts and still more in all the forms of human behavior, a man's postures or moves are based on the movements of his
[
invisible
]
mind.... In the Kage Style of swordsmanship a swordsman reads his opponent's mind through his postures or moves.... What mind can penetrate his opponent's mind? It is a mind that has been trained and cultivated to the point of detachment with perfect freedom. It is as clear as a mirror that can reflect the motions within his opponent's mind.... When one stands face to face with his opponents, his mind must not be revealed in the form of moves. Instead his mind should reflect his opponent's mind like water reflecting the moon.

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IVES OF
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WORDSMEN
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AKOTO
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UGAWARA
, 1988

By the spring of 1813, negotiations had broken down and a new war was about to break out between the badly damaged France and a powerful alliance of Russia, Prussia, England, and Sweden. By this time the Austrian army had grown considerably; somehow Napoleon had to get his hands on it--but his spies reported that Metternich had entered into secret agreement with the Allies. Surely this had to be some sort of ploy: how could the Austrian emperor fight his son-in-law? Yet in a few weeks, it became official: unless France negotiated a peace, Austria would drop its mediating position and join the Allies.

Napoleon could not believe what he was hearing. He traveled to Dresden for a meeting with Metternich, which took place on June 26. The moment he saw the prince, he felt a shock: the friendly, nonchalant air was gone. In a rather cold tone, Metternich informed him that France must accept a settlement that would reduce it to its natural boundaries. Austria was obligated to defend its interests and the stability of Europe. Suddenly it occurred to the emperor: Metternich had been playing him all along, the family ties merely a ploy to blind him to Austrian rearmament and independence. "So I have perpetrated a very stupid piece of folly in marrying an archduchess of Austria?" Napoleon blurted out. "Since Your Majesty desires to know my opinion," Metternich replied, "I will candidly say that Napoleon, the conqueror, has made a mistake."

Napoleon refused to accept Metternich's dictated peace. In return Austria dropped its neutrality and joined the Allies, becoming their de facto military leader. And with Austria leading the way, they finally defeated Napoleon in April 1814 and exiled him to the Mediterranean island of Elba.

Interpretation

Napoleon prided himself on his ability to gauge people's psychology and use it against them, but in this case he was outwitted by a man far superior at such a game. Metternich's modus operandi was the following: he would quietly study his enemies from behind his smiling, elegant exterior, his own apparent relaxation inviting them to open up. In his very first meeting with Napoleon, he saw a man straining to impress: he noticed that the bantam Napoleon walked on his toes, to look taller, and struggled to suppress his Corsican accent. Later meetings only confirmed Metternich's impression of a man who craved acceptance as the social equal of Europe's aristocracy. The emperor was insecure.

This insight won, Metternich used it to craft the perfect counter-strategy: the offer of marriage into the Austrian dynasty. To a Corsican, that would mean everything, and it would blind Napoleon to a simple reality: for aristocrats like Metternich and the Austrian emperor, family ties meant nothing compared to the survival of the dynasty itself.

When Munenori was granted an audience with the shogun, he sat down, put his hands on the tatami floor, as retainers always did to show their respect to their master. Suddenly, Iemitsu thrust a spear at the "unsuspecting" Munenori--and was surprised to find himself lying flat on his back! Munenori had sensed the shogun's intention before a move had been made, and swept Iemitsu's legs out from under him at the instant of the thrust.

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IVES OF
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ASTER
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WORDSMEN
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AKOTO
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UGAWARA
, 1988

Metternich's genius was to recognize the appropriate target for his strategy: not Napoleon's armies, which Austria could not hope to defeat--Napoleon was a general for the ages--but Napoleon's mind. The prince understood that even the most powerful of men remains human and has human weaknesses. By entering Napoleon's private life, being deferential and subordinate, Metternich could find his weaknesses and hurt him as no army could. By getting closer to him emotionally--through the emperor's sister Caroline, through the Archduchess Marie Louise, through their convivial meetings--he could choke him in a friendly embrace.

Understand: your real enemy is your opponent's mind. His armies, his resources, his intelligence, can all be overcome if you can fathom his weakness, the emotional blind spot through which you can deceive, distract, and manipulate him. The most powerful army in the world can be beaten by unhinging the mind of its leader.

And the best way to find the leader's weaknesses is not through spies but through the close embrace. Behind a friendly, even subservient front, you can observe your enemies, get them to open up and reveal themselves. Get inside their skin; think as they think. Once you discover their vulnerability--an uncontrollable temper, a weakness for the opposite sex, a gnawing insecurity--you have the material to destroy them.

War is not an act of the will aimed at inanimate matter, as it is in the mechanical arts.... Rather,
[
it
]
is an act of the will aimed at a living entity that
reacts.

--Carl von Clausewitz (1780-1831)

KEYS TO WARFARE

The greatest power you could have in life would come neither from limitless resources nor even consummate skill in strategy. It would come from clear knowledge of those around you--the ability to read people like a book. Given that knowledge, you could distinguish friend from foe, smoking out snakes in the grass. You could anticipate your enemies' malice, pierce their strategies, and take defensive action. Their transparency would reveal to you the emotions they could least control. Armed with that knowledge, you could make them tumble into traps and destroy them.

This kind of knowledge has been a military goal since the dawn of history. That is why the arts of intelligence gathering and spying were invented. But spies are unreliable; they filter information through their own preconceptions and prejudices, and since their trade places them precisely between one side and the other and forces them to be independent operators, they are notoriously hard to control and can turn against you. Then, too, the nuances that give people away--the tone in a speaker's voice, the look in his or her eyes--are inevitably missing from their reports. In the end the spy's information means nothing unless you are adept at interpreting human behavior and psychology. Without that skill you will see in it what you want to see, confirming your own prejudices.

The leaders who have made best use of intelligence--Hannibal, Julius Caesar, Prince Metternich, Winston Churchill, Lyndon Johnson during his career in the U.S. Senate--were all first and foremost great students of human nature and superior readers of men. They honed their skills through personal observation of people. Only with that foundation could the use of spies extend their powers of vision.

In my opinion, there are two kinds of eyes: one kind simply looks at things and the other sees through things to perceive their inner nature. The former should not be tense
[
so as to observe as much as possible
]
; the latter should be strong
[
so as to discern the workings of the opponent's mind clearly
]
. Sometimes a man can read another's mind with his eyes. In fencing, it is all right to allow your own eyes to express your will but never let them reveal your mind. This matter should be considered carefully and studied diligently.

M
IYAMOTO
M
USASHI
, 1584-1645