The Art of Winning Wars

Book excerpt: The trouble with the military mind is that it insists on going by the book. In the interests of discipline and uniformity, initiative and imagination are discarded, despite the lip-service paid to them. This is a problem that has plagued armies throughout history. It is, however, of particular importance today, when all the military assumptions of the traditionalists are being challenged by the emergence of the nationalist guerrilla. The impotence of the American juggernaut in Vietnam has put this problem under the spotlight of history. The one thing the guerrillas have in abundance is imagination, and this seems to outweigh the imbalance in materiel. It is the author's contention that creativity is what wins battles--the same faculty that inspires great art. The great commanders of history, he contends, have been unconventional men gifted with vaulting imaginations and a willingness to accept risks. Alexander, Hannibal, Nelson, Napoleon, Patton, T.E. Lawrence--all have in common a military insight, or what may be called trained intuition. This is what the guerrillas have, and what the modern army lacks. Colonel Mrazek builds his case by studying and discussing the literature of strategy, from Sun Tzu's Art of War to T.E. Lawrence's Seven Pillars of Wisdom (which he regards as the guerrillas' bible, the source book for the military theories of Mao Tse-rung and Lin Piao). All of it makes sense, and above all, it is timely. Any newspaper illustrates the increasing creativity gap between the professional military and the "amateur" guerrilla. This book is a plea for a change of heart before it is too late.--Adapted from book jacket.