War Is Politics By Other Means.

No Campaign Plan Survives First Contact With The Enemy

The Majority Of People Are Timid By Nature, And That Is Why They Constantly Exaggerate Danger. All Influences On The Military Leader, Therefore, Combine To Give Him A False Impression Of His Opponent's Strength, And From This Arises A New Source Of Indecision.

If We Consider The Actual Basis Of This Information [i.e., Intelligence], How Unreliable And Transient It Is, We Soon Realize That War Is A Flimsy Structure That Can Easily Collapse And Bury Us In Its Ruins. ... Many Intelligence Reports In War Are Contradictory; Even More Are False, And Most Are Uncertain. This Is True Of All Intelligence But Even More So In The Heat Of Battle, Where Such Reports Tend To Contradict And Cancel Each Other Out. In Short, Most Intelligence Is False, And The Effect Of Fear Is To Multiply Lies And Inaccuracies.

The More A Leader Is In The Habit Of Demanding From His Men, The Surer He Will Be That His Demands Will Be Answered.

A General Who Allows Himself To Be Decisively Defeated In An Extended Mountain Position Deserves To Be Court-martialled.