India's art of war
This week, I delved into my favorite Hindu epic to write about one of my beloved characters, Mama Shakuni. I also talk about Indian strategies, Chinese legendary military figure Sun Tzu and more!
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Hope all of you are doing well! We are amidst some really poignant times. India's daily Covid cases have passed the 4 lakh mark with over 3600 deaths a day. Social media has taken over in helping people get what they need, influencers and startup founders on Twitter used their reach to help people get the resources they need. People created multiple channels through Whatsapp, Telegram, etc to share leads.
A lot of people also created platforms that aggregated these leads on a national level, multiple organizations and unicorns donated exorbitant amounts of capital and resources to help the Indian population. After seeing such initiatives by these amazing people, the fire of the human spirit burns a bit brighter in my mind.
Regardless, to help me divert my mind, I decided to write upon a topic that has been hiding in my to-do list for a while now. I recently read the book "The Art of War" which is based on the tactics written by Sun Tzu (Chinese Military Strategist) annotated and explained by Thomas Huynh, and could not help but notice the cultural difference between the two neighboring nations. But before we actually talk more about the topic, let us first understand the two protagonists of this story.
1) Shakuni
Shakuni or Gandhar Naresh as the name suggests is easily one of the most celebrated antagonists from the Hindu epics. He was first the prince and then the king of Gandhar Kingdom (present-day Kandahar in Afghanistan).
Shakuni was an extremely intelligent and strategic man and is often credited as the mastermind behind the Kurukshetra War. He had a very influential persona and was able to sway multiple individuals especially his nephews the Kauravas including Duryodhana, the eldest son of Dhritrashtra (De facto king of Hastinapur), and Gandhari.
Gandhari, also the queen of the Hastinapur was the younger sister of Shakuni. Now before we go any further in this article, here is a disclaimer to the readers.
There are multiple translations and renditions of the epic and you may find sources that put forward a conflicting take from what is being mentioned here. This piece is my take on the epic and is in no way written to oppose or hurt the sentiments of people who believe differently.
Alright so moving forward, Bheeshma, son of Ganga approached Subala (Father of Shakuni) for his daughter's hand for the blind prince (Dhritrashtra) of Hastinapur. Subala and Shakuni initially were skeptical about the proposal and were eventually forced into the decision. Later Gandhari decided to cover her eyes for the rest of her life to empathize with her partner.
Shakuni adored his sister, he was in distress after seeing the condition of his sister and took it upon himself to take revenge from the kingdom of Hastinapur.
Shakuni, who swore to destroy the kingdom of Hastinapur singlehandedly influenced the great war of Mahabharata which is considered to be is one of the bloodiest wars that has ever happened during the history of mankind. Considering the total population of the world 5000 years back as per HYDE's estimate was about 45 Million, this war consumed over 10% of the population at that time. On a relative scale, 3% of the population died in the second world war.
Some strategic beliefs of Shakuni were:
Honesty is not always the best policy
One should be patient and opportunistic at the same time, either with the lack of the other will often cause more than creating
Most battles are first fought in mind rather than the field
2) Sun Tzu
Sun Tzu is revered in Chinese and East Asian culture as a legendary historical and military figure who lived in the ancient Zhou period of China. He was known for his extraordinary strategic skills with the creativity of an outbound. He was easily able to find creative yet pragmatic approaches to problems and later wrote his ideologies and findings in a book for the future generals of China.
Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat - Sun Tzu
A mental model is a term we often hear nowadays, but the concept behind the term is not something unheard of. Sun Tzu has his own mental model toward approaching conflicts.
He believed that most conflicts can be solved early through strategic maneuvers without actually going into war. War for a nation according to Sun Tzu was a great financial expense. It often left the two parties extremely vulnerable and weak.
Sun Tzu divided the art of warfare into five factors:
Way - Way or culture causes people to have similar thinking as their leaders
Heaven - Heaven is light and dark, cold and hot, essentially the external constraints that affect us but we have no control over them
Ground - Ground is high and low, far and near, obstructed and free, essentially the constraints we have little or some control over
General - General is wisdom, credibility, diligence which are the skills required for one to be a great leader
Law - Law is organization, chain of command, logistics, etc
These are the 5 factors that should be considered before acting on a conflict, the general who considers these factors according to Sun Tzu increases his/her chances of success by tenfold.
For centuries, Sun Tzu's work has been praised and employed in East Asian warfare and later grew in popularity and saw practical use in the western world. Sun Tzu's work has now gained global recognition and is taught across organizations to teach strategy and planning
India and China
Both Sun Tzu and Shakuni for me were two peas in a pod. Both of them had very similar tactics. Both of them employed their brain over brawns. Yet one is a glorified strategist and the other is an unsung warrior, which brings me to the concluding section of this piece.
The two Asian nations have had very different histories, although both of them were colonized by the British and hence have western influence. Both nations have several dialects and a culturally diverse population. They are also known to be ancient allies and have enjoyed strong economic and religious ties. But culturally, the nations have seldom matched each other's bandwidth.
Indians are known to put people or personal heroes on pedestals which often creates a divide between entities. This constant heroification of individuals not only sets unrealistic expectations but also triggers the cognitive bias of us and “them”. This leads to fewer insights and more stories and ultimately kills the scope of learning from such individuals.
Well, hope you liked this story! please feel free to share your feedback with me through commenting or directly emailing me here.
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