" The use of surprise as a technique in war is at least as old as Sun Tzu's legendary book , Art of War , written two and a half millennia ago . In 2005 , China's senior diplomatic minister , Dai Bingguo , presented me with a copy of the book in English and also the original Chinese . The book was housed in a wooden box , equipped with a pair of gloves to handle the delicate silk pages . At the heart of Sun Tzu's book is a philosophy of competition that centers on winning without bloodshed by taking advantage of secrecy and surprise so that the enemy is unable to fight back . To this day I wonder if the gift from the Chinese leader was a warning or an offer of advice --- or both . "
" Surprise can be easier for a smaller and weaker force . In the U.S. experience against guerrilla insurgencies and terrorist networks , whether in Vietnam or Iraq , we have seen that the enemy tends not to be limited by parliaments or delayed by large bureaucracies or a free press , where issues are vetted many times before finally being adopted . They are able to achieve surprise with relative ease , whether it be a roadside ambush or a mass casualty attack on the scale of 9/11 . "
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