Doubts, Facing Danger, Adaptation, Surprise Tactics, Boundlessness, Clear Orders, Trustworthy Rewards and Punishments, Shared with the Masses.

Whenever Zhang Xun A celebrated Tang commander famous for his desperate defense of Suiyang against rebel forces met someone and asked their name, he never forgot them from that moment onward. Throughout more than four hundred battles, both large and small, he oversaw the deaths of 120,000 rebel soldiers. In his command of the troops, Xun did not follow the ancient methods for teaching battle formations Zhanzhen: traditional, rigid geometric troop deployments; instead, he ordered his subordinate generals to train their men according to their own understanding and ideas.

When someone asked for the reason behind this, Xun replied: "Nowadays we are fighting the Hu barbarians original: "Hu lu," a term for the non-Han nomadic groups comprising the rebel core. They gather like clouds and scatter like birds; their transformations are never constant. Within the space of just a few paces, the tactical situation can shift entirely. To react to sudden events when the moment arrives is a matter of a single breath. If one must constantly stop to consult the commander-in-chief, the response will be too late. That is not the way of one who understands the fluid changes of warfare. Therefore, I ensure the soldiers understand the general’s intent, and the general understands the soldiers’ hearts. When they are deployed, they move as easily as a hand directing its own fingers. When soldiers and generals are intimately familiar with one another, every man fights of his own accord—is this not a viable way?"

As for weaponry and armor, they took everything they needed from the enemy and never manufactured or repaired their own equipment. Xun treated all people with sincere honesty, and there was nothing...