21st Century Strategy Needs Sun Tzu

Today's world is filled with uncertainty and is a world where typical lines of the battlefield no longer exist. The current strategic environment remains best described as volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous and is a world where future contingencies involving the United States will be asymmetrical. As the current world superpower, the United States will continue to find itself involved in world affairs whether we choose to or not and strategists must be properly armed. Theories are useful tools that strategists need to carefully study and understand in order to effectively address both current and future strategic environments. Sun Tzu's theories provide military planners and strategists with a non-prescriptive approach to achieve success in modern warfare and demand careful examination before recommendations are made requiring the use of the Nation's military to senior leaders. This Strategic Research Paper will argue that several of the precepts of warfare addressed in Sun Tzu's, The Art of War, remain relevant today, and that they will continue to, well beyond the twenty-first century. This paper will show that his precepts have influenced current doctrine and strategic decision-making through the use of historic and more recent contingency operations.