The opposition between the Military School and Confucianism in their views on war:
【Confucianism】On one hand, Confucianism vigorously promotes the reactionary wars of the slave-owning class, calling them “the army of benevolence and righteousness,” while on the other hand, it attacks the progressive wars of the emerging landlord class, shouting “those who fight well are subjected to the death penalty,” meaning they want to kill the Legalists and Military strategists who are good at commanding wars, and also propose “abolishing food and weapons” against the Legalist’s policy of farming and warfare, attempting to disarm the emerging landlord class. (Power comes from the barrel of a gun; if the Legalist landlord class cannot seize power by force, they will ultimately be counterattacked and even lose their lives. The same applies to the wars of the proletariat and bourgeoisie.)
【Military School】The Military School counters sharply, stating “War is a major affair of the state.” War is unavoidable. The “Sun Bin Art of War” refutes the fallacies of Confucianism’s “benevolence and righteousness” and “abolishing war,” citing examples from ancient rulers who used war to defeat opponents, demonstrating that using “benevolence,” “rites,” and “music” to “forbid conflict” is impossible, and that it is a deceitful talk of Confucianism. Confucius said: “Military affairs are conducted with rites, thus military achievements are accomplished,” advocating the use of Zhou rites to command armies, which could lead the slave-owning class to victory. This is complete wishful thinking. Due to the slave-owning class’s defiance of the historical trend, their reactionary wars are bound to be opposed by the working people and soldiers. No matter how much they indoctrinate with Zhou rites, “governing the army with rites” cannot save them from ultimate defeat.
【Why the Confucian route of using礼 (li)】Why is it certain that governing the army with礼 (li) will fail, and governing with law (依法) will succeed? Because the former involves establishing a hierarchy, which is truly the set of ideas of the slave-owning class—high status means doing as one pleases, a worldview where刑不上大夫 (punishments do not reach the nobles) and礼不下庶人 (礼 does not extend to commoners). In actual warfare, this means soldiers are sent to die, while commanders seek credit and rewards, and soldiers are oppressed. The latter allows for promotion based on merit, governed by laws, and targets corrupt slave owners, providing a way out for liberated slaves and small producers. Under the social conditions of that time, this was very progressive. When feudal production relations replaced slave-owning relations, former slaves became farmers with certain personal freedoms, and their economic status improved. They supported the progressive wars against slave owners, especially when the emerging landlord class opposed the slave-owning class.
Military strategists point out: “Those who desire the same thing will win.”—If both sides want the same, victory is certain. Conversely, if the upper ranks send the lower ranks to die, and the lower ranks flee to save themselves, failure is inevitable. They also note: “The people suffer from their teachers; they may be defeated.”—If the army does not have the support of the people and soldiers, it will also inevitably fail. In fact, military strategists summarized that the emerging landlord class would inevitably defeat the slave-owning class in military struggles, and this also demonstrates that the路线 of governing the army with law will inevitably triumph over the礼 (li) route.
3 Strategems of the Military School
Sun Tzu pointed out that “the weak are born from the strong,” and also said, “strength and weakness are forms,” indicating that strength and weakness are not absolute and unchangeable but can transform into each other. By exerting subjective initiative to create a situation favorable to oneself, one can turn weakness into strength. Sun An further proposed a complete set of methods to win with fewer troops, first avoiding the enemy’s sharpness, feigning weakness to make the enemy proud, and using various methods to mobilize and weaken the enemy, then launching a surprise attack to defeat them. He pointed out that one should “be able to divide the enemy’s troops,” while concentrating one’s own forces, “and lead them to attack.” In this way, although the enemy may have numerical superiority overall, they become disadvantaged on the decisive battlefield. These strategic and tactical ideas of the military school are a summary of the experiences of many small states and weak armies during the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods, who dared to fight and excelled in fighting larger and stronger armies. Chairman Mao once highly praised Sun Bin’s dialectical thinking and widely applied it in guerrilla warfare. Whether it was the Four Crossings of Chishui or the three major campaigns, many times they used local advantages in troop strength to strike at the enemy’s overall weak points, creating overwhelming local superiority and taking them down in one go. This is a practical application of materialist dialectics in military affairs, vividly impressed during the crossing of Chishui when they launched a fierce attack on Dadu Bridge. The Red Army, through continuous movement and crossing Chishui, greatly confused the Chiang Kai-shek’s army, creating favorable conditions for themselves. Conversely, Chiang’s army only fought dull battles, being played around by the Red Army and always eating dust behind. When crossing the Dadu River, the Sichuan army defending the river was equipped with heavy machine guns, but the Red Army not only had heavy machine guns but also mortars, machine guns, and other weapons. In local areas, their firepower and numbers appeared stronger. This local advantage in troop strength allowed the Red Army to quickly seize Luding Bridge and laid the foundation for subsequent victories. These fully demonstrate the application of materialist dialectics in military affairs: attacking the enemy in movement, weakening and destroying the enemy, concentrating on attacking the weakest points of the enemy, which makes the strong and weak switch positions, gradually making one’s side the main aspect within the contradiction unity.
The military school, from practical experience in command and combat, recognizes that the situation of war is constantly shifting and changing. The anti-Confucian struggle of the military school is a philosophical fight between naive materialism and dialectical thinking against idealist metaphysics. Sun Tzu believed that the conditions for victory in war depend on a thorough understanding and estimation of the objective situation in advance, and that “the wise do not rely on ghosts and gods but on human energy.” This understanding and estimation are not obtained through praying to ghosts and gods but depend on human effort. This is a strong critique of superstitious notions of fate and ghosts in Confucian military thought. (The military school believes in prophets, but not in genius theory, rather that only through practice can one judge the direction of things.) As Sun Bin said, “All tangible things can be named; all named things can be conquered.” This means that everything that exists can be understood, and everything that can be understood can be defeated. It is a revolutionary dialectical thought, embodying the spirit of the Legalist daring to win.
4 Confucianism’s Attacks on Legalism
Because Legalists were allies of the Legalist school and opposed Confucianism, they were subjected to extreme hatred (Confucian dogs hate everything progressive like this). Confucius hated Zai Yu (the one who was like rotten wood that cannot be carved), because Zai Yu helped Tian Chengzi successfully replace Qi, targeting the historical turning point where the Legalist landlord class continuously gained power while the slave-owning class kept failing. Confucius proposed “Preserve Lu, chaos in Qi, destroy Wu, strengthen Jin, dominate Yue” (which means to strike at the Legalist regime and promote Confucian rule), and sent his student Zigong to persuade various monarchs to disrupt the rule of the emerging landlord class in local governments. Confucius’s destruction of Wu and Qi was essentially a manifestation of the struggle between Confucianism and Legalism.
Sun Wu demonstrated military strategy to King Helü of Wu: generally speaking, because military warfare requires the use of materialist and dialectical knowledge, otherwise victory cannot be achieved. Therefore, in terms of worldview and political perspective, the Military School tends to be more advanced, and in politics, it can be said that the Military School and the Legalist school are basically aligned in their political stance, both promoting the execution of annexation wars. (The Military School is composed of soldiers, the School of Names studies philosophy, and the Legalists are politicians)