Art of Warfare and small scale conflict sources?

Use this forum for general Martial Arts related discussion. Please stick strictly to Martial Arts and use the "General Chat" topic for other themes.

Moderators: nyang, Dvivid, Inga

Art of Warfare and small scale conflict sources?

Postby John the Monkey mind » Mon Aug 19, 2013 8:16 am

I have been looking into the Chinese military classics http://www.amazon.co.uk/Military-Classi ... y+classics

but I have also been looking at strategic writings from Japan.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Secrets-Japanes ... in+Victory

It seems that a lot was directly applied from the Chinese military classics at small unit and individual levels. The text has a lot about where to stand in different terrain and weather as well as light and tactics against multiple opponents and how multiple people can overcome one person efficiently. Psychology in combat and more. It is more straightforward to apply that just the original texts as it goes into detail.

This is just beginning to be investigated and some teams who are now looking to translate the writings of entire schools of strategy. This is one group (check out the two shinobi soldiers books they have put up for free download they are worth a read)

http://www.natori.co.uk/natori%20home.html

They have advanced from history books about Ninja to translating historical Ninja manuals and now on to working on resurrecting the Natori school of war (unorthodox warfare) in its entirety. Natori was all documented over the hundreds of years it was an active school to the Shogun's men.
From what little they have said so far it is almost entirely based on Chinese strategy and has a lot of small unit/individual relevance as well as broader strategy and espionage.

My question is do any such manuals/tradition for combat strategy based in the classics survive for Chinese martial arts? I have come across bits and pieces but nothing systematic.

The best I did find was "Art of E'mei Spear" (a early Qing Dynasty text) translated by Jack Chen of http://www.chineselongsword.com, it was full of Dao (no pictures just chinese next to the english and very useful) and has lots of useful stuff on terrain and mental attitude although it only has a few short chapters at 82 pages.

Content:
- Introduction & History
- Mind Mastery Chapter
- Body Mastery Chapter
- Calmness Chapter
- Movements Chapter
- Attack-Defense Chapter
- Situational Assessment Chapter
- Strategy Chapter
- Refrainments Chapter
- Defensive Techniques Chapter
- Thrusting Techniques Chapter
- Defeating Various Weapons Chapter
- Body & Hand Techniques Chapter
- Essentials Chapter

Any recommendations would be appreciated. :)
John the Monkey mind
Forum ÜberGuru
 
Posts: 482
Joined: Mon Nov 16, 2009 6:15 am

Re: Art of Warfare and small scale conflict sources?

Postby yeniseri » Fri Aug 21, 2015 12:15 am

The Japanese, by their sense of mission, took the Art of War to a new level but its origin (China) lacked the financial resources to make the leap to a modern army until about 20 years ago.
Even during the post Korean War episode, some battalions were using swords because that was all they could get their hands on!

For a modern version, you can check out Small Wars Journal!
yeniseri
Forum ÜberGuru
 
Posts: 511
Joined: Fri Jun 10, 2005 3:18 pm
Location: USA

Re: Art of Warfare and small scale conflict sources?

Postby Sanfung » Fri Sep 11, 2015 9:54 am

I do have a question about this, though, yeniseri if you don't mind. While I realize that the battalions you're talking about were seriously under equipped, wouldn't there be a number of combat situations even in today's world where a fixed blade would actually be more useful than a firearm?
Sanfung
Forum Guru
 
Posts: 204
Joined: Tue May 29, 2012 3:05 am


Return to General Martial Arts discussion

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 19 guests

cron