Sun Tzu said...

[Oaty]

Well sun tzu had understanding of physcology and if you put a man on a hill he may not willingly come down but if you put him in front they will be more willing to go forward for a charge. And when all is failing you can withdraw them to the high ground.

An example from MTW I can give is look at how hard it is to bring cavalry around on the rear when you have to run them up a hill first and the charge. Usually by the time they swing around the battle is already won in the front thus allowing them to turn and fight there new threat.

1 big problem I see though is it could keep them blind to a major ambush where an army would hold off engagement and the sign for the mainline to charge would be seeing this unit pop on top of the hill and cause them to be charged from both sides. And the only way to counter this would be to have good scouts and getting a report from them early enough and charge before they can complete there maneuver(attack while there forces are split and have less flexibilty) this way you defeat there army and any smart general would stop his maneuver and go back home. Of course scouts can be killed and it would be easy to forget that they have not reported back yet.

[EatYerGreens]

Hi to all,

I'm struck by the near-contradiction of "on level plains" and the reference to "high ground", though it's fair to assume that there aren't that many places in the world (or China at least) which are uniformally flat for miles in any direction. Perhaps the suggestion is that, where the land is flat for miles in every direction, you should begin by finding a location with a small amount of raised terrain available.

Why position the right flank there, in particular? I can't tell. Was there some preference for attacking forces to attack preferentially using their left flank (your right)? All I can figure is that he's making a point about not placing it in your centre. Too obvious perhaps?

I agree with the point about placing the hill in a position to discourage any potential rout of your forces being in the direct rearward direction. The path of least resistance towards the 'tenable ground', if in full retreat, would be to come around the contour of the slope, into the centre and thus providing it some support, if under pressure.

No elaboration about the 'fatal ground to the fore'. What's so fatal about it, I have to ask?

It's also unclear about whether this deployment is in preparation for attack or defence.

I'm going to assume defence for the time being since the clear intention is to deploy in such a way that the enemy will be obliged to attack on ground of your choice. Deploy, if only partially, on the only high ground available and the enemy may decide not to engage and, as has been pointed out, your own troops up there may decide to stay put when you need them to move down and join in. With everybody on flat ground, the enemy may be lulled into thinking it's going to be a fair fight.

[katank]

well, China is extremely mountainous in most regions.

the difficulty of communication over broken terrain was likely what caused the development of so many different dialects.

EYG, I agree that the psychology maybe big.

the fatal terrain part is to refer to preferably broken ground or places like marshes to impede progress of enemy troops where upon they woudl be subject to barrages from missiles and be fatigued when they do start meleeing.

at his time, there was already conscript soldiery so many troops may be very green and break almost before getting into melee.