Sun Wu said in his book The Art of War:
March where the enemy cannot rush to defend; advance where he least expects you.
To travel a thousand li without fatigue, move through unguarded lands.
This passage from Chapter 6 (Weak Points and Strong) of The Art of War encapsulates the ultimate strategy of asymmetric warfare: avoiding the enemy’s strengths and striking their vulnerabilities. To truly understand the brilliance of “marching a thousand miles without fatigue because you travel through unguarded territory,” we can look at one of the most spectacular lightning strikes in Chinese military history: The Night Raid on Dingxiang in 628 AD.
Here is an interpretation of Sun Tzu’s wisdom through the legendary campaign of General Li Jing:
The Philosophy of the Unguarded Path
“Marching a thousand miles without fatigue is because you travel through unguarded territory.”
Sun Tzu posits that true efficiency in warfare is not about brute strength, but about finding the path of least resistance. If an army strikes where the enemy is entirely unprepared and lacks defenses, the physical toll of a long march is negated by the psychological shock and lack of opposition. The enemy’s “unguarded territory” is the ultimate manifestation of their “void” (emptiness).
Striking Where the Enemy Does Not Expect
“Appear at points that the enemy must hasten to defend; march swiftly to places where you are not expected.”
In the first month of the Zhenguan era (628 AD), the Tang Dynasty faced the formidable Eastern Turkic Khaganate. While traditional military doctrine would have dictated waiting for spring to wage war, the legendary Tang general Li Jing chose a radically unexpected approach. He led a vanguard of just 3,000 elite cavalry out of Mayi in the dead of winter, amidst a blinding blizzard.
The Turkic Khan, Illig Qaghan, was absolutely certain that the Tang army would never dare to launch a massive campaign in such extreme, freezing conditions. He believed his northern borders were completely safe. Li Jing’s decision to march through a deadly winter storm was the ultimate execution of “marching to places where you are not expected.” The severe weather acted as a cloak, rendering the Turkic defenses entirely blind.
Exploiting the Void: The Fall of Dingxiang
“Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where you are not expected.”
Li Jing’s 3,000 cavalry silently reached a treacherous, rugged, and steep mountain pass south of the ancient city of Dingxiang, known as Eyang Ridge. Because the terrain was so hostile and the weather so brutal, the Turkic garrison had left this specific approach completely unguarded. Li Jing had successfully marched through “unguarded territory.”
Seizing the high ground, Li Jing ordered his cavalry to charge down the snowy slopes in the dead of night. The attack was instantaneous and devastating. The Turkic forces, caught completely off guard and believing the Tang army to be hundreds of miles away, panicked. The historical records note that the Khan was so terrified by the sudden appearance of the Tang cavalry that he believed “heavenly soldiers had descended from the sky.” The Turkic army collapsed and fled in chaos, and Dingxiang fell in a single stroke.
In Summary:
General Li Jing’s snowstorm raid on Dingxiang is a textbook realization of Sun Tzu’s philosophy. By choosing a path that the enemy deemed impassable and therefore left undefended, Li Jing turned a grueling thousand-mile march into a frictionless strike. He proved that when a commander perfectly exploits the enemy’s blind spots, even the harshest environments and the longest distances cannot cause fatigue, because the enemy’s mind has already been defeated before the battle even begins.
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