Think Like the Enemy

Almost everyone in the military has heard the advice to think like the enemy. The saying probably originated with one of the most influential military strategists in history, Sun Tzu, who wrote in The Art of War, If you know your enemies and know yourself, you will not be imperiled in a hundred battles; if you do not know your enemies but do know yourself, you will win one and lose one; if you do not know your enemies nor yourself, you will be imperiled in every single battle. This is one of the age-old bits of wisdom I kept in the back of my mind, but never thought about too seriously. I first became familiar with the saying during 4 years as a cadet and then reflected on it more often during my 2 1/2 years as a lieutenant. It was not until recently, while serving in Iraq, that I gained new respect for its validity. As a combat engineer platoon leader, I adopted the principle of never following a daily pattern. In my platoon, we constantly changed our formation, speed, and order of march. But that was the extent of my efforts to throw the enemy off. My battalion commander liked to say that people learn through one of two ways: through repetition or because of a significant emotional event. My recent awakening was the result of the latter. Published in Engineer: The Professional Bulletin of Army Engineers, v38 p14-15, September-December 2009.