, Columnist
Get Ready, America. Trade War’s Coming for Your Hip Pocket
Washington is ignoring a 2,500-year-old lesson: Pay attention to the economics of conflict.
Collateral damage?
Photographer: iStock/Getty Images
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“A wise general makes a point of foraging on the enemy,” according to the Chinese general Sun Tzu. “One cartload of the enemy’s provisions is equivalent to 20 of one’s own.”
The lesson of that maxim — that leaders need to pay close attention to the economics of conflict, and make sure that costs are imposed more on the enemy than the home front — holds as true today as it did two and a half millennia ago. Washington doesn’t appear to be listening.