VerifiedExact passage, cited
High
Checked by the editor · 8 Oct 2026
Attributed to Sun Tzu
The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.
Yes. It is an accurate modern translation of The Art of War, III.2. Giles’s 1910 wording is different.
Source line
不战而屈人之兵，善之善者也。
bù zhàn ér qū rén zhī bīng, shàn zhī shàn zhě yě.
Hence to fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting.
The Art of War · III. Attack by Stratagem · §2 · tr. Lionel Giles, 1910
Explanation
Yes. The familiar sentence is an accurate modern translation of The Art of War, chapter III, section 2. It is not Lionel Giles's wording. The Chinese is 不战而屈人之兵，善之善者也. Giles in 1910 takes a longer road to the same place: to fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting. The modern line says "subdue the enemy without fighting" and calls that the supreme art of war.
Same claim, different English. Giles first denies that winning every fight is the height of skill, then names the higher aim as breaking the enemy's resistance without a battle. The shorter modern sentence keeps that aim and drops his opening clause. Both point at section 2. If you need words in the public domain, use Giles and name 1910. If you use the modern sentence, call it a modern translation of III.2, not a quotation from Giles. The Chinese is the part that does not move.
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Sun Tzu, III.2, tr. Giles (1910): supreme excellence is breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting.
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