Carl Von Clausewitz On War
This is the other book that everyone talks about, but that no one ever reads. In contrast to The Art of War, which is reasonably short, this book is the marathon of military treatises. And no, I am not very far into the book... nor do I expect to finish it anytime soon.
The trick with dear ol CVC is that he blabbers on and on about a whole bunch of nonsense rife with big words and run-on sentences that one frequently gets the impression that reading On War is useless. Then just as you are about to kick the text to the curb, some very important and often clever rule or comment is laid before the reader....forcing you to read further.
Now this is very funny: CVC claims that there are four kinds of officers: clever and industrious, clever and lazy, stupid and lazy, and stupid and industrious.
-- The clever and industrious make the best staff officers
-- The clever and lazy make the best commanders (on account of naturally finding the path of least resistance to success or victory)
-- The stupid and lazy are not your leaders but with supervision still have their uses
-- However, the stupid and industrious officers must be removed from the organization as quickly as possible as they will cause the greatest harm to progress.
Everyone has to like a guy who says that laziness is good for your career. lol
Posted by paul at September 5, 2007 09:51 AM