Live Off the Enemy
Updated 2026-08-10
INTRODUCTION
English translation pending.
CORE DEFINITION
From Sunzi comes the rule that a wise commander feeds the army on the enemy, and one measure of enemy grain is worth twenty transported from home. As a model it means drawing on the resources already present in the opponent, the market, or the surrounding ecosystem instead of building every capability from scratch, and converting what others have already paid for into what you can use.
SCAFFOLDING EFFECT
Reduce cognitive load
- Find the bottleneck: name the single internal resource that limits your advance - Convert what is there: turn rival users, talent, and infrastructure to your own use - Keep an exit open: avoid depending on one external source until it owns you
Anchor fast decisions
Transporting supplies over a long distance costs multiples of the supplies themselves, so self-provisioning multiplies cost while slowing movement. Resources already in the field carry no transport cost, and every unit taken from the opponent is also a unit denied to them, so the same exchange improves both sides of the ratio at once.
MINIMUM ACTION
In progress 0/1Practice this model in one real situation:
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Source support: Explicit
- zh.wikisource.orghttps://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/%E5%AD%AB%E5%AD%90%E5%85%B5%E6%B3%95verified
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