There Can Be No Rest Until the Enemy is Completely Destroyed (Strat 2)

The first thing I noticed was, “gee, that sure seems like a
brutal policy for these enlightened Byzantines” Yes, how naïve. But take a
closer look at the context! Which I have available and informs me that said complete
destruction may actually take the form of the enemy’s surrendering or striking
a treaty under favorable-for-Byzantium conditions. So, that makes sense. It means
to completely destroy the military threat, not necessarily the individuals. I
bet there were some pretty bad mofos crossing the Danube that this got literal
with.

I guess the neatest thing about reading this book for me its
fundamental difference from The Art of War, that being the total nuts and bolts-ness
of Strategikon. You can apply The Art of War to modern challenges because it’s
got a lot of philosophical instruction and advice about attitude and/or
military strategies that are scaleable. Whereas the Strat gives you specific
instructions on how to fight Persians, how to fight horseback archers, what
sort of weapons to equip your soldiers, how to do a Scythian retreat ambush. In
impressive detail, too. It’s like this was actually a textbook reproduced and
given to generals to check out while they were in the office. Maybe it was?

I’m reading this book currently so I might write about it
more, but later.

-Rob