the author confirms the daoist belief that the soft and weak can overcome the hard and strong, and extends this belief to military strategy and tactics. "the three strategies" teaches that an army must adopt a low, passive posture when not directly engaged in action, in order to prevent becoming brittle, exposed, and easily overcome. the text assumes that the employment of both hard and soft tactics must be utilized by a successful army, in order to achieve the desired levels of unpredictability and flexible deployment.