36 Strategies Vernacular Full Translation

Chapter 39 Close the door to catch the thief
The original small enemy is trapped.Peeling, there is a disadvantage.

For small groups of enemies, it is necessary to encircle them and destroy them (although small groups of enemies are weak, they have freedom of movement and are hard to guard against deceit).It would be extremely disadvantageous if you let them escape and chase after them fiercely.

Interpretation of "close the door to catch thieves" is a folk saying that has been circulating for a long time, which is similar to another folk saying "close the door and beat the dog".The so-called catching a thief behind closed doors is not only afraid of the thief escaping, but also afraid that he will be used by others after he escapes.What's more, for the fleeing thieves, they can't go after them because they are afraid of their tricks to lure soldiers.

Therefore, "closing doors to catch thieves" is a tactical action taken from a strategic perspective.When you find a thief entering the house and stealing something, you should suddenly lock the door and call on the neighbors to come and catch the thief. There are so many people, and the thief has nowhere to go, so he has no choice but to catch the thief.If there were no neighbors at that time, or none of the neighbors was at home, and you couldn't restrain the culprit with your own strength, you could only use three methods: one is to create momentum to scare the culprit away; The property is taken away; the third is to try to hold the thief for assistance.

The ancients were inspired by it, used it to fight against the enemy, and evolved it into a successful tactical strategy. The "thieves" here have become small troops who are good at sneak attacks. They act secretly, come and go, and their whereabouts are unpredictable.There are not many of them, but they are very destructive. They often attack our army when we are not prepared.For such a "thief", once it is discovered, it must not be let go.If you accidentally let it escape and chase after it, you may be desperately resisted by the opponent, or more seriously, you will fall for it.

Implement the strategy of closing the door to catch thieves. There are hundreds of "closes" and thousands of "catch". "Close" includes early pass and late pass, urgent pass and slow pass, bright pass and dark pass. "Catch" includes surprise, fatigue, lure, trap, and fight.The most common method is to design a pocket array, and after the enemy enters the pocket, tie the mouth of the pocket tightly to block their retreat.Of course, it is also a good way to tightly surround the enemy's garrison so that it cannot escape.

When we use the timing of closing the door to catch thieves, we should pay attention to the following aspects.

[-]. Timing is the key.To seize the favorable opportunity, close it when it is necessary, and catch it when it is necessary.

Second, avoid the strong and stay weak.Generally speaking, once a strong enemy is trapped in the "house", he will definitely make troubles, break the door and collapse the house.Therefore, the enemies involved are generally small and weak forces, not strong enemies.

[-]. Close the gate to prevent the enemy from escaping.First of all, the location of the "closed door" must not only be conducive to the complete annihilation of the enemy, but also conducive to our concentration of superior forces. Only in this way can we increase the number of victories.And the "thief" locked in the "house" will definitely not be honest, peaceful, and let it go, he will definitely resist desperately and try to break out of the tight encirclement.Therefore, the gate must be an important breakthrough, and it is also crucial to keep the gate well.

In short, to catch thieves after closing the door, you must first set up a siege circle and open the door to let the enemy troops in.If the enemy does not enter the door, try to lure them in.Among the Chinese military, many people have successfully used the strategy of closing the door to catch thieves, and they opened it at the right time and closed it with ease.

Of course, if the enemy adopts the strategy of closing the door to catch thieves, we can adopt the following preventive countermeasures to deal with it.

[-]. Find out the enemy's situation and avoid acting blindly. "Sun Tzu's Art of War" advocates that before fighting the enemy, one must find out the enemy's reality in detail and accurately before entering the battlefield.In this way, it is possible to avoid entering the enemy's encirclement by mistake due to unknown circumstances, and avoid the tragic ending of being locked in by the enemy and attacking them in groups.

Second, use tactics to attack and escape cleverly.Once locked in the door by the enemy, no matter how critical the situation is, you can't panic.Calm down quickly and carefully observe the encirclement circle set by the enemy.Once you find an opportunity to take advantage of, you must decisively escape from the encirclement, and you must not passively respond to the battle, let alone stubbornly love to fight.

Examples of Wisdom
Zhukov "closed the door" to wipe out the enemy

On the battlefield, the reason why "catching thieves" must "close the door" is to cut off their retreat, surround them on all sides, prevent them from slipping through the net, and win in one fell swoop.The Battle of Korsun commanded by Marshal Zhukov of the former Soviet Union is a good example of this strategy.

In 1943, Stalin, the supreme commander of the former Soviet Union, issued an order: to completely annihilate the German army in the Kersun area.The battle situation at this time is: there are as many as 12 German divisions entrenched in the Kersun area. Although the north, east, and south sides have been successfully surrounded by the Soviet army, the west is still facing the main force of hundreds of thousands of German troops stationed in Ukraine. Connected, hard to beat.

Marshal Zhukov, who was good at fighting tough battles, was ordered to command this battle.In order to win this battle, Zhukov and his generals conducted repeated studies, and finally decided to use the specific deployment of "closing the door to catch thieves": first, the two Ukrainian front forces attacked the enemy behind the Korsund army from the north and the south. Zvenigomadka carried out a frontal attack to curb its connection with the main force of Ukraine in the west, and took advantage of the situation to close the door for the German troops to escape westward in the area, and then surrounded and annihilated it.

However, it was not easy for the Soviet army to close the "gate" of the German army.This "gate" is more than 130 kilometers wide, and the German army also built a solid fortification at the "gate" and set up heavy guards. Inside the "gate" are the elite troops of more than a dozen divisions of the German army; outside the "gate" is the main force of the German army with extremely strong combat effectiveness.

Although it was very difficult, Zhukov, who faced the difficulties, did not waver in his determination to launch a campaign. On January 1944, 1, the Soviet army first launched a feint attack.The German army was really fooled, thinking that the main force of the Soviet army was attacking, and hurriedly transferred a large force from the Kersun area to participate in the defense.Therefore, Zhukov ordered the Soviet army's rapid assault force to rush to Zvenigomadka immediately, but unexpectedly encountered tenacious resistance from the German army.The German army dispatched troops and generals with high morale, and tried to cut off the giant arm of "closing the door".

Zhukov was not afraid of danger, seized the loopholes in the German defense in time, ordered the Sixth Tank Army to act from the enemy's rear, and quickly made a detour to the Zvenigomadka area. Together with the local Soviet rapid assault force, they completely cut off the German army in the Korsun area. Contact with its main force.Then, the main force of the Soviet army quickly continued to divide the enemy forces along the breakthrough, and began to compress towards the center of the encirclement.

In this situation, in order to save the more than 10 troops trapped in the siege, the German High Command urgently dispatched more than a dozen divisions to rescue the siege.The besieged German army also tried to break through the "gate" and join the rescued reinforcements.Zhukov, who was chasing after the victory, transferred the Second Tank Army to carry out a counter-breakout, ruining the dream of the German army's breakout.The two sides fought fiercely for a week, and the German army who came to relieve the siege was finally blocked by the Soviet army 12 kilometers away from the besieged German army.The "gate" defended by the German army was firmly closed.The success of Zhukov's strategy of "closing the door to catch thieves" ensured that the Soviet army would launch a general offensive as scheduled on February 2, and all of them would be wiped out by the besieged German troops.

Although the strategy of "closing the door to catch thieves" is to shut down the weak rather than the strong, it is entirely possible to encircle and wipe out the main force of the enemy if it is used well. "The law of using troops is to surround them with ten, to attack with five, and to divide them when doubled." Zhukov encountered an enemy army that was not weak. Finally win.

Tempting Japanese Negotiations

In the business war, no one will voluntarily get into the trap of others and let others close the door to deal with them as they like.Therefore, the key to using the strategy of "closing the door to catch thieves" is to induce, so that the other party can unknowingly follow his induction.

In the 20s, Cowen, a young executive of an American multinational company, was ordered to go to Japan to participate in an important negotiation.This was his first mission abroad, but he dealt with the "economic animals" he disliked - the Japanese.Ke Wen thought to himself: It's no wonder I don't step on those "economic animals" this time!

After some careful preparations, Kewen boarded the flight to Tokyo with some books on Japanese customs and psychology.When boarding the plane, I did not forget to encourage myself again and again: This time I will really show my talents.After the plane landed, Cowen was the first to get off the plane.At the immigration end, he was greeted by two courteous Japanese gentlemen.Ke Wen received the respect and courtesy of the Japanese, which made him feel unspeakably happy.

The two Japanese went through the formalities one by one for him, and then sent him to a limousine.In the car, Kewen sat comfortably alone in the back seat with his legs stretched out, while the two Japanese squeezed into a front seat.He asked the Japanese: "Why don't you sit in the back seat? The back seat is very spacious!" But the Japanese replied respectfully: "Oh! You are an important person and need a good rest, so we won't squeeze you. "This set makes Cowen feel very proud.Along the way, the Japanese asked Kewen very politely: "Excuse me, do you speak Japanese?" Kewen replied: "I'm sorry, I don't understand Japanese. But I hope I can learn a few sentences of everyday language this time. I also carry a dictionary with me!"

Another Japanese asked with concern: "Are you leaving Japan according to the scheduled flight? We can arrange a car for you and take you to the airport." Ke Wen thought to himself: It wasn't him who reminded me, I forgot It's about the return flight!The Japanese are careful in doing things.So, he took out a return ticket in fourteen days from his pocket and handed it to the Japanese so that they could prepare a car to take him off according to the date and frequency of the ticket.At this time, the inexperienced Ke Wen didn't know at all. In this way, the Japanese easily knew that his "negotiation period" was only fourteen days at most, but he knew nothing about the other party.

After settling down in Tokyo, the Japanese were not in a hurry to start negotiations, but led Kewen around, allowing him to fully appreciate the Japanese national culture and hospitality.It took a whole week for Kewen to swim from the imperial palace in Tokyo to the shrine in Kyoto. They even signed up for Kewen to participate in an English class studying Japanese Zen.

Every night, Kewen would spend more than four hours sitting cross-legged with the Japanese on tatami mats on the hardwood floor, enjoying traditional Japanese dinners and watching Japanese singing and dancing performances.Every time Cowen asked them when they could start negotiations, they always said: "It's still early, don't rush, don't rush!"

In the twinkling of an eye, there were two days left before Kewen's return date, and the negotiations finally started.But in order to play golf that day, the negotiations were suspended early.On the 13th day, the negotiations were suspended early because Kewen was going to attend the farewell feast arranged by the Japanese.

No. 14th day, the last day of the negotiation, just as everyone started bargaining in earnest, the car that took Ke Wen to the airport arrived.The most important price issue can only be solved in the car in the end.As they got closer and closer to the airport, they had no choice but to hurry up and solve the most important and most critical problems left over in a hurry.The negotiation didn't come to a hasty end until the car arrived at the airport.

Of course, the outcome of the negotiations can also be imagined.In Cowen's words, the Japanese achieved "the second major victory since the attack on Pearl Harbor."

In this example, the Japanese "closed the door to catch thieves" and put their opponents in their carefully designed "pockets".Then, through a series of deceiving strategies and delaying methods, it gradually weakened the powerful advantage of the US side in negotiations, and finally made it unknowingly fall into a passive position, and became its own pocket in the hasty negotiations.

Job Search Tips

"Close the door to catch thieves" can not only "close the door" when the enemy attacks us, but also actively create so-called "pockets" to lure the enemy into submission in a planned way.In terms of job hunting, you can form alliances with classmates and friends, so that employers can take the initiative to come to you.

For example, job fairs held by colleges and departments in universities, or several students jointly applying for jobs on newspapers, TV, and the Internet, looking for units that meet their own conditions, etc., are all extensions of "closing the door to catch thieves".It is a wise move to seek a job in this way under the extremely severe employment situation.

There is a graduate student majoring in computer science, and his girlfriend is a history graduate from the same school as him. They hope to work in the same city south of the Yangtze River after graduation.They have been to the talent markets in Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Zhuhai and other big cities together. It is not difficult for the man to work, but as soon as he talks to the employer about his girlfriend, they all reject him.

Just when he and his girlfriend were feeling exhausted from job hunting, someone suggested that they might as well try advertising.So he and his girlfriend published a job advertisement in a city newspaper at the same time, indicating their expertise, ability and job application intention, and sincerely hoped to find a suitable employer.

As a result, two companies and a scientific research institution really came to our door and contacted them for negotiation.In the end, they aimed at a large enterprise. The man entered the production planning department of the enterprise, and his girlfriend was assigned to the archives room of the enterprise. Finally, the ideal employment status was achieved.

Compared with individuals in the workplace, the talent market and employers with oversupply are undoubtedly strong and dominant.In recent years, employers basically put forward employment conditions, and individuals in the workplace follow suit to apply for employment.Under such disadvantaged conditions, individuals in the workplace may wish to use the strategy of "closing the door to catch thieves" like these two people to change from passive to active. As long as they meet the required conditions, it is not difficult to find an ideal employer.

(End of this chapter)