Deceit is of course not practiced as an art or an end in itself, contrary to tendencies sometimes prevailing in the modern world. Rather, false measures, feints, prevarications, troop deployments, dragging brush, feigning chaos, and other such acts are all designed to further the single objective of deceiving the enemy so that he will be confused or forced to respond in a predetermined way and thereby provide the army with an exploitable advantage. Warfare must be viewed as a matter of deception, of constantly creating false appearances, spreading disinformation, and employing trickery and deceit. When imaginatively created and effectively implemented, the enemy will neither know where to attack nor what formations to employ, and will accordingly be condemned to making fatal errors.
Ralph D. Sawyer, “Introduction” for Sun Tzu’s The Art of War, c. 450 BCE