Sublime

Giving a team enough structure to carry out a mission but enough flexibility to respond to changing circumstances is called commander’s intent—a military term first applied to the Germans who were trying to defeat Napoleon.

General Võ Nguyên Giáp, the Vietnamese MacArthur, the man who single-handedly defeated the Japanese, the French, the Americans, and the Chinese.

The Marine philosophy is to recruit for attitude and train for skills. Marines believe that attitude is a weapon system. We searched for intangible character traits: a quest for adventure, a desire to serve with the elite, and the intention to be in top physical condition.

However, the military dictum goes that an offense is the best defense. Unlike its predecessors, the 18th century Qing dynasty undertook the strategy of forward deterrence. It created zones of influence going beyond the Great Wall into the heart of the nomadic territory. The strategy aimed at taking more proactive measures against the nomads, projec

on June 11, 2014, the Avenue of the Entrepreneurs opened to its new tenants. Guo had used the tools at his disposal—cash, cement, and manual labor—to give a strong nudge toward indigenous innovation in the local startup. It was a landmark moment for Zhongguancun, but one that wasn’t destined to stay sequestered to this corner of Beijing. Indeed, Gu