“Never interfere with an enemy while he is in the process of destroying himself.”
The 33 Strategies of War, Strategy 28, The One-Upmanship Strategy
Upon observing enemies who find themselves in precarious situations, who appear to be aiding their own downfall rather than attempting to rectify it, our instinctive response is usually to intervene.
Even when we have not directly caused this chaos, we are desperate to speed up the process of collapse through various forms of attack.
We are tempted to gloat or sneak in the last blow, hoping to add salt to this open wound, to leave our mark on this destruction.
But such a response, whilst perhaps satisfying our sadistic and egoistical impulses, is in fact deeply counterproductive and shortsighted.
The enlightened approach, the endgame in such a situation, is deceptively simple: we must stand back and allow this rival to self-destruct.
We do not try to convince these enemies that what they are doing is wrong or right—that will only encourage them to reconsider their current course.
We do not try to add our own attacks in order to hasten the process—this meddling will likely impede on the momentum of the ensuing collapse.
We do not gloat during these downfalls either—this will only sully our reputation, instigate unwanted attention in our direction, and create new and unnecessary enemies.
In one of the most simple and efficient—and least suspecting—acts of war, we simply stand back and watch the madness unfold.
The closest we should come to taking action under these circumstances is to act friendly (not too friendly as to raise suspicions, of course), even offering discreetly dubious assistance and advice.
These targets will either fail to see through our duplicity, taking our shoddy advice, resulting in even more issues for them.
Or they will see through our mask, lashing out in rage at our arrogance to pose as a friend whilst working as a spy.
At this point, our hands are clean, our reputation unsullied.
Our rivals’ loss of position is our gain.
We are one up and they are one down.
If we had attacked them directly, our advantage would have been temporary or nonexistent.
In fact, our political position would be precarious—our pathetic, suffering rivals would win sympathy as our victims, and attention would focus on us as responsible for their undoing.
Instead, they must be left to fall on their own swords.
We may have given them a slight push, but to whatever extent possible in their own eyes, and certainly in everyone else’s, they must have only themselves to blame.
That will make their defeat double galling, and doubly effective.