{"id":702,"date":"2011-11-12T07:09:43","date_gmt":"2011-11-12T13:09:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/gazette\/2011\/11\/12\/laws_of_combat\/"},"modified":"2022-04-01T16:10:45","modified_gmt":"2022-04-01T21:10:45","slug":"laws_of_combat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/2011\/11\/12\/laws_of_combat\/","title":{"rendered":"Laws of Combat"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;m going through my files &#8211; physical and computer &#8211; and deleting or archiving those that are likely beyond their useful life. This is one of the final steps in unwinding the website business.<\/p>\n<p>In the process, I&#8217;ve run across a lot of things that I acquired and kept over the years for no apparent reason. Some of them are still interesting, if not relevant; many are simple puzzling in that I can&#8217;t remember why I thought they were important.<\/p>\n<p>I do remember the following list, though. I had it affixed to my wall when I was a dealmaker at ARCO. I can&#8217;t remember the source, but there are dozens of similar lists all over the &#8216;net. I&#8217;ve never been in combat, but I can assure you that some of the oil and gas negotiations I participated in often <i>seemed<\/i> like military conflicts. It&#8217;s probably not surprising that many of the &#8220;Laws of Combat&#8221; apply to corporate battlefields.<\/p>\n<h3>Murphy&#8217;s Laws of Combat<\/h3>\n<p><i>I&#8217;ve bolded those that have particular relevance to the corporate world.<\/i><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><b>If it&#8217;s stupid but works, it isn&#8217;t stupid.<\/b><\/li>\n<li>If the enemy is in range &#8211; so are you!<\/li>\n<li>Incoming fire has the right of way.<\/li>\n<li>Don&#8217;t look conspicuous &#8211; it draws fire.<\/li>\n<li><b>The easy way is always mined.<\/b><\/li>\n<li>Try to look unimportant &#8211; they might be low on ammo.<\/li>\n<li><b>Professionals are predictable; it&#8217;s the amateurs that are dangerous.<\/b><\/li>\n<li>The enemy invariably attacks on two occasions:&nbsp;\n<ul>\n<li>When you&#8217;re ready for them.&nbsp;<\/li>\n<li>When you&#8217;re not ready for them.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><b>Teamwork is essential, it gives them someone else to shoot at.<\/b><\/li>\n<li>A &#8220;sucking chest wound&#8221; is natures way of telling you to slow down.<\/li>\n<li><b>If your attack is going well; you have walked into an ambush.<\/b><\/li>\n<li>Never draw fire, it irritates everyone around you.<\/li>\n<li>Anything you do can get you shot, including nothing.<\/li>\n<li>Make it too tough for the enemy to get in, and you won&#8217;t be able to get out.<\/li>\n<li><b>Never share a fighting hole with anyone braver than yourself.<\/b><\/li>\n<li>If you are short of everything but the enemy, you are in a combat zone.<\/li>\n<li>When you have secured an area, don&#8217;t forget to tell the enemy.<\/li>\n<li>No combat ready unit ever passed an inspection.<\/li>\n<li>No inspection ready unit ever passed combat.<\/li>\n<li>Fortify your front and you&#8217;ll get your rear shot up.<\/li>\n<li>If you can&#8217;t remember, the claymore is pointed towards you.<\/li>\n<li>All five second grenade fuses are three seconds, or all five second fuses will burn out in three.<\/li>\n<li>It&#8217;s not the one with your name on it &#8211; it&#8217;s the round addressed &#8220;to whom it may concern&#8221; you have to think about.<\/li>\n<li><b>If you can keep your head while those around you are losing theirs, you may have misjudged the situation.<\/b><\/li>\n<li><b>If two things are required to make something work, they will never be shipped together.<\/b><\/li>\n<li>Whenever you lose contact with the enemy, look behind you.<\/li>\n<li><b>The most dangerous thing in the combat zone is an officer with a map.<\/b><\/li>\n<li>The quartermaster has only two sizes, too large and too small.<\/li>\n<li>If you really need an officer in a hurry, take a nap.<\/li>\n<li>If your sergeant can see you, so can the enemy.<\/li>\n<li><b>When in doubt, empty your magazine.<\/b><\/li>\n<li>The important things are always simple.<\/li>\n<li>The simple things are always hard.<\/li>\n<li>If you take more than your fair share of objectives, you will have more than your fair share of objectives to take.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;m going through my files &#8211; physical and computer &#8211; and deleting or archiving those that are likely beyond their useful life. This is one of the final steps in unwinding the website business. In the process, I&#8217;ve run across a lot of things that I acquired and kept over the years for no apparent&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/2011\/11\/12\/laws_of_combat\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Laws of Combat<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[47,49],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-702","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business","category-thinking-allowed","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/702","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=702"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/702\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9470,"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/702\/revisions\/9470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=702"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=702"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ericsiegmund.com\/fireant\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=702"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}