Guo Huaruo

Guo Huaruo was a military strategist from China. Alastair Iain Johnston, author of "Cultural Realism and Strategy in Maoist China," said that until the mid-1980s Guo was "the CCP's most authoritative interpreter and annotator" of the book The Art of War by Sun Tzu. Samuel B. Griffith, a translator of The Art of War, wrote in the introduction of his edition that Guo was "practically unknown in the West".

Johnson said 'Guo stressed that from a Marxist-Leninist perspective the notion of "not fighting and subduing the enemy"'—the core of the conventional interpretation of Sun Zi—was un-Marxist, since class enemies could not be credibly defeated without the application of violence.'

Around June 4, 1937, Guo was the dean of studies of Qingyang Infantry School.

Works
Guo wrote A Preliminary Study of Sun Tzu's Art of War or "Sun Tzu Ping Fa Ch'u Pu Yen Chiu" (T: 孫子兵法初步研究, S: 孙子兵法初步研究, P: Sūnzǐ Bīngfǎ Chūbù Yánjiū), which was completed in 1939. It was used as a military textbook in areas controlled by Communists. The book says "The position Kuo has now enjoyed as a leading military theoretician seems to date from that period."

By 1971, Guo's latest edition of The Art of War was A Modern Translation with New Chapter Arrangement of Sun Tzu's ʻArt of Warʼ or "Chin I Hsin P'en Sun Tzu Ping Fa" (T: 今譯新編孫子兵法, S: 今译新编孙子兵法, P: Jīnyì Xīn Biān Sūnzǐ Bīngfǎ). In this edition, Guo rearranged the material, used Simplified Chinese, and phrased Sun Tzu's verses in colloquial Chinese.

List of works

 * A Preliminary Study of Sun Tzu's Art of War (T: 孫子兵法初步研究, S: 孙子兵法初步研究, P: Sūnzǐ Bīngfǎ Chūbù Yánjiū)
 * A Modern Translation with New Chapter Arrangement of Sun Tzu's ʻArt of Warʼ (T: 今譯新編孫子兵法, S: 今译新编孙子兵法, P: Jīnyì Xīn Biān Sūnzǐ Bīngfǎ)
 * Guo Huaruo's Selected Essays on Military Affairs (S: 郭化若军事论文选集, T: 郭化若軍事論文選集 Jūnshì Lùnwén Xuǎnjí). Liberation Army Press (Beijing), 1989.
 * Includes "Sun Zi yi zhu' qian yan," the preface to "Translation and Annotation of Sun Zi," 1983.