Divide an conquer is the oldest trick in the book (except maybe knock them on the head with a bigger rock than they can hit you on the head with). Imperial Chi

Divide an conquer is the oldest trick in the book (except maybe knock them on the head with a bigger rock than they can hit you on the head with). Imperial China repeatedly followed the same policy of trying to keep the outlying nomadic peoples fractured and prevented from uniting under a single leader. The results for the Chinese state were not good when Turkish, Mongol, or Manchu leaders were able to unite the disparate clans under a single banner, to give another example.