The previously posted comments are correct that the way to evaluate a translation is to find someone who knows the original language. I do read literary Chinese

The previously posted comments are correct that the way to evaluate a translation is to find someone who knows the original language. I do read literary Chinese, although I have never tackled the full text of Sun Tzu's The Art of War. (I've mostly read the major philosophers like Confucius and Mencius.) There was a whole genre of Chinese literature at that time of guides to warfare, so 兵法 ("art of war") is a title of some other books from that era, which is why Sun Tzu's book is usually mentioned with his name. Literary Chinese has quite intricate grammar, about which both Chinese and Western linguists debate in book-length works. Just as with any other language, a word-by-word approach to translation will not do. When I first saw this article submitted to Hacker News, I read it for a while, looking for clues that the blog post author actually knows Chinese. To me, too, the site looked a bit like a scam, trying to sell management advice based on an ancient holy text for rather too much money. For me, the key take-away from translations of Sun Tzu's Art of War that I have read is to leave an enemy a way to flee. Don't force people to fight to the death by surrounding them entirely. That advice was followed when P.R.C. soldiers moved in on the peaceful Tiananmen Square protesters in 1989. One corner of the square was left open as an escape route so that people could simply run away.