Steal the Beams and Replace the Pillars

Steal the Beams and Replace the Pillars Constantly shift the enemy’s dispositions, secretly draw off its elite main force, and wait for it to decline of itself; then seize the moment to attack and take it. It is like holding back a cart’s wheel: the cart cannot move forward. Remove the beams and pillars that support the whole, and the opponent’s structure will cease to function from within. Allusion:After Qin Shi Huang died at Shaqiu, his testamentary edict ordered his eldest son Fusu to return to Xianyang to preside over the mourning and succeed to the throne. The eunuch Zhao Gao and the chancellor Li Si conspired together: they destroyed the true edict and forged two false ones—“ordering Fusu and Meng Tian to die” and “making Huhai crown prince”—while at the same time sealing off news of the death and using the stench of salted fish to mask the odor of the corpse, thereby maintaining the illusion that “the emperor was still alive.” On receiving the false edict, Fusu cut his own throat, and Huhai ascended the throne. The supreme power of Qin was thus substantively......