ABSTRACT
There is one component of campaign planning that cannot be managed on the map or sand table and that no military strategist can control with absolute certainty: central to all military tactics is the question of how to make a soldier abandon the security of his trench or bush or doorframe and advance in the face of death. All armies face this dilemma, and all armies seek to solve it by motivating their soldiers to perform in specific ways. In 1979, the approach used by the PLA was to combine intense political motivation with the tactics of massed attack, as described in a contemporary news report:
The Chinese infantry advanced shoulder to shoulder . . . When they moved out of Lao Cai they were as numerous and close together as the rice in the paddy fields.2
