Unrestricted Warfare by Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui (1999)

Warning: This is the worst audiobook on this channel - or the internet - I suggest reading the book.

Unrestricted Warfare is a 1999 Chinese military strategic manual arguing that powerful nations can be defeated without firing a shot. The authors explain that modern conflict is no longer limited to soldiers or missiles but to the systems a rival depends on. They outline a world where finance, trade, cyber networks, media, law, technology, and culture can be weaponized. This is sharply relevant in 2025 because nearly every American institution rests on digital and economic structures that can be disrupted remotely.

Qiao and Wang argue the United States is uniquely vulnerable due to global market integration, dependence on high speed information systems, and a lingering belief that war means tanks and missiles. They show how an opponent can weaken a nation through market shocks, currency moves, supply chain pressure, intellectual property theft, infrastructure hacks, influence campaigns, or legal exploitation. These tactics blur the line between war and peace... often unfolding long before leaders recognize them.

They stress asymmetric strategy - the idea that a weaker actor wins by bypassing strength instead of confronting it. Instead of meeting the U.S. military head on, an adversary would strike banks, grids, communications, pharmaceuticals, semiconductors, public confidence, or the mental stability of a population. In their view, the battlefield is everything a society needs to function.

For Americans in 2025, the pattern is visible. Cyberattacks on pipelines and hospitals, foreign influence operations, weaponized economics, targeted research theft, and non state digital actors all mirror the model described in the text. Qiao and Wang treat these not as isolated incidents but as parts of a continuous struggle fought across every domain where leverage exists.

Unrestricted Warfare reads like a blueprint for twenty first century conflict - a warning that modern power contests unfold across markets, networks, narratives, and institutions, and that ignoring these fronts leaves a nation exposed.

About the Authors:
Qiao Liang is a retired senior colonel of the People’s Liberation Army Air Force and a strategist known for examining how global finance, technology, and information systems shape modern conflict. He spent much of his career studying U.S. operations and the vulnerabilities created by America’s reliance on high tech systems and global markets. After retirement he lectured across China on geopolitical trends and long range strategic competition.

Wang Xiangsui is a former PLA officer who later became a professor of international relations and security studies. His work focuses on unconventional tools... cyber tactics, economic pressure, information shaping... that allow weaker actors to challenge major powers. He has written and lectured extensively on the limits of traditional doctrine in an interconnected world.

Together they combined military experience and academic analysis to produce Unrestricted Warfare, a challenge to old assumptions about conflict and a guide to exploiting the open systems of the early twenty first century. Their collaboration reflects a shift inside parts of China’s strategic community toward viewing conflict as a broad contest fought across finance, technology, law, and information rather than strictly on battlefields.

About the Translator and Translation Methodology:
The English edition most Americans read was produced by the Foreign Broadcast Information Service, the U.S. government’s translation and analysis division. FBIS translators were career linguists trained in military and political Chinese. Their mission was precision and clarity for analysts, not literary smoothness.

The translation reflects that purpose. Strategically loaded terms... financial warfare, information control, cross domain operations, psychological shaping... were rendered directly. PLA specific jargon stayed intact rather than softened for Western audiences. When a phrase lacked a clean English equivalent, translators used a literal rendering with a brief clarifying phrase. They avoided interpretive rewrites that could distort intent.

Because Unrestricted Warfare is an argument, not a literary project, FBIS preserved structure, logical progression, and the blunt tone of late 1990s PLA analysis. They did not modernize terminology or insert their own views. The result is a clear but clinical English text that mirrors how Chinese officers articulated doctrine.

Later commercial editions reused the FBIS translation. Some added dramatic subtitles or marketing language, but the core text remained unchanged. For American readers in 2025, this matters. The English version is not filtered through a Western stylistic lens. It is a direct, professional translation designed to convey the authors’ ideas with precision rather than decoration.

Thank you for paying attention.