You may have the clock; but we have the time


It was 1975, at the thick of the Vietnam war.  A US general was baiting Viet Cong guerrilla fighters to come out of their trenches. He was at the fag end of the war. All strategies to gouge them out failed. Days turned to nights and the sun sunk twice over. The four star general was restless to call victory. He pounded the land, rained bullets and pulverized the sky. Still the guerrillas were entrenched and holding the ground. The cat and mouse game went on at an immense cost for America. The NATO army had the best of the equipment, finest of the strategies, deepest of the resources and valorous of the men. The Guerilla’s had only one resource as they sneered at the general “ you may have the clock but we have the time!”. That alone determined Vietcong’s indomitable spirit. In war games often, the only winning move is not to play and time out your opponent.

In a parallel world, venture capitalist rushed in and out of PowerPoint meetings and invested scores of millions of dollars, as though it was a panacea to all problems. Much to their chagrin, the natives would often say nonchalantly, "you may have the Rolex but we have the luxury of time". Harmony and balance is often beyond the tick-tock of needles and the round dial. 

This may be a key lesson as the world pensively battles the corona virus today. As sun tzu would tell us “Supreme excellence lies in breaking the enemy’s resistance without fighting them”.  If we were about to face our worst enemy, of which you knew very little, and we had two options: Either run towards it with all your resources, or escape to buy a bit of time to prepare. Which one would should we choose?” The lock-down precisely allows us to buy time, create an action plan and control the virus until we hopefully have a solution. The virus is pounding the land, raining bullets and pulverizing the sky. The real question is are we the US General or the viet cong fighter?  


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