空城計
The Empty Fort Strategy
Meaning
Throwing open the gates of a defenseless city so the enemy suspects a trap and retreats — psychological warfare that hides weakness in plain sight.
Origin story
After Ma Su’s disaster at Jieting, the city where Zhuge Liang was staying had almost no soldiers left — and word came that Sima Yi was bearing down with 150,000 men. Unable to flee or fight, Zhuge Liang gave a startling order: hide the banners, open all four gates, and have soldiers sweep the streets like commoners. He himself climbed the wall, lit incense, and calmly played the zither. Reaching the walls, Sima Yi read the serenity as the sign of an ambush and withdrew his entire army. The novel built this beloved scene from an anecdote the annotator Pei Songzhi had dismissed as unreliable — yet it became the very name of the bluff.
Source: Romance of the Three Kingdoms, ch. 95 (from an anecdote Pei Songzhi himself rejected)
People
Modern examples
- Running the promotion with zero inventory left was a pure empty-fort bluff.
- Holding nothing, he raised big — an empty-fort play that made the whole table fold.