>> We need to stop untethering the text from the historical and cultural milieu of its origination

> The reason we still read these people at all (Thucydides, Machievelli, Clausewitz, Sun Tzu, etc) is because their work transcends "the historical and cultural milieu of its origination".

Yes and no. IIRC, Sun Tzu strongly advises against attacking walled cities. The edition of Sun Tzu that I read made the point that reason for that was because, at his time, siege engine technology was not up to the task. In Sun Pin, written a few hundred years later, the advice changed.

There's a core there that does transcend "the historical and cultural milieu of its origination," but you kinda need to tether the text to its milieu to find it.