I wanted to cover one more topic before going into some guidelines/suggestions for our own strategies on national security.
There's an element of art, or gamesmanship, that I can only explain with poker.
Texas Hold 'Em, to be more precise. (Again, I want to add the caveat that I'm not an expert poker player. I have an uncle that plays much more seriously than I do, and I'm aware that I sometimes have tells that he can pick up on, for example. And I don't always know the statistical likelihood of getting a winning hand, so sometimes I play when I probably should have folded and sometimes I fold when I might have done better to play). In Texas Hold 'Em, each player has two cards that are hidden from the other players' view. Five more are eventually revealed to the entire group, so you've got some intelligence that everyone can see and some intelligence that only you are aware of.
You can make guesses about what the other players have, based on what's on the table and how they're playing. (If they fold, they probably don't have anything that matches up well with what's on the table. If they bet big, they might be holding on to a pocket pair of aces. Or cards that play well with the flop, and might lead to a flush, a straight, or three of a kind.)
In addition to the mechanics of the game, however, a lot of poker is based on being able to read the players around you. You can bluff, and perhaps win the pot with nothing. Push other players out of the game when you don't really have anything. But bluffing, in my experience, can also make you lose big. That is, if the other player has a good enough hand to stay in the game they'll probably keep playing regardless of how big you bluff...and you're single ace is just not going to win the pot.
Actually, when you're going head to head with someone there's a lot of quick games where each side knows their cards are bad (or good) and one side quickly folds. Then you just slowly lose the money you have to put in the pot (with two people, you're always the small blind or the big blind, so you're going to keep losing money if you keep folding). Then you either have to get really good cards or bluff. So in those situations you can recoup your losses by bluffing, but if the other player has a worthwhile hand you can also lose big. In my little bit of experience each round goes pretty quick until either both sides have good hands and commit to bidding (and one side doesn't have as good a hand as they think), or one side tries to bluff the other out and loses. Otherwise whoever has the largest number of chips can probably outlast the other just by refusing to get sucked in unless their cards are great.
Like I keep saying, go find a real expert if you want a better discussion.
I brought this up, though, because there are some similarities to foreign policy. There's some information only you know, there's some information everyone knows, and there's some information the other side has that you don't. You're reputation and the signals you send can make a difference. You might be able to bluff and get away with it. Or you bluff, and they call your bluff, and you lose.
Bluffing...
Sometimes it's worth bluffing and losing, just so the other side is aware that you sometimes bluff. That's more if you want to sucker them in with a good hand, make them think you're bluffing when you're not. And sometimes you also want to show that you've got the cards to back your actions up, so that they know it's not always a bluff. That might make them back down in the future when you really don't have anything.
This is tied to two things. First, Vietnam. You could say that Vietnam was a situation where someone called our bluff. That is, Vietnam wasn't an existential threat. The American people stopped supporting it as the body count added up and didn't really see any reason to keep fighting for something that ultimately wasn't really a threat to us. But losing in Vietnam meant more people questioned whether we really have as good a hand as we sometimes imply. That did cause problems for us, because more people are likely to take the risk of calling our bluff, assuming it's a bluff. This is part of the problem we have in Syria. If we escalate our engagement there, are we really committed to it? Or, if the body count adds up and we get tied up there for a decade or more, will our people eventually get tired of it and call for us to leave? (Iraq adds to that analysis, since everyone and their mother saw that the American people were tired of it after five years of fighting.) I would say that Vietnam was not an existential threat, and that it doesn't necessarily mean we're weak when it's important...but our government is still responsive to the will of the people and what we consider 'important' is not necessarily what our leadership claims it is.
Second, Syria and Russia today. Russia is sending signals that they are very committed to keeping Assad in power. Is it a bluff? Can and will they back it up? Do we have the commitment and resources to call that bluff, if it's a bluff in the first place? Or do are they holding a pocket pair of aces, and will we wind up folding as soon as they reveal their hand? Or do they have a pocket pair of aces, but the flop was all clubs and we've got a pocket pair of clubs? In which case we'll have a showdown, but ultimately come out on top since our hand is better.
Does that make your head hurt?
What I wanted to get to, with all of that, is that some of our strategy is going to depend on how well we all are reading each other. How well we know the cards we have, what educated guesses we can make about the cards the other side is holding, our estimates of whether the other side has a good hand or not, and whether we in turn decide to play, fold, or bluff. It's not as straightforward as analyzing who has how strong of a military, because it depends as much on human psychology as it does on the actual cards in play.
There's an element of art, or gamesmanship, that I can only explain with poker.
Texas Hold 'Em, to be more precise. (Again, I want to add the caveat that I'm not an expert poker player. I have an uncle that plays much more seriously than I do, and I'm aware that I sometimes have tells that he can pick up on, for example. And I don't always know the statistical likelihood of getting a winning hand, so sometimes I play when I probably should have folded and sometimes I fold when I might have done better to play). In Texas Hold 'Em, each player has two cards that are hidden from the other players' view. Five more are eventually revealed to the entire group, so you've got some intelligence that everyone can see and some intelligence that only you are aware of.
You can make guesses about what the other players have, based on what's on the table and how they're playing. (If they fold, they probably don't have anything that matches up well with what's on the table. If they bet big, they might be holding on to a pocket pair of aces. Or cards that play well with the flop, and might lead to a flush, a straight, or three of a kind.)
In addition to the mechanics of the game, however, a lot of poker is based on being able to read the players around you. You can bluff, and perhaps win the pot with nothing. Push other players out of the game when you don't really have anything. But bluffing, in my experience, can also make you lose big. That is, if the other player has a good enough hand to stay in the game they'll probably keep playing regardless of how big you bluff...and you're single ace is just not going to win the pot.
Actually, when you're going head to head with someone there's a lot of quick games where each side knows their cards are bad (or good) and one side quickly folds. Then you just slowly lose the money you have to put in the pot (with two people, you're always the small blind or the big blind, so you're going to keep losing money if you keep folding). Then you either have to get really good cards or bluff. So in those situations you can recoup your losses by bluffing, but if the other player has a worthwhile hand you can also lose big. In my little bit of experience each round goes pretty quick until either both sides have good hands and commit to bidding (and one side doesn't have as good a hand as they think), or one side tries to bluff the other out and loses. Otherwise whoever has the largest number of chips can probably outlast the other just by refusing to get sucked in unless their cards are great.
Like I keep saying, go find a real expert if you want a better discussion.
I brought this up, though, because there are some similarities to foreign policy. There's some information only you know, there's some information everyone knows, and there's some information the other side has that you don't. You're reputation and the signals you send can make a difference. You might be able to bluff and get away with it. Or you bluff, and they call your bluff, and you lose.
Bluffing...
Sometimes it's worth bluffing and losing, just so the other side is aware that you sometimes bluff. That's more if you want to sucker them in with a good hand, make them think you're bluffing when you're not. And sometimes you also want to show that you've got the cards to back your actions up, so that they know it's not always a bluff. That might make them back down in the future when you really don't have anything.
This is tied to two things. First, Vietnam. You could say that Vietnam was a situation where someone called our bluff. That is, Vietnam wasn't an existential threat. The American people stopped supporting it as the body count added up and didn't really see any reason to keep fighting for something that ultimately wasn't really a threat to us. But losing in Vietnam meant more people questioned whether we really have as good a hand as we sometimes imply. That did cause problems for us, because more people are likely to take the risk of calling our bluff, assuming it's a bluff. This is part of the problem we have in Syria. If we escalate our engagement there, are we really committed to it? Or, if the body count adds up and we get tied up there for a decade or more, will our people eventually get tired of it and call for us to leave? (Iraq adds to that analysis, since everyone and their mother saw that the American people were tired of it after five years of fighting.) I would say that Vietnam was not an existential threat, and that it doesn't necessarily mean we're weak when it's important...but our government is still responsive to the will of the people and what we consider 'important' is not necessarily what our leadership claims it is.
Second, Syria and Russia today. Russia is sending signals that they are very committed to keeping Assad in power. Is it a bluff? Can and will they back it up? Do we have the commitment and resources to call that bluff, if it's a bluff in the first place? Or do are they holding a pocket pair of aces, and will we wind up folding as soon as they reveal their hand? Or do they have a pocket pair of aces, but the flop was all clubs and we've got a pocket pair of clubs? In which case we'll have a showdown, but ultimately come out on top since our hand is better.
Does that make your head hurt?
What I wanted to get to, with all of that, is that some of our strategy is going to depend on how well we all are reading each other. How well we know the cards we have, what educated guesses we can make about the cards the other side is holding, our estimates of whether the other side has a good hand or not, and whether we in turn decide to play, fold, or bluff. It's not as straightforward as analyzing who has how strong of a military, because it depends as much on human psychology as it does on the actual cards in play.
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