George Friedman’s latest policy analysis examines the apparent contradiction of America’s continued rise over the past 60 years despite repeated military stalemates. From Korea to Cuba to Vietnam to Iran to Iraq, the US has been consumed in maneuvers that courted disaster and brought no decisive V-E or V-J Day victory. This same 60 year period, however, also saw conventional measures of American power continue to rise. On the surface of things, something doesn’t match up here.

Friedman introduces the military concept of a spoiling attack to explain this apparent contradiction. Such an attack seeks not to defeat the enemy but to disrupt enemy offensives. As Friedman puts it, “The success of the spoiling attack is not measured in term of enemy capitulation, but the degree to which it has forestalled successful enemy operations.” For one engaged in the spoiling attack itself, it can certainly feel as if one’s efforts are being wasted. It is only by looking at the broader context for the attack that one can see its value.

I’ve gradually learned this lesson in go. Novice players try to win everywhere at once. They want to win every fight without losing a single stone while also gaining influence over the entire board. They avoid fights that they can’t see winning, making it relatively easy to hem in their territory. One of my first teachers used an old proverb - “they’re just stones” - to encourage me to fight more. If you fight, even if you lose, you ought be able to force your opponent to give up influence elsewhere in order to win the fight. If you don’t fight, then you forfeit the initiative to your opponent and allow him to continue dictating the game’s flow. Even fighting a losing battle gives you an opportunity to make ko, allowing you to take the initiative in another theater of operations. Or, a losing battle could give you a ko threat, which could be used at a later date to win a ko fight elsewhere. Often, simply finding a way to make seki (a stalemate) can decide a game since it denies that region to either player, allowing strength in other areas to carry the day.

Thus, Friedman argues that American spoiling attacks of the past 60 years have successfully frustrated the strategic priorities of their primary enemies, allowing other dynamics (such as the vitality of the American economic or the structural weakness of the Soviet state) to carry the day. Whether the logic behind these spoiling attacks was intentional or the product of some strategic invisible hand is unclear, but that’s a separate issue.