Ghost of a flea

Europa Universalis III has taught me a few hard lessons in geopolitical goals and logistics, too.

In one game I was fighting a massive war in British India. Emptied out most of the European garrisons and Middle Eastern ones too. Ferried thousands of troops from Britain to the Ottoman-owned Sinai peninsula, then another transport fleet would pick them up on the opposite side and ferry the reinforcements to Bombay. Much faster than sending everyone down to St Helena and then around the Cape of Good Hope.

Then the Ottomans went and invaded some tiny little Med country I was allied with (probably Knights of Rhodes). Well, I didn't have enough troops on hand to beat the piss out of both the Ottomans and the last few independent Indian pricipalities. So I sacrificed resource-poor Rhodes and turned a blind eye to the Ottoman invasion in order to subdue rather more richly-endowed India. After India, Afghanistan and Burma were firmly under British rule I decided to secure the Suez route by taking Sinai from the Ottomans, and liberating Rhodes.

Focus on the strategic goal first, then you can come back and deal out punishment to the sideshow troublemakers later. In our current situation I would tend to see Iraq and Afstan as the strategic goals, and Georgia as the sideshow. That said you can't sacrifice too many sideshows or your other, bigger allies (i.e. NATO) will start to wonder what their alliance is worth.

Spengler is right about one thing: American politicians are, on the whole, a bunch of dumbasses and loons.

This is because, in the American system, it is still possible to get rich in the private sector. There is no need to go into politics to achieve a decent living, and sane people aren't willing to go through the "election" process anyway.

One of the human drives is toward power, being able to make others do what you want. Like every other drive it is distributed unevenly, with some not caring at all, most gratified by achieving it but not willing to go to extraordinary lengths, and some ready, willing, and able to do anything necessary to achieve it. The American political process weeds all but the latter group out very early, leaving only the "fire in the belly" bunch. Unfortunately if there is any correlation between fire in the belly and ability to do the job, it would appear from outside that the coefficient is small, and possibly negative.

Regards,
Ric