With no good option on Afghanistan available, it’s clear President Obama last night took the one he considered least bad–and by least bad, we mean the most likely to avoid the Worst Case Scenario. In the president’s case, that would be the “I told you so” scenario, the one that would become possible if America were to withdraw from Afghanistan and the Taliban and al-Qaeda were to return and restore the status quo of the year 2000.
Ask any behavioral economist, and he or she will tell you that the idea of rational decision-making is largely a myth, and that we are all highly susceptible to the influence of emotion when we try to analyze things. And one of the things that fires up our emotions most disproportionately is fear of loss. We will do a lot of things, including foregoing a lot of potential gains, in order to avoid a loss. And of all the losses possible here, none, including blood and treasure, would be more painful to the president, and to the country, than discovering in 2010 that we had walked away from the gains we won on the battlefield in 2001 and 2002.
No doubt that feeling is complicated by another tendency behavioral economists have 
recognized, our tendency to overvalue what we already possess. In his book Predictibly Irrational, Dan Ariely discusses a clever experiment conducted at Duke University, where students wait in long lines every year, often for days, for the right to buy the scarce tickets available for basketball games. One year after the allocation, Ariely called students who had waited in line but who had not obtained tickets, and asked them how much they’d be willing to pay to buy one. The average offer was $170. He then called students who had won the tickets, and asked at what price they’d sell. The average asking price was $2400.
Clearly our tendency to overvalue influences our willingness to risk. But one of the things we should ask ourselves in what would happen if we left and the Taliban returned. I don’t think airplanes would suddenly start flying into buildings. There are a lot of things America could do to protect itslef, including more police work and tighter security and even going back and overthrowing the regime again. Maybe repeating as necessary would be cheaper than staying and holding.
Obama has given himself until July 2011 to figure out a better answer–or a better question. On one of the talk shows this morning, one of the analysts said that there are 300 members of al-Qaeda in Afgahnistan. We are going after these guys with 35,000 additional troops. No doubt you can kill a lot of flies with a howitzer, but maybe it’s not the most effective or efficient method. We are still wrestling with the question we began dealing with under President Clinton: will we be safer if we treat al-Qaeda like an army that has to be confronted in a war, or a criminal organization, like the Mafia, that has to be fought with vigorous international police work? Or some creative combo?
On trueslant.com, Scott Yates commented: “I’ll have to check out Ariely’s book. Another great one along those lines is How We Decide, by Jonah Lehrer. (I don’t know if he is related to the retired News Hour Lehrer.)
His book illustrates how powerful the sense of loss is because of brain wiring. The threat of loss has an immediate influence on way more areas in the brain, and can over-ride any other brain function at the time. It probably goes back to the need to not lose, for instance, some food.
Great post!”
On trueslant.com, Ken SMith commented: “I agree. There is no good option. How do we get out and save as much face as possible? I laughed when the Russians were mired there. It ain’t no different now. My friend says it’s futile. I say it is feudal. Obama has been disappointing and last night only emphasized it. He gives great speech. I’m in the choir. But nothing gets done.”