Sarah Paine

expert in that part of the world, but I think this frozen conflict veto player works, that there are these veto players who are vetoing peace very easily.

All you have to do is send a certain number of package bombs and peace is not gonna happen.

So,

Cutthroat billiards, what can you take away from all this?

Well, common enemies cannot be conjured.

So check out the alignments of who these common enemies are before you leave the parking lot.

and figure it out for all possible players who might want to crash the party.

What's their primary objective?

Who's their primary adversary?

What primary theater are they truly interested in?

And then you've got your hunches on how you think this is, and then you should reassess early and often to see if your assumptions are correct.

And don't worry about changing your mind.

Some people get really hung up about being wrong.

Don't worry.

reassessing is a sign of strength.

It's like, I got more information, I've changed my mind.

Good thing.

Don't double down on bad information.

And then if you're looking into areas of the world that are ethnically diverse, where people have been at odds for a long time,

Expect veto players and real difficulty in settling that matter out.