Is playing Backgammon is like playing a war game?

No one can compare war to a board game; the idea that a clash which involves the murder of blameless people on both sides of the partition is something that cannot be considered as anything other than foolish. Yet, in the very basics of war the strategy that is used to crush one’s opponent could have come from a board game...

Chess uses the method of moving piece by piece to a better position before it finally takes out the other side, backgammon uses much of the same logical thought process, but backgammon has more of the fatalistic feature of war associated with it, the element of chance, the possibility of a bad roll, could be deemed to be the same as a mistake on the battlefield, which when played out on the larger battlefield map illustrates the fragility of such a plan. The Generals move their pieces or soldiers as giant checkers on a battlefield of possibility and opportunity.

It is the same with backgammon as piece by piece is moved or respond to attacked or a blockade it buy putting defend. So the basic foundations of the clash begin to take shape. You can start see the similarities. Movement attack, and retreat to safer ground, move again, attack, place a checker in a better position ready for another charge or a strategic higher ground move, before attacking and bearing off. Is it not the same with war, only with different rules?

Of course the big difference is the dice, when you cant tell precisely what is going to happen next until the action occurs, in many ways this is another element of war- and you see it usually at the forefront of any conflict; but, eventually it gives way to the action- diplomacy; the dice setting the tone for the battle, almost the same way that the politicians and diplomats do.

Their objective is to get you into the best bargaining position as a winner or a loser. There is no stalemate in this game. This is a fight until the end. Just like backgammon.